[EL] Los Angeles Times, I made an error

[Richard Winger]

I should have said there are 5 open seats in California, not 3.

 
Richard Winger
415-922-9779
PO Box 470296, San Francisco Ca 94147


________________________________
 From: Richard Winger <richardwinger at yahoo.com>
To: "law-election at uci.edu" <law-election at uci.edu> 
Sent: Saturday, February 15, 2014 12:36 PM
Subject: [EL] California's top-two primary and the Los Angeles Times
 


Rick has linked to a story in the Los Angeles Times "Top-two system shakes things up", but the only thing mentioned in the article that suggests it has "shaken things up" is that 3 members of the US House from California aren't running for re-election.  But nationally, 18 members of the US House have said they aren't running for re-election, plus two members have resigned recently, one from North Carolina and one from Alabama.  California has over 12% of the members of the US  House, so the fact that 3 members aren't running for re-election doesn't indicate California is very different from a typical state this year.  So, as I read it, there is nothing in the L.A. Times story to support the title's conclusion.

Below is a link to a much more analytical story about California's top-two system, which I hope Rick links to.

http://www.calnewsroom.com/2014/02/14/in-statewide-debut-top-two-primary-blocks-third-parties-from-june-ballot/

The L.A. Times also published another George Skelton column on top-two, two days ago, in which he again says top-two has blocked extremists from winning, but Skelton does not mention any so-called extremist who lost because of top-two, nor does he mention any moderate who won because of top-two.  Under the semi-closed California system before top-two, no extremist Democrats or Republicans were elected or even nominated for California statewide office, unless one considers Bill Simon, Republican gubernatorial nominee in 2002, an "extremist".  But generally it is believed that Simon won because of massive Gray Davis expenditures attacking Richard Riordan during the primary season, and also because moderate Republican Bill Jones also ran in that Republican primary and split the moderate Republican vote.

During the campaign on Prop. 14, the top-two measure, the Los Angeles Times published three op-eds in favor of Prop. 14, and regular columnist George Skelton regularly boosted it, but that newspaper refused to run any op-ed against Prop. 14.  Finally, two days before the election, the L.A. Times published on its internet version only an anti-Prop. 14 measure by Mike Feinstein, but refused to put it in the print edition.

 
Richard Winger
415-922-9779
PO Box 470296, San Francisco Ca 94147
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