At 09:24 AM 8/10/2002 -0400, you wrote:
>Folks in bashing the Dems spend almost all there time talking about the
>national government, where they only had control of the whole government for
>two years since the 1970s (and with Senate filibusters not real control even
>then).
>
>So it's probably more interesting to evaluate the Dems in a state where they
>have full legislative control such as California (okay not full control of
>the budget because of post-Prop 13 controls on budget matters that require
>two-thirds votes for tax issues, but control on most regulatory issues by
>the majority.
>
>The California legislature has pushed through bills just recently that:
>
>-- set the toughest emissions standards for cars in the country to fight
>global warming
>
>-- doubled to 60 days the notice landlords must give tenants
>
>-- enacted binding arbitration for farm workers seeking new contracts (which
>Davis may veto, the scum)
>
>On other labor fronts, the Democratic legislature pushed through in the last
>couple of years:
>
>-- a return to daily overtime pay for any work beyond eight hours per day
>
>-- increased unemployment benefits and allowed students and others who can
>only work part-time to qualify as long as they cannot find part-time work
>they need
>
>-- made it illegal to discharge, discriminate or take disciplinary action
>against an employee or applicant for employment because of lawful conduct
>occurring during non-working hours away from the employer's premises
>
>-- Extended state overtime laws to the construction, drilling, logging, and
>mining industries; and (among other things)
>
>-- Signed legislation creating the highest civil fines for workplace safety
>and health violations in the nation;
>
>-- Limits an employer's ability to adopt or enforce a policy requiring
>employees to speak only English in the workplace.
>
>-- Requirements that employers reasonably accommodate employees who wish to
>express breast milk at work, including increased break time and privacy.
>
>-- requirements that contractors and subcontractors that are awarded
>contracts to provide janitorial or building maintenance services at a job
>site to retain, for a period of 60 days, certain employees who were employed
>at that site by the previous contractor or subcontractor and retain them
>indefinitely if their wor is "satisfactory."
>
>
>There is an extensive list of good policies by the government in the last
>few years, framed in terms of Davis's reelection but more applying to what
>the legislature pushed through, at
>http://bucket.blogspot.com/2002_07_28_bucket_archive.html#85299496
>
>A few of the highlights:
>
>- increased investment in K-12 education by $9.1 billion, or 39 percent -
>the largest three-year increase in history;
>
>-- Signed domestic partners legislation establishing the nation's first
>statewide registry for domestic partnerships, and providing hospital
>visitation rights for domestic partners. The bill also makes health benefits
>available to the domestic partners of state employees and permits local
>governments to provide domestic partners' benefits to their employees;
>Another law allows a person to collect unemployment insurance if he or she
>leaves a job to relocate with a domestic partner; allows domestic partners
>to use kin care (sick leave) to care for the other partner or the other
>partner's child.
>
>-- Signed some of the strongest HMO reform laws in the nation, enacting 21
>bills giving Californians new health care rights, including the
>establishment of the Department of Managed Care, the first state agency in
>the nation devoted solely to improving the managed health care system;
>
>
>I'll take those real changes in peoples lives over the failed spoiler
>strategy of the Greens.
>
>Nathan Newman
>nathan at newman.org http://www.nathannewman.org