Election 2008: October 2008 Archives

In a last minute boost to the Measure A campaign, Attorney General Jerry Brown is supporting the $36 a year parcel tax proposal on next Tuesday's ballot.
Brown joins Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Police Chieff Bill Bratton in backing the measure, that was developed by Councilwoman Janice Hahn to develop a $30 million a year funding stream to pay for gang intervention and prevention programs.

With registration closing, Secretary of State Debra Bowen reportedf Friday more than 1 million new voters signed up for next Tuesday's election since Sept. 5.
That means there are 17.3 million Californians who have registered to take part in the election.
"It's great to see so many Californians taking an active role in their democracy," Bowen said.
"Voter interest in this historic election is enormous and I expect to see a record number of Californians cast ballots on Tuesday. Thanks to everyone - including community groups, elections workers, campaigns, schools, and businesses - who helped register so many new California voters."
The state now has 17,304,091 million registered voters - almost 747,000 more than it had at this time before the general election four years ago.
The previous voter registration record in California was 16.6 million in February 2005.
The breakdwon is heavily in favor of Democrats, who account for 43 percent of all voters. Republicans make up 34.7 percent. The remaining voters are decline to state, Amercan Independent, Green, Peace and Freedom and Libertarian.

A high-speed bullet train connecting Northern and Southern California - $9.95billion. Tony Castro in the Daily News.

Rebates to companies and consumers to buy hybrid vehicles - $5billion.

Help for children's hospitals - $1billion.

These price tags sounded reasonable in May, when the nation's economy was more stable and the Dow stood at a lofty 13,000. Now, not so much.

Getting California voters to approve new taxes for a bunch of bonds on Tuesday's ballot appears to be a tall order, especially with Thursday's news that the gross domestic product fell at an annual rate of 0.3 percent during the third quarter. One more negative quarter and the U.S. economy will officially enter a recession.

Absentee balloting, which has played a pivotal role in California politics, is causing headaches again, even before the polls close in Tuesday's historic election. Tony Castro in the Daily News.

A crush of last-minute absentee ballot requests have swamped county elections officials, who warned voters to either return voted ballots today or deliver them to polling places on Election Day if they want their votes to count.

As clerks were trying to send out 13,000 last-minute vote-by- mail requests Thursday, the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder's Office in Norwalk was also still attempting to process 55,000 remaining voter registrations Thursday.

While the Los Angeles Unified School District has built hundreds of new schools in the past decade, it is now seeking an additional $7 billion for older schools that remain in need of repair and remodeling. George B. Sanchez in the Daily News.

Along with funds for upgrades and new technology, Measure Q would set aside $450 million for local charter schools.

Critics acknowledge a need to repair older buildings, but say the measure is expensive at a time of national economic turmoil, and when district enrollment is dropping. Charter schools also criticize the measure, saying they would rather have more freedom to build their own schools.

The Los Angeles labor movement said Thursday it will launch a four-day marathon on behalf of Sen. Barack Obama and their other candidates leading up to next Tuesday's election.
Officials with the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO, said they will call 500,000 union members in battle ground states.
The operation will run from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.each day until the close of polls on Tuesday.
Since September, the unions have targeted their members in Colorado, Nevada, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Washington.

Mixing politics and business, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is in Washington, D.C., today to meet with federal transportation officials before heading out for a weekend of campaigning on behalf of Sen. Barack Obama.
Villaraigosa is meeting with Transportation Secretary Mary Peters to discuss loans the Metropolitan Transportation Authority has recieved from AIG.
AIG has loaned the MTA $1 billion as part of a sales-leaseback of buses.
On Friday, Villaraigosa turns into a campaigner, with a trip to New Mexico. On Saturday, he is off to Colorado, returning to Los Angeles on Sunday.
Villraigosa, earlier, campaigned in Nevada for Obama _ much as he did during the primary election for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton..

Thousands of people have descended on the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder's Office over the past several days to cast their ballots early, braving the heat and long lines to avoid potential Election Day foul-ups and ensure that their vote counts in Tuesday's historic election. Rachel Uranga in the Daily News.

Hundreds of voters formed a line that snaked around the office Wednesday in a scene mirrored in Florida, Georgia and other states whose residents anticipate chaos as record numbers of voters head to the polls next week.

Excited over the heated presidential election, some Los Angeles County voters came prepared for the lines and reclined in foldout chairs Wednesday as they discussed the future and a country eager to choose a new president.

all it an election-year twist of fate: Even as Barack Obama's historic candidacy is expected to draw a record number of Latinos and African-Americans to the polls, those same voters could help pass the statewide measures that oppose gay marriage and abortions for minors. Tony Castro in the Daily News.

Supporters of those two measures are making a strong pitch to Latino voters - especially immigrants who have become voting citizens - many of them Roman Catholics who oppose abortion and gay marriage.

The campaign for Proposition 8, which would ban gay marriage, has also targeted African-American voters, who some experts say traditionally have been religiously and culturally opposed to gay marriage.

Admit it. Election withdrawal is starting to set in.
But, wait. Just when you think it's all over but the voting, third and fourth party candidates Bob Barr and Ralph Nader come to the rescue.
The two, who have been unable to get any attention beyond their own efforts on the internet, will debae on Thursday in Cleveland.
. The topic is on the economy and will be the first debate between the two.
This will be the first professionally organized debate to include both Bob Barr and Ralph Nader.

After a harmonizing chorus of hallelujah hymns closed Mass on a recent Sunday at St. Charles Borromeo Church, a volunteer got up and carefully made her way to the altar. Justino Aguila in the Daily News.

Standing at the microphone, she urged the 500 parishioners to vote Yes on Proposition 8, which would change the state constitution to ban gay marriage.

"Let's not waste this opportunity," she said, shortly before other church members distributed fliers at the exits supporting the proposition. "It's a commitment to God."

California is set to break voter registration records in an election that could result in the nation's first African American president or first woman vice president. Sacramento Bee.

The deadline for reporting pre-election registration is Friday, but preliminary counts already exceed 17 million - higher than the state's previous best of 16.6 million, Nicole Winger, spokeswoman for the secretary of state, said Tuesday.

The soaring rolls are good news for Democrats, who held a lead of nearly 12 percentage points over Republicans in statewide voter registration through Sept. 5, the most recent figures available

After getting bumped from two earlier ballots, bullet-train measure Proposition 1A finally goes before voters who will decide whether to back a nearly $10 billion bond to begin plans for an electrical, high-speed rail whisking passengers between Los Angeles and San Francisco. Sue Doyle in the Daily News.

The measure would give $9.95 billion to the California High Speed Rail Authority for planning, design and initial construction of a $40 billion, 800-mile passenger train from Union Station in Los Angeles to San Francisco. Future connections are planned for Anaheim, Sacramento and San Diego, but do not include a link with Los Angeles International Airport.

But the 220-mph bullet train needs at least $10 billion in federal money - and masses of private investment - before it starts zipping Californians up and down the state and thinning traffic on the highways.

The Los Aneles Police Protective League is all over this November's ballot, taking on athird issue before voters.
It already has come out agaisntg Proposition 5, the mesure expanding drug diversion programs, and on behalf of state Sen Mark Ridley-Thomas, D-Los Angeles, for county supervisors.
On Monday, it was announced they are backing the Proposition 6 proposal advancd by state Sen. George Runner, R-Palmdale, with a radio commercial.
"Californians are fed up with gangs," said League President tim Sands. "Proposition 6, also known as The Safe Neighborhoods Act, is a comprehensive anti-gang and crime reduction measure that will bring more cops and increased safety to California communities and greater efficiency and accountability to public safety programs and agencies that spend taxpayer money
"The LAPPL urges voters to support the Safe Neighborhoods Act just like they supported Three Strikes and other critical law enforcement reforms. The safety of our communities is critical to all of us," added Sands.
In backing the mesure, the union is going against the Los Angeles City Council, which voted to oppose the measure.

In a tiny house on wheels, Geri Ulrey is trying to capture democracy in action. Connie Llanos in the Daily News.

Inside the house in a compact living room stocked with a plush suede chair, Ulrey, a professor of cinema and television arts at California State University, Northridge, is taking video confessionals from students.

They pour out their thoughts to a camera on everything from the economy and health care to education. Ulrey is streaming the videos on the Web and after Election Day will send them to the next president of the United States.

For Michael Spitzer-Rubenstein, it's the campaign of Sen. Barack Obama that is driving him to the polls.Daily News.

"This is my first election and I couldn't be more excited," said Spitzer-Rubenstein, 18, who also made calls for the Obama campaign in Los Angeles.

But, other than a couple of other items, he said he was unsure how to vote on all the ballot propositions.

"I know about (Proposition) 8, but a lot of the other ones are pretty confusing," he said. "There's no way anyone can really know about some of the issues that are on the ballot."

With 32 years in the solar business, Gary Gerber should be one of the biggest fans of an initiative to increase California's production of renewable energy.AP in the Daily News.

But he and hundreds of other small business owners say an alternative energy initiative on the November ballot could force them out of business at a time California is struggling to boost its production of clean power.

Proposition 7, one of two alternative energy ballot measures, would require California utilities to generate half their electricity from windmills, solar systems, geothermal resources and other renewable sources by 2025.

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who worked Nevada for Sen. Hillary Clinton during the primary election, is returning there on Sunday to work on behalf of Sen. Barack Obama.
The mayor is scheduled to appear at a vareity of events kicking off get out the vote ralles, from unions, to small businesses to Latinos. in addition, he will be doing a number of media appearances, including a radio call-in show.l

The Engineers and Architects Association, which represents about 10,000 workers, is escalating its battle with Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and has come out against Measure R, the half-cent sales tax measure for transportation programs.
The union, which staged a walkout last year in a dispute with the mayor, is paying for radio commercials and a robocall to voters urging them to oppose the measure on the Nov. 4 ballot.
Bob Aquino, head of the union, said his board decided to take the action.
"Much of the reason has to do with the fact that we don't trust this mayor," Aquino said. "We've seen him increase every fee that Angelenos pay in this city and then misuse the money.
"In all candor, our board feels that when we're talking about $40 billion, that we aren't sure the money will be used as they say."
The EAA has a long history of feuding with mayors. It was the first of the city unions to endorse Villaraigosa when he was running against former Mayor James Hahn.

Courtesy of Latinogossip:

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is speaking out to the Latino community in California about Prop 8 via a new Spanish language radio ad. In it, he says:
"The Prop 8 campaign has knowingly targeted the Latino community with shameful and deceitful advertising. Proposition 8 is about discrimination, not education. It's disgraceful to use children to try to take away people's civil rights. Proposition 8 attacks all California families, including our Latino families. I am confident that once our community understands the discrimination behind Prop 8 they will join me and vote No."

A new poll showing California's constitutional amendment outlawing same-sex marriage trailing for the first time in weeks has renewed hopes of the gay-rights movement, which had become increasingly divided over its campaign to defeat the Nov. 4 ballot measure. Tony Castro in the Daily News.

Two weeks before Election Day, Proposition 8 is losing among likely voters, 52 percent to 44 percent, according to a statewide survey released Wednesday by the Public Policy Institute of California.

"If we defeat the measure, it will be in spite of the No on 8 campaign, and if we don't it will be because of the No on 8 campaign," said gay activist Robin Tyler of North Hills, a vocal critic of the organized drive against the measure.

California voters on Nov. 4 will consider sweeping changes to the state's criminal-justice codes, ranging from new drug-treatment programs to anti-gang measures and expanded rights for victims. AP in the Daily News.

State Propositions 5, 6 and 9 have not received the same publicity granted to a proposal to ban gay marriage, but supporters and opponents of the three measures have raised a combined $13 million so far to advance their causes.

The proposed Nonviolent Offender Rehabilitation Act, Proposition 5, would require treatment instead of prison for most drug offenders. It would require $610 million in new state spending through mid-2010, followed by annual increases based on population and inflation.

Lo Angeles Police Chief Bill Bratton is warning of the danger of an October suprised in the New York Daily News. He writes:
"Will Osama Bin Laden have anything to say about the U.S. presidential race? Does our economic implosion make us an even more tempting target?
"Al Qaeda has a history of trying to influence elections, most notably with the 2004 train attacks in Madrid. Just three days before Spain's prime ministerial elections, 10 bombs left 191 dead- and Al Qaeda affiliates swung the election away from the incumbent, who supported the coalition wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and toward the challenger, a vociferous critic of U.S. foreign policy. "

Los Angeles county officials reported that Democrats now represent 52 percent of all voters in the county and that 57 percent of new voters signed up with that party.
The final talley shows teh county with 2.2 million Democrats, the most ever, while Republicans accounted for 1,02 million or 24.1 per cent.
Naturally enough, it made Democrats jubilant.
"The unprecedented number of Democrats registered in Los Angeles County and across our nation reflects the recognition of failed Republican policies and governance and points to the need for change, said Eric Bauman, chair of the county Democratic Party.
. "Sen. Barack Obama's inspiration, the Los Angeles County Democratic Party's voter outreach efforts, and grassroots Democratic activists' impressive voter registration drives are the key factors that have made Los Angeles County the Democratic stronghold of California."
There are a total of 4.2 million registered voters in the county. County election officials are urging people to vote early and be patient on election day because of the potential of long lines. Also, the results from the Nov. 4 election could be late because of the expected number of voters.

Following the recent arrest of the owner of a firm hired by the California Republican Party to register voters, Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder Dean Logan said Tuesday he is reviewing 9,000 registration affidavits turned in by the firm to determine if party affiliations were involuntarily changed. Troy Anderson in the Daily News.

Logan said he has sent letters to 85 of the 9,000 voters to find out if their registrations were changed from Democrat to Republican.

Despite the ongoing investigation, Logan said the issue won't be a problem Nov. 4 because all voters will vote on the same ballot. But it could be a problem in the next primary.

The final proposition that will appear on California's Nov. 4 ballot seeks voter approval to continue funding a state-run home-loan program for military veterans. AP in the Daily News.

If it's passed, as 26 previous versions were, Proposition 12 would allow the state to issue $900million in bonds to fund the existing CalVet Home Loan program so it can cover veterans who have served in the military since 1977.

The program, previously available only to those who served before 1977, helps California veterans buy homes, mobile homes and farms.

Three new commercials for Measure R, the half-cent sales tax for transportation programs, were released on Tuesday and, to the surprise of many, did not feature any local politicians.
Even though Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has put his political reputation on the line with the measure, the new spots feature UCLA Professor Jonathan Steward, Don Sepulveda of the American Society of Civil Engineers and Trisha Murakawa of the American Lung Association.
The three spots are designed to emphasize the impact on the environment as well as improving road and rail safety if the measure is approved.

It will be a star-studded event tonight at the home of billionare Ron Burkle to raise money for the No on 8 campaign to fight the measure that would ban same sex marriages.
Hosted by Burkle, Steven Spielberg and Kate Capshaw, David Geffen and Steve Bing, among others, entertainment will be provided by Melissa Etheridge and Mary J. Blige.
It also will feature the state's two most prominent mayors, Antonio Villaraigosa and Gavin Newsom of San Francisco. Newsom has become the unwitting star of the Yest on 8 commercials, showing him performing gay marrianges.

Political bodies love nothing better than a debate over issues as arcane as reapportionment.
Witness the Los Angeles City Council.
It just spent the better part of 45 minutes arguing over whether it should take a position on Proposition 11, the measure dealing with creating a reapportionment commission to take the drawing of political boundaries away from the state legislature.
The council ended up voting 10-3, to oppose the measure _ with arguments by two former state legislators _ Councilmen Richard Alarcon and Tony Cardenas _ arguing the measure would disenfranchise minority voters. Councilmen Dennis Zine, Greig Smith and Bill Rosendahl said they favor the measure.
"This is nothing more than the governor attempting to elect his own party," Alarcon said.
But several others pointed out most of the gains for minorities has come when the districts were redrawn by the courts.

With consumers' dollars at gasoline pumps dwindling and draining a federal fund for highway and transit projects, local leaders Monday pushed for a half-percent sales tax to generate $40 billion for Los Angeles County transportation projects. Sue Doyle in the Daily News.

The cries come two weeks before voters head to the polls and vote on Measure R - a third county sales tax for roadway and mass-transit needs. Unlike the others, it sunsets in 30 years.

The measure needs two-thirds of voter approval on Nov. 4 and would bump the county's sales tax to 8.75 percent. Leaders said local money raised would turn into a larger sum with federal and state matches and comes at a time when neither will provide enough on its own to meet the gridlocked county's needs.

At the J.S. West and Cos. poultry farm, half a million chickens are squeezed six at a time into wire cages where they must share 2 square feet of space. AP in the Daily News.

Beneath them, conveyor belts whisk away excrement while 1.2 million eggs travel from hen to carton each day without touching a human hand.

California voters will decide Nov. 4 whether this kind of operation is an example of factory farming at its most efficient - or the cruel farming practices of producers concerned only about the bottom line.

If a ballot measure seeking money for children's hospitals seems familiar to California voters, it's because they approved a nearly identical measure in 2004. AP in the Daily News.

Proposition 3 on the Nov. 4 ballot would authorize the state to borrow $980 million to pay for construction, remodeling and equipping children's hospitals. The measure would cost the state about $1.9 billion over 30 years, money that would have to come from the deficit-ridden general fund.

In 2004, a similar measure was approved by about 57 percent of voters. It authorized $750 million in bonds, which will cost the state about $1.5 billion to repay.

IN a very real sense, this election has become about hope and despair. Daily News.

On one side there is a sinking sense that America is losing its position as center of the Western world. There is despair that this one-time beacon of opportunity, bounty, democracy and decency that our forefathers dreamed of and people break laws to get into is disappearing.

Our financial markets are roller-coasting, our banks sit on the edge of collapse and our economy is in such shambles we can't see the bottom of the mess. We're stuck in a prolonged war in Iraq that no longer seems strictly winnable but keeps gobbling up billions of dollars each month - and the lives and futures of many of young Americans.

During his five years as chief of the Los Angeles Police Department, Bernard Parks was the main persona non grata of the Los Angeles Police Protective League.
Now, the Protective League is extracting its revenge as Councilman Parks is running in a fierce contest against state Sen. Mark Ridley-Thomas, D-Los Angelesl, for a seat on the Board of Supervisors.
The Protective League this weekend began a $50,000 radio campaign on behalf of Ridley-Thomas against Parks. With the buy, the Protective League joins with the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO, in backing Ridley-Thomas,. The union has said it is prepared to spend $4.5 million in the campaign.

The first commercial for Measure R, the half-cent sales tax measure for transit programs, debuted on Friday.
And, as expected, it featured a politician to make its pitch for support _ President Dwight D. Eisenhower.
The spot, which shows a series of shots of backed up freeways, recalls the effor by Ike in the 1950s to buiild the nation's highway system and says a similar effort is needed now.

The chairman of the state Repbulican Party on Thursday instructed two organizations to clean up their web pages which contained racially insensitive material regarding Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama.
Ron Nehring said he has instructed the Sacramento County Central Committee and a Republican women's club in San Bernardino County to change their web pages and halt emails of material considered unacceptable.
"We have a responsibility to wage a campaign that is focused on the real issues and qualifications of the candidates," Nehring said. "Any material that invokes issues related to race is absolutely unacceptable, tarnishes our party, diminishes the hard work of the tens of thousands of volunteers who are working hard every day for our candidates, and must be condemned.
"This material I've seen inspires nothing but divisiveness and hostility and has absolutely no place in this election, or any public discourse.
"This is an important election, but that is not an excuse for bad judgment or actions that impugn the integrity of our party. As Republicans, and as Americans, we have a responsibility to set a higher standard.
"I have asked both the leaders of these groups to take immediate and swift corrective action on these issues, and indicated that the California Republican Party vigorously opposes any material of his kind. We will continue to denounce similar behavior in any similar instances."

Billionaire philanthropist and producer Steve Bing announced ge was offering a
$500,000 match/challenge against Prop 8 at a event planned for Oct. 21 at the hom eof Ron Burkle in Beverly Hills.
The event will feature performances by Mary J. Blige and Melissa Etheridge. Barbra Streisand is honorary chair and others involved incoude Kate Capshaw and Steven Spielberg, David Geffen, Rob Reiner, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, among others.

New York City Mayor Michael Bllomberg joined Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Wednesday in backing Propositoin 11 on the Nov. 4 ballot. The measure would change how legislative districts are drawn,.
"Right now big problems get debated and debated at the Capitol, but they rarely get solved,' Schwarzenegger said. "We saw the dysfunction on the budget that was three months late.
Bloomberg said he was backing the measure to give more power to voters.
"If we want legislators to spend more time reaching across the aisle and solving problems, we have to stop allowing them to draw districts that promote ideological extremes," Bloomberg said.
"Proposition 11 will take the power of redistricting away from legislators and give it to a neutral and nonpartisan group of qualified citizens."

California first lady Maria Shriver - whose father, Sargent Shriver, ran for both president and vice president - said she finds it "unbelievable, jaw-dropping" that Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin so far has managed to sidestep news conferences and Sunday TV talk shows. San Francisco Chronicle.
Shriver, a prominent veteran broadcast journalist and bestselling author who is married to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, is preparing to interview and talk with dozens of international newsmakers, politicians and celebrities at her popular Women's Conference on Oct. 21 and 22 at the Long Beach Convention Center.

Cheryl Green could have been written off as just another innocent victim of gang violence, a 14-year-old with dreams of becoming a doctor instead becoming collateral damage in a turf war.Daily News.

Instead, the December 2006 death of Green, who lived in Harbor Gateway, became a rallying cry against gangs and served as the impetus for City Councilwoman Janice Hahn to find money needed to provide alternatives to gangs.

It then developed into Proposition A on the Nov. 4 ballot.

The measure, which needs two-thirds support to take effect, is a $36-a-year tax on every piece of property in the city to raise $30 million a year to fund gang prevention and intervention programs.

The Los Angeles Police Protective League has decided to get involved in the Nov,. 4 election, coming out with a $100,000 radio campaign against Proposition 5, the Nonviolent Offender Rehabilitation Act (or NORA ) that exp
"Proposition 5 is poorly drafted, deeply flawed and fiscally irresponsible. It takes up to $1 billion annually out of the state's General Fund to fund a massive new bureaucracy and mandate a controversial drug treatment program for criminal offenders that provides no accountability and little likelihood of successful rehabilitation," said Tim Sand, President of the Los Angeles Police Protective League.
The measure is oppsoed by a broad cross-section of those in law enforcement, including the California District Attorney's Association, the state Sheriff's ASsociation, Mothers Against Drunk Drivers and former Govs. Pete Wilson and Gray Davis.

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has contributed $25,000 to the anti-Proposition 8 campaign.
The measure, which seeks to overturn gay marriages, has gained support in recent days with a series of commercials warning about the potential impact on children.
Villaraigosa, however, said he believes the measure should be rejected.
"I entered politics because the America of my dreams includes everyone, not just a few," he wrote in a lettter with his contribution.
"Too many people have suffered injustice, discrimination, and inequality. It's time to bring every American out of the shadows and into the light. Our laws should not be used to single one group out to be treated differently. Instead, our laws should guarantee the same fundamental rights to every Californian.
"Same-sex marriage is the law of the land in California. In my legal capacity as Mayor of Los Angeles, I have proudly officiated many same-sex weddings since the Supreme Court ruling in June confirmed the constitutionality of these unions."

Supporters of Proposition 11 on the Nov. 4 ballot say the measure will make California state elections competitive once again, after years of lawmakers facing only token challenges to their re-election bids.

The measure removes the ability of legislators to draw their own district lines and instead transfers that responsibility to a citizens commission. Troy Anderson in the Daiily News.

Advocates say they have more than 1,800 organizations and elected politicians endorsing the measure, including Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, the California and Los Angeles chambers of commerce, and the California Taxpayers Association.Supporters of Proposition 11 on the Nov. 4 ballot say the measure will make California state elections competitive once again, after years of lawmakers facing only token challenges to their re-election bids.

The measure removes the ability of legislators to draw their own district lines and instead transfers that responsibility to a citizens commission.

Tipoff: Turning to Chief Bratton to front for Measure A; donor fatigue

The two sides in the Proposition 8 ballot initiative have amassed more than $40 million for media campaigns now playing on California television, but their most important asset might be the huge, volunteer, shoe-leather armies battling over same-sex marriage. Mercury News.

In an election that looks increasingly tight, Dean Merkley, a retired executive and part-time rancher in San Jose, is a member of a volunteer army that hopes to convince Californians to pass a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage. Darius Ngo, an 18-year-old college student in San Francisco, is among an opposing corps of volunteers who could make the difference on Nov. 4 in whether California becomes only the second state to reject a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage.

Only City Council President Eric Garcetti could turn a road trip to Las Vegas into a weekend of walking and knocking on doors.
In this case, it is part of the Obama get out the vote effort where volunteers from Los Angeles head to Nevada to try to turn the formerly Republican state for the Democratic nominee.
Garcetti is California co-chair for Obama and this trip is the second he has organized to Nevada. This weekend's trip is aimed at getting early votes for the Democratic ticket.
"For the first time since 1996 we have a strong chance to win Nevada's five electoral votes this year, and potentially to change the outcome for this election" Garcetti said.

With a presidential election and a slate full of ballot measures, campaign fundraising has been somewhat slow for proponents of local tax and bond measures, according to campaign finance reports filed Monday.Kerry Cavanaugh and George B. Sanchez in the Daily News.

Campaigns for three local measures all raised less than $265,000 each through September.

By comparison, earlier this year supporters of Proposition S, which extended the city's utility user tax, had donated more than $1.5 million a month before the Feb. 5 election.

Expected to generate $30 billion to $40 billion over 30 years for transportation projects in the nation's most traffic-clogged city, Measure R is aimed at relieving Los Angeles County by building a subway, expanding rail and bus service, and widening roads.Sue Doyle in the Daily News.

Though it comes at a jittery economic time - with subprime mortgages unraveling the banking industry and Congress bailing out those financial institutions - the half-percent sales-tax measure could find favor with voters sick and tired of soaring gasoline prices and seeking better mass transit.

The measure needs approval from two-thirds of voters and would increase the county sales tax rate to 8.75percent.

Secretary of State Debra Bowen announced that vote by mail for Californians began on Monday for the Nov. 4 elections with estimates it could account for 25 percent of the total vote.
Bowen since in the 2004 presidential election, absentee ballots were 32 percent of the 12.6 millino votes cast and represented fully 58 percent of the votes cast in the low turnout June primary election.
"Interest in the Nov. 4 election is going through the roof and I wouldn't be surprised to see a record number of Californians cast ballots," Bowen said.
"Any Californian can vote by mail for any reason. Many people enjoy voting at the polls on Election Day, but an increasing number of voters find the mail option to be an easy way to beat the crowds by voting at their convenience."
Bowen said her office has processed between 6,000 and 10,000 registrations a day due to the voter registration efforts of both parties.
County elections officials begin mailing out ballots to the more than 4 million permanent vote-by-mail voters.
The last day to request a vote-by-mail ballot for the November election is Oct. 28.

The wesbsite Fivethirtyeight.com takes a look at California's role in this year's presidential election:
COASTALLY URBAN AND MAVERICKILY LIBERAL, California is one of only four majority-minority states (TX, HI, NM) in the nation. It's a guaranteed 55 electoral votes for Barack Obama, as it has been for every Democrat since 1992. It has the smallest percentage of rural voters in America. Ironically, it's a state both candidates have visited far out of proportion to the closeness of the race, because both sides need wealthy donors.

Looks like the Yes on Proposition 8 ad that features San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom declaring same-sex marriage is here to stay, "like it or not," has hit a legal - if not political - snag down in Southern California. Mattier and Ross in the San Francisco Chronicle.

Newsom's bit is fine - but apparently not the part where Pepperdine University law Professor Richard Peterson warns that, if same-sex marriages remain on the books, people could be sued over personal beliefs, churches could lose their tax exemptions, and gay marriage could be "taught in public schools."

A number of alumni who saw the ad contacted the university president's office to protest what appeared to be Pepperdine's own endorsement of Prop. 8, which would violate its tax-exempt status. The university is affiliated with the Churches of Christ.

"Oh my god. Take a gun and shoot me."

That's one Hollywood fund-raiser's take on the difficulties of coming up with more political coin this month.

In recent weeks, the two presidential campaigns, various Senate and House candidates, plus myriad state legislators, ballot propositions and 527 committees have all been making the same play for the same pool of entertainment industry money. Variety.

Sarah Palin the pit bull showed up at The Home Depot Center in Carson on Saturday, taking shots at Sen. Barack Obama on taxes and on his association with a former member of the Weather Underground. Gene Maddaus in the Daily News.

Palin, who has energized the Republican Party base since she was chosen as Sen. John McCain's running mate, fired up a crowd estimated at 15,000 people.

"There is a time when it is necessary to take the gloves off, and that time is right now," Palin said, adding that a staffer had told her, "OK now, the heels are on, the gloves come off."

Apparently stung by local criticism, Councilman Bernard Parks has apprentlt droped hie effort to evict th SCOPE program from a city-owned building.
Parks had written to the city's General Services Department asking for the eviction, complaining they were using the site to campaign for his opponent, Sen. Mark Ridley-Thomas, for the Board of Supervisors.
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa stepped in to block the eviction, saying it needed to be approved by the full City Council
Now, the Liberty Hill Foundation says that Parks has dropped the effort and will not ask the council to evict the group.