Democracy: August 2006 Archives

Assemblymember Goldberg has provided us with another day and another look at the pressures and compression of the last days of a legislative session. This is the real inside scoop that we hope will give you a better picture of how politics really operate.
Note that her references to the Koretz firearm bill is one of the six bills that Speak Out California has been following and identified as key measures for progressives to watch in the waning days of the legislative year. Not many firearms bills get through these days, as the NRA has nestled nicely in the OVal Office and kept this aspect of public safety in the freezer. We'll follow this as well in the weeks ahead if and when it gets to the Governor's desk.
Meanwhile, here's Jackie's Day Four from the Floor report:

It's 6:40 p.m. on Wednesday night. We've been debating and passing on bills since 10:00 a.m. Most people are taking a dinner break. We all fight on the floor, but both parties eat together in the Members' Lounge, with food being brought in. We all prepay for food and snacks and soft drinks when we arrive in January.

The break began when Assembly Member Koretz mentioned the name of Assembly Member La Suer in his opening speech in presenting his bill for action. Koretz is a liberal Democrat and La Suer is an ex-cop, extremely conservative Republican. Whatever was said, La Suer got into a parliamentary spat with the Speaker Pro Tem,( not to be mistaken for the Speaker....(the "Pro-Tem" usually presides over the Assembly on the dais) and so we left the floor and had dinner.

But that is not what really is going on. We are down to the last bills of the two-year session. The "head-bangers" are the bills mostly left for debate. At the end of session, relations between the Senate and the Assembly are often strained, even among members of the same party. "Head-bangers" are the bills which are controversial, or represent "big" leadership deals. And that's where we are. The Assembly tends to be more conservative than the Senate. I think it is because smaller districts can be more homogenous than the larger Senate district.

In any case, as Senate bills by liberal Democrats come to the Assembly, they get 35-38 votes, and don't pass. They can be reconsidered, but the Senators begin to get worried that their bills will fail, while those same Senate authors vote for the Assembly bills of Democrats who won't support their more liberal Senate bills. So, it is almost 7 p.m., but the Senate has been working on prison issues, and has been voting only on Senate bills back in the Senate for concurrence on Assembly amendments. They are not hearing bills by Assembly Democrats.

So now as Senate bills go up for a vote, some Assembly Democrats are not voting on those bills until they hear that the Senate is working on Assembly bills. And soon, there is gridlock. This is not a Democrat vs. Republican thing. It is a more liberal Democrat vs. more "moderate" (or "business") Democrat thing. The Senate bills that are not getting enough votes in the Assembly range from making possession of less than an ounce of marijuana an infraction instead of a misdemeanor, to a variety of pollution prevention bills, and consumer issues.

The sad part of all of this is that a lot of good bills in both houses may die. And most of them will likely be liberal Democrat bills. In the meantime, I have some bills in the Senate, so I hope that leadership of both houses will work this out.

At the moment we are debating Assemblymember Paul Koretz' AB 352, a bill to require that certain semiautomatic pistol be equipped with microstamping technology, which imprints the make, model and serial number of the pistol into the interior of the firearm so that the information is transferred to each cartridge upon being fired. The Republicans have gone wild. They don't want their guns to be tracked back to them I guess. But the debate is over, and now we've moved on. That bill is "on call." Not enough votes, yet.

The bill that got the heat up again would require the 70 employers in California who employ more than 10,000 people each to pay 6-8 % either in benefits to their employees, or to a fund that would provide it for them. The Republicans said that they just don't know why we (Democrats) hate success so much? ("Why do they hate democracy?") Do these Republican speaking points sound familiar to anyone?
I tried to remind everyone that slavery was cheap and efficient. Finally, the bill passed with only Democrats voting for it. (I insisted that prices could go even lower if the Republicans were willing to reintroduce slavery into the workplace. They do not love me when I say things like that.)

Flash! The "war" between the Democrats in both houses is off, for now! It is 8:50 p.m. They are taking up Assembly bills in the Senate, and we are taking up Senate bills. Hurrah!

The scary thing going on now is the effort of Republicans and some moderate Democrats to bring all of the new tribal compacts back for a vote, again, and again. Now they are putting all of the tribal agreements into one bill and will try to bring it up again. The problem is that these new compacts will give the wealthiest tribes huge new numbers of slot machines, and they get exclusivity to be the only ones with the right to any gaming in large swaths of the state until 2030. Two of the smaller tribes have compacts that include labor agreements with unions. But the big "4" tribes specifically asked Governor Schwarzenegger to reduce labor pressure in their compacts, and because Schwarzenegger is so anti-union himself, he was oh so happy to agree. The Democrats in the Assembly have decided not to pass these compacts this year, but to wait until January 2007, and the new legislative session to take this up. There is no hurry, because the current compacts are not ready to expire for many, many years.

So why would the Governor renegotiate compacts at the end of the session (they were signed by the Governor this week!)? Well, there is an election in November. The Governor wants to paint a picture of being pro-sovereignty of Native Americans in California. But most importantly he wants their vast amounts of money to be in his campaign, and not in the Angelides campaign. So, he is trying to jam the legislature, at the last minute, to do this. In addition, the largest casino tribes want to remove, diminish, or eliminate most of the labor protections in the original compacts negotiated by Gray Davis. They weren't much and have not really been enforced by tribal leaders. We all voted for them, because the Native American tribes were so poor and we felt a need to let them do the gaming any way they wanted.

Now, however, the largest tribes are large corporate-type casino owners. And some Democrats want to pursue labor legislation like we pursue it with other wealthy business interests. There is division among Assembly Democrats, but we all agree that it is too late in the session to fully understand these complicated compacts, and perhaps it is best to do this in the light of day, in January, since the compacts are not expiring and there really is not near deadline to get this done.

The tribal leaders are furious at Assembly Democrats. Senate Democrats voted to ratify these compacts. There are rumors that the Senate campaign funds for November have already been enriched by $ I million. I am sure there was no commitment made to get money for voting for their compacts, but by the Senate Democrats voting first, it means that they will reap rewards while Assembly Democrats have to decide whether or not to vastly expand gambling in California. (Some "conspiracy theorists", and there are always conspiracy theories about everything in the last two or three days of the session, believe that the Senate Democrats want the Assembly Democrats to delay ratification until January, 2007 so that Senate Democrats get the money, but the state does not get a huge increase in gambling, and compacts until 2030 which require almost no labor peace at these multi-millions of dollars casinos.)

It's 12:35 a.m. We've been at this well-over 14 hours. That is another reason so much mischief goes on at the end of two year sessions. We are all exhausted. Thank goodness we will close down until 10:30 a.m. tomorrow. Almost all the bills "on call" have been passed, including some really good "head bangers." A few failed, and perhaps we will reconsider them tomorrow.

Good morning.

Thank you, Jackie..........We look forward to your report on the final day of session and all its contortions, successes and disappointments.

With session rapidly coming to a head---and a close no later than Thursday, August 31st, Assemblymember
Jackie Goldberg is focusing on the way the process of voting works when the "leadership" starts turning the screws on its members. Here she talks about how "Speakerizing" works in action, focusing on AB 1381--- the bill sought by Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa to provide him with control over the LA Unified School District.
It is no secret that the Speaker, Fabian Nunez, is a close friend of the Mayor and wanted this bill to pass. Here's Jackie's view of how the dance was done:

Now, at 3:30 in the afternoon, I am going to try to help you understand the role of Leadership in the Assembly. The Assembly has 80 members, 48 of whom are Democrats. The majority party essentially selects the Speaker of the Assembly, who becomes extremely powerful by virtue of that election.

The Speaker is charged first and foremost with keeping her/his party in the majority. The majority party has all but total control of who will chair each of the committees. Each committee has a majority of members who are from the majority party. The Speaker decides a member's office size and location. The Speaker sets each member's budget for staff, on which committees they will serve, and if they will chair a committee. Through the Majority Leader, always a trusted member of the Speaker's team, the Speaker controls the movement of bills once they are on the floor. The Speaker can remove members of committees for one day if they are not voting on a bill important to the Speaker, and replace them with members who will vote as the Speaker wants. The other close members of the Speaker's team are the chairs of the Appropriations Committee, the Budget Committee, and the Rules Committee.

The Rules Committee decides which and how many committees each bill must pass before coming to the floor for a vote. The Appropriations Committee Chair literally sits down with the Speaker to decide which bills would get out of Appropriations, which should be amended there, and which should be killed. And the Budget Chair works closely with the Speaker on fashioning the deals that allow the various bills to be funded if and when they pass the policy committee. These are powers that make the Speaker almost king-like!

So let's look at how these awesome powers permit the Speaker to get what he wants done. Take for example AB 1381. AB 1381 started out life as a bill by Speaker Nunez that would help set up vegetable gardens at some of the state's elementary schools. Then when Los Angeles Mayor Villaraigosa decided he wanted to "take over" control of the LAUSD public schools he waited until the original language passed the Assembly. Then in the Senate, he did a "gut and amend" and put into the bill the proposal sponsored by the L.A. Mayor.

That bill has now been amended many, many times in the Senate. But it cannot be amended in the Assembly and was never heard in any Assembly committee until today, Thursday. The bill was heard in the Education committee, but no amendments could be taken. By deciding to put the bill's contents in an Assembly bill after it left the Assembly, the Speaker guarantees that he only has to take amendments in the Senate and can better control the bill. It got out of the Assembly Education committee and moved directly to the Assembly floor.

At about 5 p.m. the bill was brought up for a vote on the Assembly floor. Our rules require a waiting period before we vote on items that come out of committee. But the Speaker asked for a vote to take it up today. Procedural votes are almost always along party lines. If our floor leader asks for an "aye" vote on a procedure, we all vote for the procedural motion, even if we are not in favor of the bill.

The vote was taken, and it is "on call." That means it did not get the necessary 41 votes, but the proponents have until the meeting closes to talk to members and try to get them to vote for their bill. Right now the bill has 30 votes and needs 11 more. There were 21 "no" votes, and 28 people decided not to vote either way.

Here is where the Speaker"s power is critical. This bill has been "Speaker-ized." That is a term that means that the Speaker will negotiate with those who have not yet voted for the bill. The negotiation can be promises or it can be penalties. There were 13 Democrats who have not voted on the bill. Now the problem for the Speaker is that 8 of the 13 are not returning to the Assembly next year. So penalties regarding budgets, offices, and committee assignments are not helpful in giving the Speaker any leverage. But five of the "not voting" Democrats are returning next year. That probably means that the Speaker will get some of them to vote for the bill. The Speaker will also speak to Democrats that voted "no", but only one of them is a returning member. And there were no Republican "aye" votes on the bill, so we can expect at least a few of them will be called into the Speaker's office one at a time, and the carrot and the stick will be there too.

And, if the bill fails to pass tonight, it can be brought up again on Reconsideration. In fact it can also be brought up on Thursday as well. So, when a bill is "Speaker-ized" , it almost always gets passed, sooner or later.

This is not good or evil per se. It is in fact how some of the best legislation gets passed. The legislature would never be able to do landmark environmental legislation, or critical consumer protection laws without bills being Speaker-ized. The question is always one of point of view. When reactionaries are in power, as they are in Washington D.C., we can see what this same power can do to harm the nation. The danger is always the same. One must always worry about the immense power of corporate America on our leadership and how its money influences such decisions.

Some say this is a terrible way to run things. It does sometimes result in people voting a different way than they actually believe. But there is a check on the Speaker's power. If the Speaker uses his power to Speaker-ize a bill too often, a vote of the majority of the Democrats could remove him as Speaker. So, it is a way for the Speaker to all but guarantee success of a certain bill. But it must be made clear that Assembly members can say "no", and they do. At lease three returning members are committed to opposing this bill one way or another, or so they say. We shall see.

So, now at 7:30 p.m. the "call" was lifted. From 30 votes, in 10 seconds, the vote went to 42 votes, and the bill passed. Three Democrats who voted "no" went to "aye" and nine Democrats who abstained from voting previously, went to "aye." In the final analysis, two returning members voted "no", as did one new Senator-elect, and two members leaving the Assembly, abstained. Now, several Republicans will add on in private, and the vote will look very good. The Governor will sign it tonight, and there will be a celebration at a Charter school in Los Angeles tomorrow. The celebration invitations went out from the Mayor's office at about 5 p.m. tonight, BEFORE the bill went up for its first vote. Now, that's power.

Thanks again, Jackie, for describing how power and control can influence legislation so significantly.
It is clear that where there is a will, there is a way----even in politics!
Jackie has promised us one more blog, at least, "From the Floor".

Earlier this week, I asked Speak Out California's big supporter, AssemblymemberJackie Goldberg, to share her thoughts and observations with us as the Legislative process unwinds in the frantic last days of session. The following is her direct-from-the-Assembly-floor analysis of the day's activities. It's no wonder we shouldn't be watching how legislation or sausage are made! And as you can see further, the power and influence of lobbyists can be overwhelming, if not simply undemocratic. From the floor on Thursday, August 24, 2006:

It's about noon, and we, in the Assembly, are all in Legislative Session on
the"floor." We have been at it since about 9:30 a.m. There are 101
amendments on 96 bills before us today. Among the amendments there are 18
amendments that begin with the words,"Delete the language in the current
bill" We call such bills "gut and amend bills." There are two ways to do
this process. Both require permission of the Speaker of the Assembly and/or
the permission of the Senate Pro Tem. The first is to revive a bill that
was held in some committee and thus was "killed" earlier in the process.
The other is to introduce a new issue, the need for which occurred in recent
days, long after all the deadlines for introducing new bills had passed.

We have both in the 18 "gut and amends" before us. For the bills that
"died" in other committees, it is just new life. They have mostly been
heard in two to four committees, and for some reason, lost out in the
process. We who vote on those bills, have indeed already heard them, and
are familiar with them. But the second group, the "new" bills, we must
scurry to read and understand. They will get a very brief visit in a
committee, but the kind of scrutiny bills normally get will be missing.

Often, the late amended bills and the "gut and amends" are the result of
deals made among the lobbyists for and against the bill. Sometimes, they
are items slipped in the middle of the night (literally!) and people vote on
them thinking they know what the bill says, but actually it has been
dramatically changed.

Let me give you an example from last year. On the very last day of session,
a bill by Senator Maldonado was on the floor of the Assembly for action.
The bill allocated about $18 million to provide "fresh fruit and vegetables"
to schools for their breakfast programs. We all thought this was great and
it passed the Assembly and Senate with full hearings from the Members. But,
late at night., amidst lots of chaos we got an amendment, amidst literally
70-80 other amendments. The change was to eliminate the work "fresh" and to
substitute the word "nutritious." A deal had been made in the Governor's
office to allow canned fruit, dried fruit, and otherwise processed fruit and
vegetables to be served with the new subsidy. The amendment almost went
unnoticed. But it was caught. Now mind you, this bill was in the
Governor's package of bills designed to reduce obesity in children. But
because those who can goods were powerful supporters of Schwarzenegger, he
allowed his bill to be amended to allow a subsidy for canned fruit in HEAVY
syrup! After much misinformation about how the law would be carried out, it
was amended again. This time they added words that would say the "priority"
would be for "fresh fruits and vegetables." The bill passed.

One of today's proposed "gut and amends" is SB 1696 by Senator Joe Dunn (D).
The existing bill was designed to prohibit the state's National Guard from
engaging in domestic surveillance. That bill, if the amendment passes will
die. Instead, SB 1696 will become a labor bill designed to upgrade the pay
of employees of the Los Angeles County Superior Court. Now, I support the
new bill, but I am disappointed that we are losing Senator Dunn's original
bill to do it.

Now, stay tuned, because it is possible that Sen. Dunn's National Guard bill
will reappear at a different "gut and amend."

Jackie has indicated she might continue this "series" during the final week of session, so long as the hijinks continue to make this an interesting and insightful discussion.

With the end of session only eight days away, and a major gubernatorial election coming this November, the legislature is frantically trying to push through key legislation that will allow it to claim some victories and progress going into the election season. Of course, so is the Governor as he tries to re-establish his damaged credentials as anything but a right-wing movie-star-turned-politician. Schwarzenegger and his Bush advisors are desperate to have some constructive accomplishments that appeal to California's average voter. So he's got to do more than demonstrate he's Big Businesses lackey and sign into law some legislation that actually does something for the average Californian.

The Democratic leadership is, of course, well aware that this is the year for major reform efforts to force Schwarzenegger to move out of his Right-wing stupor and become the governor he promised he would be. To force his hand, Democrats and Progressives have targeted important legislation like increasing the minimum wage and making healthcare available for all Californians. If we can't get this key legislation signed into law this year, and if Schwarzenegger gets re-elected, there is no way he is going to sign legislation creating these important reforms during his next four year term

All the political experts agree that Schwarzenegger needs to appeal to the center to get re-elected. Of course, should he be re-elected, we can expect another George Bush-like performance after he was handed his second term--- he won't and doesn't have to give a damn about the will of the people or doing anything but handing out favors to his supporters and mugging for the camera---something we know our Governor does only too well. Bottom line: It's now or never for important efforts to help working people and to make California a leader in providing health care to its people.

Now that a federal court has stated what most Americans have known for years---that Big Tobacco companies are guilty of conspiracy and lying to the public about the risks of smoking so they can continue to generate high profits, it's time to stop the obvious and unabashed flow of this dirty money into campaigns of those seeking public office or running initiative campaigns.

Thursday's ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Gladys Kessler puts the final nail in Dirty Tobacco's coffin. It is an industry that is the pinnacle of corruption and promotes a product that is a known insidious killer. Although her ruling offered little in the way of sanctions that Big Tobacco deserved (she cited a recent Court Of Appeals case precluding her from imposing meaningful financial penalties), she didn't mince any words in issuing her 1653 page opinion.

What she did say, in no uncertain terms, is that over the course of 50 years, Big Tobacco has "lied, misrepresented, and deceived the American public" about the health impacts of smoking and second-hand smoke. In addition, she found that the major tobacco companies "suppressed research, destroyed documents, manipulated the use of nicotine so as to increase and perpetuate addiction, and distorted the truth about low-tar and light cigarettes so as to discourage smokers from quitting."