Matt Singer makes, I think, a good point here:
Two years ago, I went on a rant following Schwarzenegger's election about how politicians in California were using ballot issues to sidestep the legislative process. There has been an uptick in anti-initiative sentiment in recent years, a natural response to interest groups walking away from the legislative table in order to succeed independent of the system.
Now, to an extent, this isunfortunate. Nominally, even Schwarzenegger's ballot issues were aboutreform, even if that reform all happened to structurally favor a singleparty. And there are good reasons to think that legislators won'treform themselves, but it seems clearer that this is precisely whatthey want.
In Ohio, the Governor has a measly 19% approvalrating (think Judy Martz) and scandals are present virtually all overthe state. Yet the voters rejected four reform measures. In part, thisshows how a machine dedicated to staying dirty can fight reform byvoters just as effectively as it can fight reform in the statehouse.
But it also demonstrates, I think, that the best way to get reform is to elect reform Democrats.
Picking up your toys and stalking off to the voters really isn't proving itself a workable alternative. Indeed, there's not much in the way of ballot initiatives, from any side, that seem to be faring well. In Califronia, neither Prop 78 nor 79, initiatives doing exactly opposite things, passed. Voters aren't evaluating these individually, they're making blanket judgments on the desirability of wading through long initiative ballots. At this point, virtually the only initiative I'd vote for is one to get rid of initiatives. It's not that the voters are bad folks, but they're not trained or experienced legislators, so some of what they approve on face value ends up have subtle and negative impacts down the road. Happily, they seem to have figured this out, and are now rejecting the whjole process as a tool of special interests. It's a shame, because legitimate initiative drives are a positive option, but this sort of cynical overuse is killing the whole medium.
