How to Vote: November 2018

I’ve been meaning to write this for weeks. In some ways, it is hard to get too excited about, however. I can go through the propositions in July and tell you which good ones that are polling well will go down in flames because all the money spent on them.

Prop 10

This year, the primary example of this in Proposition 10.

The interesting thing about 10 is that it didn’t actually need much spending to be killed. The truth is that our “liberal” Californians are very much like our Silicon Valley plutocrats: they are all for liberal causes as long as it doesn’t require even the smallest personal sacrifice.

And the amazing thing is that Prop 10 doesn’t even do much. All it does is allow local governments to enact rent control if they want to. Currently, local governments are greatly limited regarding how much they can do to keep rents low.

Now, on one level, I’m not that keen on local control. As we have seen over and over, it is usually local governments that are most corrupt and evil. So I always had a small reservation about Prop 10. But I find it annoying that all the “local government is best” conservatives out there are voting against it. Remember: it doesn’t enact rent control; it only makes it available.

Other Stuff

Some propositions each year confuse me greatly. That was the case with Proposition 12. It sets how large a farm animal’s pen must be. I am voting for it. But both sides of 12 claim to be the real defenders of animals. And listening to them go back and forth makes my head spin.

One really good thing this year is that Kevin de Leon is running for US Senator against Dianne Feinstein. I know that she is going to win (although that itself is an indictment of our political system). But it is nice to have someone else to vote for. Feinstein’s sell-by date is about a decade old.

Votes

I am afraid this list is not very interesting. This is how a hard-core Democrat would vote. But that should surprise no one.

  • Prop 1: yes
  • Prop 2: yes
  • Prop 3: yes
  • Prop 4: yes
  • Prop 5: no
  • Prop 6: no
  • Prop 7: yes
  • Prop 8: yes
  • Prop 10: yes
  • Prop 11: no
  • Prop 12: yes
  • US Senate: Kevin de Leon
  • Representative (5): Mike Thompson
  • Governor: Gavin Newson
  • Lieutenant Governor: Ed Hernandez
  • Secretary of State: Alex Padilla
  • Controller: Betty Yee
  • Treasurer: Fiona Ma
  • Attorney General: Xavier Becerra
  • Insurance Commissioner: Ricardo Lara
  • Superintendent of Public Instruction: Tony Thurmond

But just make sure you vote! Also: it’s important that Tony Thurmond win because that means Marshall Tuck will lose.

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About Frank Moraes

Frank Moraes is a freelance writer and editor online and in print. He is educated as a scientist with a PhD in Atmospheric Physics. He has worked in climate science, remote sensing, throughout the computer industry, and as a college physics instructor. Find out more at About Frank Moraes.

4 thoughts on “How to Vote: November 2018

  1. If I were a betting man, I’d bank heavy cash on “we’re all doomed,” but elections still matter, immensely. Even if we’re all doomed, one would rather the suffering be slower.

    • I agree with both points. On the latter point, I hope that the US doesn’t decline too fast because its military is too powerful. When I heard Macron say that Europe needs to build up its military, I was very heartened. The US is already a pernicious force in the world. (Americans are shockingly ignorant of the fact that the US is the most hated country in the world.) It’s frightening. As the Republican Party gets more and more fascistic, it doesn’t lose voters. There is currently a larger percentage of proto-fascists in the US than there were fascists in 1933 Germany.

  2. Eat a bag of bats, Scott Walker! He’s contesting the election results; of course he is.

    The great thing about rooting against some repugnant asshat like Walker to lose is, that guy’ll be fine. He’ll just become a lobbyist. So you’re not rooting for someone to be unemployed & poor. They’ll actually get a pay raise — that’s entirely why they passed the laws they did.

    But f**k that guy. He went after teachers. Dude, that’s a jerk move.

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