While the California Republican Party is busy defending tax breaks for yacht owners, Democrats are busy working to decrease barriers to voting and increase participation in democracy. The California Democratic Party Platform even talks about increasing participation:
To promote honest leadership and open government, California Democrats will: [...]
Increase voter participation by advocating for extended voting hours and/or days, scheduling elections on weekends, or by declaring Election Day a holiday
While I agree that would be great, the current perspective of the CDP Platform is to seek increases in the percentage of participation among registered voters. Yet there is even greater potential to increase voter participation by reforming barriers to voter registration. This is the premise behind recent national legislation by Democrats in Congress and a bill by Assemblyman Curren Price for California.
These are two pieces of legislation that deserve to be followed closely, which means you'll probably need to follow on the blogs as so far both reforms have been largely ignored by traditional media.
A couple of weeks ago, I wondered out loud whether we would get a chance to see where California legislators stand on the Bush's Iraq escalation. The following press release just hit my inbox:
Assemblyman Mark Leno (D-San Francisco), who authored the first anti-Iraq war resolution in the country as a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in October of 2002, announced that he would author a resolution in the State Assembly that would support efforts at the Congressional level to hold the President accountable for the failed Iraq war policy and oppose his plan to send more troops into the war.
The release says a, "strong majority of Assembly Democrats" will be co-authoring the resolution. It will be good to see where Republicans stand, are they with Bush and Schwarzenegger or with the vast majority of Californians?
George Bush and Arnold Schwarzenegger look ridiculous supporting the "McCain Doctrine" escalation of the Iraq war. California Democrats have a huge opportunity to do the right thing (supported by the vast majority) and stand up against the Escalation of the war in Iraq that has already cost the lives of more than 300 Californians and is on track to cost Californians more than a half a trillion dollars.
Progressive States is working with MoveOn to introduce Resolutions against the surge escalation in a 50 State Strategy manner. As of yet, I'm told that it has yet to be introduced in California. Who is going to step up and lead on this no-brainer and where do your legislators stand? You can contact your legislators and when they step up, all they need to do is cut and paste the draft resolution that is after the flip:
