The Art Of The Deal

7 Responses to The Art Of The Deal

1. rl crabb says:

   July 23, 2017 at 8:51 am

   St. Jerry even got a handful of Republicans to seal the deal, much to the dismay of the GOP “resistance.” https://spectator.org/kinder-gentler-gop-embraces-cap-and-trade/

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   • Chris Peterson says:

     July 24, 2017 at 5:30 am

     The American Spectator, like most politically challenged sites, hates the concept of cooperation for the greater good. And I’m surprised you found it, seeing as how they changed their name 40 years ago to discourage free thinkers from participating, dropping the pre-text of “The Alternative.” Or, as they put it:
     “in order to discourage unsolicited manuscripts from florists, beauticians, and other creative types, the club reverted to the magazine’s original name.”

     And almost comically, they proclaim in the very next sentence:
     “Published remarkably without regard to gender, lifestyle, race, color, creed, physical handicap, or national origin.” (As long as you’re not “creative.”)

     Where do you find such drivel?

     And I watched some of Brown’s testimony before the committee; “This isn’t for me, I’ll be dead and gone” is a long way, morally and politically, from, “We’re all gonna’ die.”

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     • rl crabb says:

       July 24, 2017 at 6:53 am

       Not word for word, but he implies that without California’s relatively small contribution, your kids and grandkids will suffer. Oh, I know… it’s the symbolism of our leadership in the climate wars that has been vacated by the neanderthals in Washington.

       It’s nice of us to subsidize Tesla to the tune of $3,000,000,000 while our cities and counties are being overwhelmed with the homeless, mentally ill and criminals. I don’t know if you read The Union, but it’s worse than I’ve ever seen it in our lifetime.

       The Governor and Legislators assure us they are now working on our lack of housing for those unfortunates who are being pushed out of the cities. Another round of subsidies and incentives for a problem that they themselves created.

       I’m for all of these improvements, and I hope the tech bubble that sustains them never pops. Or if it does, hopefully I’ll be with long gone with Jerry.

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       • rl crabb says:

         July 24, 2017 at 7:07 am

         NIMBYism does account for some of the housing dilemma, but state mandates have added thousands of $$$ to the cost of building a home… https://calmatters.org/articles/will-california-politicians-really-address-housing-crisis-settle-tokenism/

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         • Chris Peterson says:

           July 24, 2017 at 12:20 pm

           I’m thinking that the author of that article can be accused of being a bit over-dramatic, if not outright bending facts to compare apples to bananas. In one paragraph he states:
           “Between 2003 and 2014, California built just 47 percent of what it needed, according to state housing officials, with construction dipping at one point during the Great Recession to a sixth of pre-recession levels. Although the economy has fully recovered, homebuilding has increased to just half of its pre-recession high.”

           Virtually EVERY facet of our economy was running at one sixth of the norm; hence the term “Great Recession.” And “Although the economy has fully recovered”? For who? Certainly not the people who so desperately need housing. The last sentence implies that we should return to the runaway housing market that got us into the mess in the first place. Pretty sad logic he’s using there.

           No, the CA legislature isn’t going to fix this; not by a long shot. what we are suffering through today is not some new anomaly; it’s a continuation of the failed “trickle down” economics that got us here in the first place; where unions are quashed for the enrichment of big business, and small. The new business model is one that demands ever smaller payment for labor, which is no longer considered even near equal to capital.

           So, build all the homes you want; the people who need them simply can’t afford them without pulling me and you down into the depths of mediocrity by taxing us to supplement their income, as we already do to feed the average Walmart worker.

           No thanks.
       • Steve Frisch says:

         July 24, 2017 at 11:23 am

         With all due respect it is not just a small contribution.

         First, if every entity things of their 1% as a small contribution nothing ever gets done about things that affect the commons, and air quality and climate is a commons.

         But more important reducing GHG emissions has the ancillary effect of reducing criteria air pollutants like PM emissions, ozone and NOX, which all have serious and very costly health effects.

         Why is it when we calculate the cost of things we only count what it is going to cost today—as in how much more will I pay for gas—and never what something is going to cost tomorrow, like how much does every asthma case (which 1 in 7 California children have or have the precursors of) every time they go to the emergency room (on average $6100 per visit) with more than 50% of them using public resources?

         The cost of adapting to climate change as opposed to the costs to mitigate are going to be very high and will disproportionately effect low income people.

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2. Steve Frisch says:

   July 24, 2017 at 6:40 am

   I just see this as a political caricature…exaggerating a characteristic in order to make a point…and as such, chuckled.

   I was there to watch Brown testify to the Senate EQ committee. It was a piece of political mastery I have rarely seen. Not only was the fact that a Governor showed up for the committee hearing rare…he stayed for the entire more than 3 hours committee hearing, and engaged in debate with the committee members, respectfully, and with great mastery of the issues and the intricacy of the bills being heard.

   There is a moment in every committee hearing where the public testimony is heard. Usually the committee members use that time to catch up on e-mail, talk to aides, read the background documents on the next item on their agenda, or go to the restroom, which I always find somewhat contemptuous. In this case almost 100 people (myself included) lined up to testify in favor of the bill along with about 4 in opposition. Brown never took his eyes or his attention away from the public. Every person who stepped to that microphone was acknowledged in some way, with a nod, a smile, a shift in body language, or in many cases a direct question from the Governor. He took copious notes, and later in the process I saw at least three items brought forward by the public directly addressed in amendments to the bills.

   There were also several items I heard in the halls and from staff members and Republican legislators while doing meetings in the week before the vote that made their way into the bills….including expanding the tax credit program to cover agricultural equipment and expanding the purposes of the use of the fund to make more types of renewable energy eligible.

   This is how Democracy is supposed to work. Hopefully national parties will take note…this is indeed how it is done.

   At the end of the day the absolutists are never happy….we see them all the time, the people who say you must adopt 100% of my view or this is a bad thing…and I agree with Bob that they come from both sides of the aisle and in every ideological shape and form.
   I have heard from them all week….it could have been perfect.

   These bills passed because for one brief moment the good we can get prevailed over the fear. In a democracy compromise is the coin of the realm. We really need to get back to understanding that democratic processes are by design about incremental changes being consistently advanced to achieve a greater goal.

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