November 12, 2008 
Since they have been so hard to find, I will put these up for easy viewing.
California 2008 General Election Propositions
Prop 1A (High speed rail): YES
Meh. Fine, it passed. At least it’s mostly funded by private industry, but keep an eye on it. We don’t want it to become another Big Dig (boston).
Prop 2 (Humane Treatement of Farm Animals): YES
Nice to see this one pass. And you got 7 years to get ready farms. Not that bad.
Prop 3 (Children’s Hospital Bonds): YES
Disappointed. The Children’s hospitals have always spent their money recklessly and asked tax payers to bail them out. They need to be held accountable at some point.
Prop 4 (Parental Notification of Minor’s Abortion): NO
Another disappointment. If she is a minor this decision is too important to be left solely in her hands. Her family deserves to know – the majority of cases are not abusive families, and this prop had protections.
Prop 5 (Non-violent Drug offender early release & Parole): NO
Glad to see this fall. It needs refinement, as worded it was too open to exploitation.
Prop 6 (Police funding): NO
Another plus. This sort of budgeting should not be in the hands of voters.
Prop 7(Money for Renewable Power): NO
It was a scam, and voters didn’t fall for it. Very positive.
Prop 8(Gay Marriage Ban): YES
This represents a return to 2000. From here, we need to make a solid compromise: Keep marriage as it’s own, and make a standard for gay unions, with it’s own title, and the same benefits. This way everybody’s happy.
Prop 9(Crime Victim’s rights): YES
Bad. This one was redundant and has now added a lot of lawyer speak to the constitution. Very exploitable.
Prop 10(Other Energy Bill): NO
Soundly defeated. Another energy scam that didn’t deserve passage – there’s better ways.
Prop 11(State Legislature Independent Redistricting): YES
Very good. While far from a perfect solution, it was imperative that we get the state legislature district drawing out of their hands. When they failed as badly as they did last budget round, they should NOT be allowed to draw their own election districts which would stand for 10 more years.
Prop 12(Home loans for Veterans): YES
Neutral. While I have concerns for the veterans who may be vulnerable with these loans, and I think that this could’ve been done better, it’s a positive for them. They need all the help they can get and I’m willing to cede that.
The Skeptic Conservative 
Why do you need to “defend” marriage from homosexuals? The passage of proposition 8 means you’re alright with “separate but equal” standards. Brown vs. the Board of Education rejected those ideals more than 50 years ago…
I’ll write a rebuttal monologue some time today, or tomorrow. But in brief, separate but equal doesn’t quite apply here since marriage is a term for a traditional, religious act. I think that having two terms, one for gay/lesbian couples, and one for religious (and maybe even one for the non religious) that have mostly equal standing legally is the best result. That way, each group can maintain and build their own tradition with their respective institutions. The problem here is that some gay couples are rather militant, and intend to use the legal definition of marriage to shove their views down the throats of religious people, ie, forcing churches to hold ceremonies they don’t agree with. If that weren’t going on at all, there wouldn’t be a problem.
One of the things I hate about the Premier of Ontario, Dalton McGuinty, is that he digs the provice into debt over major expenditures in “clean” energy. This is not the way to run a province, state, or country. Thanful those didn’t pass in California.
Yeah, if you follow me for a longer time (which I hope you do!) I’m going to continue doing these sorts of articles on how things are run here in the great People’s Republic of California. I may even take the time to explain how the proposition system in this state works!
California tends to be one of the most overbearing states in the country in terms of legislation, particularly ‘green’ legislation and in handouts to large union interests. The state has been and continues to be in a state of severe financial hardships, and yet keeps wanting to float bonds, raise taxes, and increase spending. The state legislature is the worst offender, and occasionally as you see above propositions are pushed to do the same thing.
If any state in this country goes bankrupt it’s almost certain California will be the first, and they will set the trend for how exactly that’s handled country wide. Fun stuff to live through!
Question – did you like how I presented and color coded things in this one? and as a quick reminder this was done back in 2008.