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Santa Barbara County Volume 4 Issue 10 Jerry Brown’s Failed Legacy 2 Armpits, Alligators, And Apologies 4 Recipe For Disaster: The Regulator, The Activist And The Ideologue 6 How Hillary Burned Bernie And America 8 Confessions Of A Brain Surgeon 10 How Dry We Are 12 Our Motto Or Epitaph? 14 The Misedukation Monopoly 15 Election 2016: Critical Choices For Crucial 16 Analysis Of California's 17 Ballot Propositions 17 Inside the October Issue: October 2016 COLAB PO Box 7523 Santa Maria, CA 93456 Phone: 805-929-3148 E-mail: [email protected] ELECTION EDITION

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Santa Barbara County

Volume 4

Issue 10

Jerry Brown’s Failed Legacy

2

Armpits, Alligators, And Apologies

4

Recipe For Disaster: The Regulator, The Activist And The Ideologue

6

How Hillary Burned Bernie And America

8

Confessions Of A Brain Surgeon

10

How Dry We Are 12

Our Motto Or Epitaph?

14

The Misedukation Monopoly

15

Election 2016: Critical Choices For Crucial

16

Analysis Of California's 17 Ballot Propositions

17

Inside the

October Issue:

October

2016

COLAB

PO Box 7523

Santa Maria, CA 93456

Phone:

805-929-3148

E-mail:

[email protected]

ELECTION EDITION

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Jerry Brown’s Failed Legacy

By Andy Caldwell

Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine Page 2

California is as much a laboratory as it is a

state. This has to do with progressive experiments being run on residents and businesses for all the world to see. The most profound and ridiculous ex-periment has to do with global warming notwithstand-ing the fact that a significant number of eminent cli-mate scientists have completed a 180-degree course correction. These scientists concede the planet quit warming nearly 20 years ago and now believe that actual temperature data projections based upon measurable solar activity indicate we are heading into a mini-ice age!

What should be even more troubling for our legisla-ture is that the original theory of global warming posit-ed that as long as carbon concentrations in our at-mosphere kept increasing so would our tempera-tures. Well, carbon emissions are still on the rise but planetary temperatures plateaued two decades ago! Therein lies the problem with a theory which was based entirely on computer models but could never be validated in the real world.

Consider the fact that California produces less than 1% of the world’s carbon despite constituting the eighth largest economy in the world. By signing SB32, Governor Brown just doubled down on efforts to further reduce our carbon emissions to 40% below 1990 levels. Why? To create a demonstration project to the rest of the world even though the gesture makes no difference to our air quality (carbon is not a pollutant) and will have no effect on climate change. China, India and Pakistan, with their behe-moth populations and emerging economies, continue to expand their carbon emissions unabated complete-

ly overwhelming our relatively puny efforts to make a difference.

Another facet of our state’s efforts to curtail carbon emissions comes by way of an auction the state con-ducts by which companies are forced to buy and sell greenhouse emission credits, with the state taking a commission worth hundreds of millions of dol-lars. The goal over time is to reduce the number of credits available forcing companies to eliminate car-bon emissions in order to save money and stay in business. Well, unfortunately for Gov. Brown who plans to fund high speed rail with these monies, the lab rats are refusing to pay the carnival barker. The emission auctions, which are supposed to raise more than $2 billion per year, have only sold about 20% of the credits available and those were sold below so-called market value. Moreover, almost all of the cred-its that were sold must be used to buffer customers from the increased cost of electricity! In essence, the auction is accomplishing nothing more than recirculat-ing dollars.

There are several reasons the carbon credits aren’t selling. First, there is a lawsuit challenging the scheme as an illegal tax. Second, some democratic legislators have begun to realize the plan isn’t accom-plishing anything which gives the business community hope the plan will be abandoned. Finally, some busi-nesses simply can’t afford to be experimented on. They plan to close shop or move, joining the exo-dus of 9,000 other companies who have recently left California. First Published in the Santa Barbara News Press

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805-739-5354 / www.sudsvendor.com

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Hypocrisy, Thy Name Is Jerry Brown By Katy Grimes

the bills benefitting illegal aliens have been authored by Los Angeles Sen. Ricardo Lara, who was an an-chor baby to illegal alien parents.

Free education… financial aid… student loans… low-cost auto insurance… free health care… free child care… free legal aid… subsidized housing… food stamps… school breakfasts, lunches, snacks and din-ners… drivers licenses… the right to vote… Califor-nia’s millions of illegal aliens are even enjoying many benefits the state’s legal residents and taxpayers do not, but are paying for. And it comes at a very heavy financial burden — legal residents are not just paying for their own health care, rent, transportation, food and education, they are paying for illegal aliens’ as well.

Brown formalized California as a sanctuary state by signing the Trust Act into law, limiting California’s co-operation with federal immigration authorities, to pre-vent deportations from the state. When Brown signed the law giving driver’s licenses to illegal aliens, his real motivation was to have them automatically regis-tered to vote via the DMV.

More ‘Swag’ for Illegal Aliens

In June, Brown signed SB 4 authorizing free health care for illegal aliens – of course authored by Sen. Ricardo Lara. Through the bill, California became the

(Continued on page 19)

Page 3 Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine

California is a Failure at Business

The inconsistencies of California Gov. Jerry

Brown’s climate change policies, together with his im-migration policies, are formidable and deliberately de-ceptive — one policy is driving taxpayers and busi-nesses out of the state, and the other is driving droves of unskilled, unemployed aliens into the state.

Last year, in 2015, Gov. Jerry Brown claimed Califor-nia has an overpopulation problem, and the ongoing drought was proof that the explosion of population in California has reached the limit of what the states’ re-sources can provide.

“We are altering this planet with this incredible power of science, technology and economic advance,” Brown told the publisher of the Los Angeles Times. “If California is going to have 50 million people, they’re not going to live the same way the native people lived, much less the way people do today.… You have to find a more elegant way of relating to material things. You have to use them with greater sensitivity and so-phistication.”

WTF is he is talking about?

If you subscribe to man-made global warming the way Jerry Brown does, you think it’s bad to have billions of people using more energy and emitting more CO2, so it’s better to have fewer people using less energy and emitting less CO2.

But if you subscribe to man-made global warming the way Jerry Brown does, then why do Jerry and Demo-crats offer a welcome mat and a Swag Bag full of goodies to illegal aliens and Middle Eastern refugees? This only makes it harder to meet the strict lower car-bon emission goals of California’s Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, also known as AB 32.

You can’t have it both ways Jerry

Illegal aliens, who are enticed here with an assort-ment of freebies and entitlements, fuel Jerry Brown’s “population explosion.”

Quick trip down memory lane with Governor Jerry

The pro-amnesty Jerry Brown has a long history of inviting illegal aliens into the Golden State through the scores of bills he has signed into law providing illegal aliens everything they could possibly need, including being able to vote. It is interesting to note nearly all of

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Health Sanitation Services

(805) 922-2121

Armpits, Alligators, And Apologies

By Andy Caldwell

eviscerated out of concern for the environment in complete ignorance and disregard for the living envi-ronment of these many people trapped in poverty as a result of these policies! Insult to injury? Salud Carba-jal led the way making things exponentially worse by singling out our county for one of the most extreme regulatory standards in the state and nation.

Another example of abuse that deleteriously impacted the quality of life for Lompoc residents occurred when Supervisor Carbajal voted to deny the use of a soccer field donated by a farmer in Lompoc. Believe it or not, it's true! Kids in Lompoc are forced to practice in the town cemetery due to the resulting lack of facilities!

Please consider this quote from a former long time director of county planning: “The cost of preserving the high quality of life in Santa Barbara County in-cludes limiting opportunities for others. It limits eco-nomic mobility but that is a legitimate political choice”. That sums up the heart rather than the arm-pit of the controversy. It reveals the priorities and attitudes of elitists at the expense of the living environ-ment of struggling families.

Hence, despite his weak apology, candidate Salud Carbajal finds himself up to his armpits in alligators, deservedly so. First Published in the Santa Barbara News Press

Page 4 Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine

Santa Barbara County happens to have one of the

most extreme disparities in quality of life between its residents than is found anywhere else in the coun-try. Specifically, the income inequality gap between the North and South County is sixth worst in the na-tion. One of the ways the county makes this medicine go down is by manipulating the statistics. Whenever the supervisors hear a poverty report they divide the information into three parts. Even though we always talk about the north and south county, the county bu-reaucrats invented a third area of the county, the “mid-county”, thereby cutting the county into thirds and effectively separating Lompoc and Santa Maria. The purpose is to prevent the public from adding the pov-erty rates of these two cities! That way, perhaps the public will be less concerned about the impact of poverty, crime, and joblessness as it affects the quality of life for more than half the residents of our county.

In a nutshell, upwards of 66% of all the impoverished people live in either Lompoc or Santa Maria. Lompoc has 27% of all the Section 8 housing in the community while having only 9% of the county’s population. The average household in Lompoc is supported by just one wage earner working just 75% of a full time job! Santa Maria’s problems are just as bad.

These realities give context to the utter outrage throughout the North County with regard to Salud Car-bajal referring to Lompoc as the armpit of the coun-ty. In a nutshell, the town I grew up in was quite love-ly and relatively prosperous up and until the county of Santa Barbara helped put the kabash on economic growth. One of the worst things the county did was to eliminate 272 acres of light industrial land to agricul-tural zoning even though the land was worthless for farming. The county also negatively impacted em-ployment opportunities at VAFB, in mining, and in the oil industry.

Herein lies the angst of the impoverished “colonies”-a term Supervisor Peter Adam coined to characterize the economic and political abuse South County super-visors foist on the north. In the name of preserving the environment they have continuously undermined the economic prosperity of the region. North county residents’ best and only hope for good paying jobs is in blue collar manufacturing and industry. Yet the ability to permit the creation of these jobs has been

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Hillary And Huma’s Third Strike

By Andy Caldwell

influence via our federal government. Once Hillary was named Secretary of State the operation went into overdrive as discovered by Judicial Watch.

A company named Teneo Holdings was formed by one of Bill Clinton’s closest associates. Teneo is a worldwide company that “collaborates to solve crucial reputational, transformational and capital markets is-sues”. They hire people who know people from throughout the world who need favors. With Bill Clin-ton serving as the honorary Chairman of Teneo (a paid position) the group arranged beneficial contacts via Huma Abedin who simultaneously worked for Te-neo, the Clinton Foundation, and Hillary Clinton in her capacity as Secretary of State!

The purposely scrubbed emails, which Hillary claimed were personal, boring and mundane were anything but. The emails, once they were discovered, prove the links between Hillary, Huma, the Clinton Founda-tion and the numerous individuals and foreign govern-ments who donated tens of millions in order to get ac-cess via this global pay to play scheme. The list of donors with “reputational issues” included dictators and war lords, as well as, crony capitalists from both here and abroad.

The disclosures from the AP investigation and lawsuit, coupled with the research by Peter Schweizer in his book and documentary film “Clinton Cash”, along with the evidence gained by Judicial Watch equals strike three for the Clintons. They, along with Huma Abedin need to be investigated and prosecuted for corruption, influence peddling and perhaps even treason. First Published in the Santa Barbara News Press

Page 5 Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine

The Associated Press, several years ago, sought

to obtain Hillary Clinton’s calendar and schedule in her capacity as Secretary of State. Subsequent de-lays in obtaining the information forced them to file a lawsuit to obtain the relevant information. Now, we know why the Obama administration refused to coop-erate with the request and further, we understand why Hillary Clinton scrubbed her private server of tens of thousands of emails. It all has to do with her selling access, favors and influence by way of the Clinton foundation while she served as Secretary of State.

What the Associated Press discovered is that more than half of the people who obtained personal atten-tion and private contact with Hillary happened to be donors to the Clinton Foundation. Specifically, 85 ap-pointments were granted to donors who gave over $150 million to the foundation! However, that is only half the story!

The Associated Press chose not to include in their calculations the money that was donated by foreign governments ostensibly because Clinton would have met with these representatives anyway in the course of her normal duties. However, the fact that the 16 foreign governments who obtained appointments do-nated on average $10 million each to the foundation screams out that this was anything but business as ususal. I interviewed a retired CIA senior official who explained exactly how this system worked.

What Bill and Hillary Clinton did to secure their politi-cal legacy and to create a steady stream of income once Bill left the White House was to be accomplished by way of the Clinton Foundation selling access and

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Recipe For Disaster: The Regulator, The Activist And The Ideologue

By Andy Caldwell

prolific industry in the state have now been declared anathema!

Unfortunately, this narrative hits too close to home. Locally, the policies and values emanating from our own South County elite have a disparate im-pact on our impoverished North County. For exam-ple, ag and oil, drive the North County economy. Yet, these natural resource industries are being constantly undermined and buffeted by policies driven by South County politicians. For instance, Salud Carbajal helped pass the strictest greenhouse gas regulation (by a factor of ten!) in the State, while Das Williams just coauthored a bill regulating cow flatulence!

I am worried that if Joan Hartmann beats Bruce Porter in the 3rd District election, meaning she will be joining Das Williams and Janet Wolf as the new board majori-ty, the proposal to split our county will surface for the third time. Having served as a local government watchdog for over 25 years, I honestly believe the combination of Hartmann, Williams and Wolf will simply be too much to handle. Hartmann is an over-reaching regulator at heart, Williams is an extreme activist, and Wolf is a hopeless ideologue. These poli-ticians present the perfect trifecta for disaster. First Published in the Santa Barbara News Press

Page 6 Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine

Quite honestly, I wish the guy who proposed to

split California into six states would go back to the drawing board and scale down his proposition be-cause he was actually on to something. California is simply too big and diverse to govern. Moreover, as it pertains to federal representation in Washington, it would behoove us to double our representation in the US Senate by splitting our state in two.

One of our nation’s most brilliant scholars is Victor Davis Hanson, Ph.D.. He lives in Selma, one of the poorest communities in California, while he works at Stanford’s Hoover Institute in Palo Alto, one of the most prosperous communities in the country.

Dr. Hanson has developed a theme called the two Californias whereby he juxtaposes the absurd values, policies and priorities of the Bay Area elite as con-trasted with the rest of the state. This is important because what starts in the Bay Area doesn’t stay in the Bay Area. Because our State government is al-most entirely controlled by Bay Area politicians (e.g., Jerry Brown, Kamala Harris, Gavin Newsom), the poli-cies developed in San Francisco eventually end up becoming state policy. Of course, it makes no sense that the rest of the legislature would allow these elites to dominate the state as they do, but the fact that it happens continuously demonstrates the reason why we should split the Bay Area off from the rest of Cali-fornia!

Two recent examples of San Francisco lunacy? The Nanny Statists have singled out the soda industry re-quiring advertisements to include a warning to con-sumers that drinking beverages with added sugar contributes to obesity, diabetes, and tooth decay albe-it the City has given all the other products that contain added sugar a pass from including the same warning in their advertisements. This is an indication that the regulation is under-inclusive which brings up the con-stitutional question of equal protection for soda manu-facturers. Another proposal is a local payroll tax that would only be imposed on technology companies that earn $1 million per year. Why? Some supervisors are making the claim that the tech boom in the Bay Area threatens the city’s ability to thrive and pros-per! That’s right, the best paying jobs in the most

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California’s Roads Improve, But Still Are Troubled According To New Study

By Steven Greenhut

regional systems that are in various conditions.

“The good news is that California reported the lowest percentage of deficient bridges of any state in the nation,” according to Reason Vice President Adrian Moore, writing in the Orange County Register. California also ranked 10th in highway fatalities with a rate of 0.9 per 100 million vehicle miles. The best performance was in Massachusetts, with 0.58 fatalities per 100 million miles and the worst was Montana, with 1.9 fatalities per 100 million miles. Those rates, however, have been dropping

(Continued on page 20)

Page 7 Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine

Despite its well-documented inefficiencies and travails, California’s Department of Transportation (Caltrans) has managed to improve the state’s system of roads, bridges and freeways incrementally in recent years, according to a newly released annual survey of state highway systems by the free-market-oriented Reason Foundation.

Reason’s 22nd Annual Highway Report ranked California 42nd. While this is still in the lowest category, the ranking has steadily improved over the years, moving up from a low of 46th. Because of data-collection delays, the rankings only go through 2013.

The study measures a number of important factors: Road conditions on freeways and primary commercial highways, the state of each state’s bridges, fatality rates and various costs per mile – administrative, maintenance, capital costs and expenditures.

California has done particularly poorly on the spending side of the equation. It ranked 44th in total disbursements per mile; 43rd in maintenance disbursements per mile; 40th in capital and bridge disbursements per mile; and 47th in administrative disbursements. That reinforces a California state auditor study from last summer showing that Caltrans may have as many as 3,500 unnecessary job positions.

The state’s overall per-mile capital and bridges cost totaled nearly $170,000 – far costlier than highest-ranked South Carolina, at nearly $21,000, or middle-ranked Utah, at nearly $78,000. But California wasn’t nearly the worst. Worst-ranked New Jersey spends $839,000 per mile; Florida spends more than $380,000; and Illinois spends nearly $202,000. On administrative costs, California spends more than $47,000 per mile, compared to $1,107 per mile in top-ranked Kentucky and $3,762 in 10th ranked Texas.

On the bad side, California had one of the highest proportions of rural interstate mileage in poor condition, at 6.52 percent. Its urban interstate mileage in poor condition was even worse, at 13.32 percent, which isn’t a surprise to anyone who regularly navigates the Los Angeles, San Diego or Bay Area highway systems. The survey only looks at state-owned highway systems, not at the myriad local and

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Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine Page 8

Two investigative journalists, Katy Grimes and Me-

gan Barth, have written a fascinating, albeit, distress-ing series of articles titled “The Voting System is Rigged” available at www.reaganbaby.com having to do with voting irregularities in the June elec-tion. Whereas, much has been said and written about the age-old strategy of individual people showing up and voting in someone else’s stead, what is emerging now is a greater pattern of fraud by orders of magni-tude. In essence, this vastly superior threat to the in-tegrity of our democracy was best explained by Jo-seph Stalin, “It is enough that the people know there was an election. The people who cast the votes de-cide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything.”

Grimes and Barth’s laser focus on our rigged voting system highlights the fraud perpetrated at the ex-pense of Bernie Sanders, including the disenfran-chisement of decline-to-state voters, and the manipu-lation of the vote in those states which rely on ma-chines instead of paper ballots. In essence, there is considerable evidence that the voting machines were either manipulated or hacked. The journalists cite evi-dence, complaints and studies from throughout the nation that these voting irregularities are becoming increasingly widespread and formidable in their scope and impact.

Here in California, as a way of background, there have been numerous examples of people showing up at the polls only to find that somebody, somehow, changed their party affiliation without their permission or knowledge. What that portends is that these voters did not have routine access to the ballot of their par-ty. To make matters worse, poll workers were di-rected by the California Secretary of State not to in-form voters of their rights to cast provisional ballots so that they could vote for their party’s candidate. Spe-cifically, the official training manuals instructed elec-tion officers to keep no party preference voters in the dark as it pertains to their rights to request a cross-over ballot as precinct workers were instructed to only provide the same upon request! Accordingly, up-wards of 20% of the voters were forced to use provi-sional ballots to cast their vote in the June election.

Nationally, a team of university researchers discov-ered extreme statistical anomalies which led them to the conclusion that election fraud did occur specifical-ly benefitting Hillary Clinton’s nomination. Specifical-

ly, the research scientists from Stanford and the Neth-erlands discovered severe abnormalities approaching a 25% variation between polling data and the tabulat-ed results from states which rely on electronic voting machines instead of paper ballots. It is important to note that these anomalies occurred in greater meas-ure in large precincts while no anomalies or irregulari-ties whatsoever were discovered in republican prima-ries!

Finally, the authors quite convincingly suggest that our State legislature’s effort to allow illegal aliens to obtain driver’s licenses was not motivated by their de-sire to make our roads safer. Instead, with the full knowledge that our state lacks a centralized comput-erized statewide voter registration list, which happens to be in noncompliance with statutes protecting the rights of voters, the effort to issue driver’s licenses to illegals was meant to coincide with the Motor Voter Program which automatically registers to vote all new drivers upon license issuance. This is made possible by the fact that the DMV is unable to differentiate be-tween citizens and non-citizens when plugging them into the voter rolls. Moreover, the state law shields the ineligible voters from criminal prosecution in case they get caught!It would behoove us to turn back the clock while turning our back to computerized voting systems susceptible to rigging. Let us prefer a paper trail of ballots, hanging chads and all, just to be on the safe side. First Published in the Santa Barbara News Press

How Hillary Burned Bernie And America

By Andy Caldwell

805-937-6151

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The Twits Of The Twitter Generation

By Andy Caldwell

jobs I have witnessed are for the construction of industrial scale solar farms, which are few and far between short duration jobs, and the installation of solar panels on rooftops. The underlying problem with both of these jobs is that they are dependent on a false economy of mandates and subsidies. The irony is that there is no such thing as free solar. Somebody else is paying for these projects by way of higher utility bills, fees and taxes. That is only sustainable for so long.

Next, we have the call for open borders. How on earth is increased competition for jobs, housing, health care, education, and in California, water, going to improve the quality of life for people that are already here? We should be reserving the opportunities here in America for our own impoverished urban underclass and the twit generation. First Published in the Santa Barbara News Press

Page 9 Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine

One of the most insidious problems facing America

has to do with the loss of critical thinking skills. This loss came about by way of our public education system teaching to the test (which simply requires regurgitation) and the millenial’s penchant for valuing all things, including learning, only in terms of an entertainment quotient. In other words, we have raised a generation of Americans who received an education void of the requirement to think for themselves and who now get their news via Youtube, Facebook and Twitter. Their intellectual laziness and abbreviated attention span spells trouble for a political system that entrusts them to make sound decisions based on facts and logic. Hence, they fall hook, line and sinker every election cycle for politicians advocating policies and priorities that don’t make sense.

The unemployment rate in our inner cities hovers around 40%. Many of these unemployed lack a high school education, but they do have a criminal record, and more than a few are substance abusers. What can be done for them? Good old-fashioned factory jobs historically fit the bill. Unfortunately, these type of jobs went offshore thanks to an overwrought environmental movement.

Another consideration? The $15 minimum wage. Historically, many unemployed teens got their first job in the largely minimum wage sector, including the fast food industry. Yet, most all of the jobs can be performed by machines that can be paid for in full by way of salary savings in light of minimum wage hikes. For instance, you can use a kiosk or app to order your food. There is a machine that can fill your drink order. There is another machine that can make a custom hamburger cooked to order.

Business owners who employ machines don’t have to worry about the minimum wage, sick leave, vacation schedules, worker’s compensation, liability insurance or getting sued for disputes concerning sexual harassment or any other cause of action. Why on earth would anyone who needs to get a starting job advocate for this 50% minimum wage increase except for their failure to understand they just priced themselves out of a job?

Another promise young people are falling for has to do with the creation of green jobs. The only green

The One Name In Crop

Production Inputs 1335 W. Main St.

Santa Maria, CA. 93454

(805) 922-5848

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Confessions Of A Brain Surgeon

By Andy Caldwell

for any number of farmers in Santa Maria who started as field workers but now own their own farming companies.

Finally, perhaps the smallest node in the diagram was the “molecule of guilt” for being white, healthy, well-fed, and happy. This particular node is overshadowed in the brain diagram by a relatively large section labeled “sense of history”. Isn’t it true that all of us have relatives and ancestors who had it tough regardless of race? My father, for instance, lived through the great depression, the dust bowl, the Bataan Death March, a Japanese prisoner of war camp, and twenty years of being underpaid by Uncle Sam in service to our country. Yet, not once did he envy anyone or blame America. I am forever grateful for his example of fortitude. First Published in the Santa Barbara News Press

Page 10 Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine

I came across a great illustration from an unknown

author that lays out a diagram of conservative values and mores. Humorously, the illustration comes in the form of a diagram depicting large segments of the brain devoted to things that conservatives find important with very small areas portraying things conservatives don’t value whatsoever. In my own words, I will highlight and contrast by way of distinction the large and small areas of the brain as they represent the comparative value or lack thereof to a conservative’s thought process.

Two of the largest areas of the brain were labeled “responsibility for one’s own behavior” and “absolute moral standards”. The concept that our rights, freedom and liberty are tied to personal behavior and responsibility is pretty much lost in our public discourse these days. In fact, the entire concept of redistribution of wealth and equality of outcomes is antithetical to this principle that holds that people need to accept responsibility for their decisions, work ethic, and priorities in life. For instance, here in America, you are virtually guaranteed to escape generational poverty by simply graduating from high school, foregoing teenage out-of-wedlock pregnancy, staying away from drugs and alcohol, and having a strong work ethic. Unfortunately, liberals don’t think in these terms.

Compare and contrast this emphasis on personal responsibility to two of the smallest nodes in the diagram, that of “envy of those who are better off” and “blame America”. These happen to be the mainstays in the modern progressive democratic movement! In fact, these would be the correct labels for both hemispheres of Bernie Sanders’ brain! Yet, if you care to think about it, the mega-rich in America typically give away most all of their fortune to foundations that will keep giving long after they are gone.

Of course, the United States is still the one country in the world that provides the freedom and opportunity for the poorest of the poor to become upwardly mobile in a dramatic way. Although the Black Lives Matter Movement and the democratic party don’t want to discuss either of these men, both Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, and one of our nation’s most eminent surgeons, Dr. Ben Carson, are modern day examples of this phenomenon. The same is true

Saturday, October 1st & 2nd

CHUMASH INTER-TRIBAL

POW-WOW

Thursday, October 20th

SCOTTY MCCREERY

Thursday, November 3rd

SERGIO MENDES & BRASIL 2016

Thursday, November 17 th

OLIVIA NEWTON-JOHN

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Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine Page 11

Santa Barbara is truly a beautiful city but for many

the experience of the city is marred by the presence of homeless people throughout the community. Suf-fice it to say, that some of these folks use our door-ways and sidewalks to relieve themselves, while the residents and business owners who have to put up with them are getting no relief whatsoever. Some of the other problems associated with their behavior in public places is just too gross and disgusting to men-tion.

How is it lost on our society that a significant number of the homeless population are mentally ill while many others are seriously addicted to drugs and alco-hol? The majority of these people are not getting the help they need to make the necessary substantive changes in their lives to get better.

In the meantime, besides inundating our sidewalks and parks, the homeless in communities throughout our state have been invading our libraries leaving be-hind bedbugs and lice! They make use of the facili-ties in a number of ways, including bathroom access, charging ports for their phones, internet access on computers, and simply as a means to escape the ele-ments. Some communities are trying to figure out ways to keep these transients away while others are trying to figure out how to accommodate them.

How is it more merciful to allow somebody who is liter-ally out of their mind, and/or so severely disabled to live on the streets instead of in an institution? Why is it considered more beneficial to allow these people to voluntarily take mind altering drugs than it is to force them to take medications that could help them? Why

Books, Bedbugs And Lice!

By Andy Caldwell

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The Premier Caterer in Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo Counties

Since 1983 “Locally Owned by Martin & Debi Testa”

805-739-0809 www.TestaCatering.com

are families completely powerless to force their loved ones into institutional care instead of watching them waste their lives away living on the streets?

For the most part, we can only force institutionaliza-tion when the person becomes a danger to them-selves or others. In many cases, that is simply too late to do any good, especially, when someone has been victimized.

Why haven’t we had a serious discussion on this is-sue since the decision was made decades ago that forcing people into institutions against their will was a violation of their civil rights when the fact remains they are too mentally ill and deranged to make decisions for themselves? When we finally do treat these peo-ple, once they become dangerously ill and/or danger-ous to society, it comes at great expense to taxpayers.

Here is Santa Barbara County, in addition to spending millions of dollars taking care of these people in our emergency rooms, we also spend a fortune treating and housing them in our jail, which has become by default our area’s largest mental ward! Additionally, we spend millions sending some offenders to special-ty care centers because they are so deranged they have been judged incapable of understanding the charges against them in order for them to enter a plea! We have to first treat them in order to prosecute them.

Is this really the best we can do as a society? First Published in the Santa Barbara News Press

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How Dry We Are

By Andy Caldwell

lichen on a rock from being disturbed by a develop-ment project. Yet, all that I hear is crickets when it comes to two of the most basic things that make for quality of life, that having to do with our water supply and protection against wildfires.

I for one have been warning the community for years that we were running out of water and that the activist community, namely the Environmental Defense Cen-ter, is clamoring to protect fuel in the form of brush and habitat, from being removed from the hillsides which will serve to dramatically increase fire dan-ger. In fact, right now, in the middle of this extreme fire season, the EDC is advocating that your County Supervisors to declare all of this fuel for fires as envi-ronmentally sensitive habitat which means it can only be removed by permit! This is an extremely danger-ous and foolhardy policy.

Unfortunately, we seem stuck in a loop of insanity and misfortune. We continue to release upwards of 40% of the water in storage for fish causing us to prema-turely run out of water to serve our domestic needs and fight fires. The fires are burning up the watershed which means runoff from the next storm will clog our reservoirs further diminishing our water storage ca-pacity. And, instead of breaking the cycle, the EDC is calling for more protection for the brush! Time for a wakeup call wouldn’t you say? First Published in the Santa Barbara News Press

Page 12 Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine

Lake Cachuma is officially dry! More precisely,

even though there is still a little water left in the lake, it is not suitable for drinking nor can it be pumped over the mountain to the South County. The realization of how dry we are coming as somewhat of a surprise to the South County water districts because they thought they still had a couple thousand acre feet of water re-maining. However, in addition to the water we wasted on a few fish, more water than expected went down the river by way of the clever machination of one Bruce Wales, a crafty fellow who works for the Santa Ynez River Water Conservation District. Santa Bar-bara’s water czar was none too happy to discover the well was dry, but as the adage goes, old age and treachery will always beat youth and exuberance!

Of course, Lake Cachuma is not the only dry spot in the county. Gibralter Lake is also dry. A problem ex-acerbating this situation is that the Rey fire burned up much of the corresponding watershed meaning we will have serious problems when it rains again. In all likelihood these lakes will fill up with a mixture of wa-ter, debris and silt from the fire-scarred watershed re-sulting in a severely compromised capacity to store drinking water.

Now, you would be hard pressed to find any commu-nity more concerned than Santa Barbara about pre-serving their quality of life. I have personally wit-nessed one person crying at a hearing pending the removal of bougainvillea as part of widening the 101 freeway. I have witnessed requirements to protect

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Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine Page 13

Salud Carbajal, County Supervisor and candidate

for Congress, likes to rib people, but sometimes his ribbing rubs people the wrong way. Such is the case when Supervisor Carbajal walked into a meeting of local elected representatives and asked a staff person about her recent move to Lompoc. He asked her how she liked living in the armpit of the county! Of course, describing a community as an armpit is the ultimate insult meaning that place is a most miserable or unde-sirable area. The comment is wrong on so many lev-els, I don’t quite know where to begin considering the fact that I was raised in Lompoc.

Like countless other people, the staff member had moved because she could no longer afford to live in the South County. She joins tens of thousands of oth-ers now forced to commute long distances due to the jobs/housing imbalance and the related high cost of housing. To say that Mr. Carbajal’s comments were elitist, rude and insensitive would be an understate-ment.

One thing I want to say about armpits is that it is one of the best places to accurately take one’s tempera-ture! In other words, taking the temperature of a com-munity like Lompoc serves to inform us of our overall health as a society, accordingly, the community should be of concern to our electeds, rather than an object of disdain and disrespect.

Lompoc is the third largest city in our county and one of the largest in this congressional district. If Mr. Car-bajal truly considers Lompoc a miserable and undesir-able place to live, it begs the question, what is he will-ing to do to improve the quality of life for the residents of the city? Moreover, what does he think of Santa Maria and Guadalupe, two other impoverished North County communities? For that matter, what does he think of the poorer neighborhoods in Santa Barbara?

Whereas, Mr. Carbajal has long had the privilege of rubbing elbows with constituents in Montecito, one of the most affluent communities in the nation, the fact is most residents in the 24th Congressional district can’t relate. They live from pay check to pay check, strug-gling to make ends meet on a daily basis. Mr. Carba-jal therefore should reconsider asking residents of Lompoc, and other impoverished areas of the 24th Congressional district, for their vote. He obviously lacks empathy for the communities who need his help

For The Love Of Armpits

By Andy Caldwell

the most. Their plight is no laughing matter.

What Salud Carbajal fails to understand is that a lot of people, including myself, held no hope whatsoever to become upwardly mobile apart from blue collar manu-facturing jobs. The main reason the North County suffers in relative poverty compared to the South County? It lost these very types of jobs that historical-ly lift people out of poverty.

I witnessed the closure of Grefco, Sunoco, Arrow Au-tomotive, Union Sugar, Santa Maria Chili, and numer-ous other companies due to the black hole of environ-mental review that exists in our county. Salud Carba-jal subsequently made things worse by imposing a greenhouse gas standard ten times stricter than any other in California serving to threaten the highest pay-ing blue collar jobs remaining in the county.

In conclusion, I am disappointed, but I can’t say I was surprised by Mr. Carbajal’s armpit remark. For his entire political career, he has catered to a pampered constituency of arm chair activists who have had their way with him at the expense of the working class. I know. I worked at one of the plants that closed. The policies supported by Mr. Carbajal cost these commu-nities their best paying jobs, and now he has the au-dacity to mock their misery? First Published in the Santa Barbara News Press

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Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine Page 14

Much has been said over the years about how, at

a minimum, borders, language and culture define a nation. I would add that religion or the lack thereof serves to define the character and virtue of a na-tion. Accordingly, America is in a world of hurt.

Our borders are porous and insecure. Both our lan-guage and culture are under assault by way of multi-culturalism, political correctness and the abandon-ment of traditional values and mores. Much of the root of these ills can be traced to the deliberate de-construction of our historic faith- based constitutional foundation which served to define the principles and precepts of our society, culture, and government.

America has always been a nation of immigrants, however, there was a clear expectation that when an immigrant came to America, they came to become part of our country as they are required to swear alle-giance to become a citizen. Nobody asked immi-grants, or demanded of them, that they abandon their ethnic identity or traditions per se, but they were ex-pected to assimilate, hence, the formation of the great American melting pot.

Today, thanks to the emphasis on multiculturalism, we are facilitating the creation of communities where pop-ulations of residents are not assimilating or coalesc-ing. The most extreme and dangerous example of this phenomenon would be communities of Muslim immigrants who desire to be governed and judged by Sharia law instead of the law of the land.

A more sublime example here in California is Prop. 58 a ballot measure this November that would serve to eviscerate English-only learning in our schools. It is an effort to return to the failed regimen of bilingual ed-ucation that was eliminated in 1998 by Proposition 227 which mandated English immersion. Bilingual education was of course a complete and utter failure and everybody knows it. It not only served to slow down the progress of the English learners but every other student in the class. The Sacramento politicians who placed Prop. 58 on this year’s ballot did so be-cause they believe forcing kids to learn English has racist undertones! Of course, it is not racist to have a common language which facilitates the potential for upward mobility based upon the requisite capability to communicate with fellow citizens.

What is even more outlandish than the return to

bilingual education has to do with the City of Oakland once having requested funding to teach Ebonics in public schools as reported by Steve Greenhut in The American Spectator. This main streaming of the ghetto rap culture permeating our society by way of music, fashion and culture with its celebration and glo-rification of violence, misogynism, drugs, and the gangster lifestyle is anathema to a healthy socie-ty. Accordingly, our inner cities are rotting from with-in. All the while, race hustlers cast blame everywhere else except where it belongs.

Ultimately, the decomposition of our society is a re-flection of our embrace of secular humanism whereby narcissism and hedonism reigns supreme. Our motto has become our epitaph as we are no longer one na-tion under God, indivisible. First Published in the Santa Barbara News Press

Our Motto Or Epitaph?

By Andy Caldwell

Walker Wilson & Hughen,

CPA’s Tax Preparation and Planning, Trusts

and Estate Planning

1201 E. Ocean Ave. Lompoc, CA.

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The Misedukation Monopoly

By Andy Caldwell

political leaders to promise they are committed to pre-paring American students to compete in a global economy while failing miserably to eliminate the sta-tus quo which shields our schools from competition and success. Dr. Alger doesn’t just delineate the problems, she also outlines a plan for success which calls for abolishing the federal department of educa-tion. She offers in its place, a return of control to states and localities, school choice, state tuition tax credits, privately operated charter schools and educa-tional savings accounts. These programs work here and abroad.

When will families in our inner cities, where the public education system has notoriously failed, demand edu-cation as a basic civil right? When will they realize that the democrats they elect are more interested in protecting government control and the union cartel than in their children’s future? First Published in the Santa Barbara News Press

Page 15 Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine

For the first 100 years or so of our republic, educa-

tion was provided for the populace by a combination of familial, civic, religious and private means. Missing from this winning formula was the federal govern-ment. Today, public education suffers from monopo-listic control by government and unions to the detri-ment of our students who are rapidly and hopelessly falling behind other nations.

One person in America who understands this situation better than most is Vicki Alger, Ph.D who recently published “The Federal Misedukation of America’s Children”. Her historical and insightful work includes a quote from a Congressman during the 1866 debate concerning the creation of a national education de-partment. Congressman Samuel Randall predicted that creating the federal department would result in a “bureau an at extravagant rate of pay, and an undue number of clerks collecting statistics...that does not propose to teach a single child its ABCs!” How right he was!

Dr. Alger work proves without a doubt that there has been no discernable improvement in student academ-ic performance since the modern day version of the Department of Education was created in 1979. Fur-ther, the federal government has failed to reach nearly every meaningful goal it promised to achieve. Name-ly, despite having spent hundreds of billions of dollars as it usurped control from both States and local school districts, student performance has remained stuck at average levels since the late 1960's and early 1970's.

One of the key obstacles in the way of providing a top-notch education has to do with the monopoly of pub-lic schools and teacher unions made possible by con-trol of our tax dollars. Dr. Alger understands that the key difference between our education system and that of our foreign competition lies in the area of school choice based on competition. Of course, the educa-tion lobby doesn’t welcome competition, they simply want control, despite the fact that they are turning out an inferior product, namely, kids who can barely read and write! Parents in 90% of the countries who per-form as well if not better than the United States have more freedom to choose their children’s schools and this has great relevance to the topic at hand.

Dr. Alger observes that it makes no sense for our

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Election 2016: Critical Choices For Crucial Change

By Andy Caldwell

activist agenda that has become business as usual in Sacramento! We need representatives that will roll up their sleeves and address the very real problems as-sociated with our $1 trillion debt, our failing infrastruc-ture, our dwindling and squandered water supplies, and the tax and regulatory burdens that are stifling opportunities for the working poor and killing our farmers.

I hope Third District voters will elect Bruce Porter to serve as their next supervisor. We desperately need Bruce’s expertise in managing our failing infrastruc-ture and our acute water supply shortage. He also knows a thing or two about preventing the cata-strophic threat of fire and how to handle big budg-ets. He is highly educated, having earned multiple degrees from West Point and Stanford. He is a very good man who truly wants to serve our communi-ty. We need his sense of balance and fairness that comes from decades of experience as a public serv-ant in the Army Corps of Engineers. If you want to end the acrimony and drama on the Board of Supervi-sors, then please elect Bruce Porter!

Finally, I urge voters in Goleta to vote for Tony Vallello for City Council. In Santa Maria, I am encouraging voters to reelect Alice Patino for Mayor and Michael Moats and Mike Cordero to the City Council.

Page 16 Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine

I am voting for Donald Trump knowing full well that

he has offended many by way of insults, rhetoric and bombast, albeit, he has also been willing to talk about important things noone else wants to discuss! I be-lieve the Donald’s verve will do our country well in a time when we desperately need strong leadership and fiscal acumen. Trump will do well for America by sur-rounding himself with America’s best and brightest in order to address our nation’s chronic problems having to do with illegal immigration, terrorism, debt, our fail-ing military readiness, and generational poverty among the working poor and the welfare class.

The hardest thing I plan to do on election day is vote for Loretta Sanchez for Senate. Admittedly, Sanchez is a left-leaning progressive who will support all sorts of policies that I find abhorrent. However, the fact of the matter is that her opponent, Kamala Harris, makes Sanchez appear moderate by comparison! Harris represents the worst of the Bay Area tradition of activ-ist legislators who represent a threat to our very lives and what is left of our rights. Harris, while serving as the San Francisco District Attorney, helped foment the sanctuary mentality that resulted in people being gunned down by illegal aliens! She also is one of the Attorney Generals who wants to prosecute think tanks because they don’t agree with her on climate change while giving Planned Parenthood a pass on selling aborted fetus parts on the black market! I believe Ka-mala Harris is an evil woman and accordingly I am voting for Sanchez.

I am voting for Justin Fareed for Congress. I recog-nize Justin as a bright hope for the future, a marked departure from the politics and policies of his oppo-nent Salud Carbajal who happens to be an Obama appointee. Mr. Carbajal has repeatedly failed us de-spite having ample opportunity to fight for a sustaina-ble water supply, better jobs for the working poor, and limiting the size and cost of government ser-vices. Fareed, on the other hand, offers a fresh start and a much needed break from career politicians.

With respect to the State Assembly races, I am sup-porting Ed Fuller in the 37th Assembly District and Jor-dan Cunningham in the 35th. Both Fuller, an inde-pendent, and Cunningham, a republican, are common sense candidates that will serve to return the legisla-ture’s focus to solving problems instead of the absurd

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Analysis Of California's 17 Ballot Propositions

By Andy Caldwell

voting yes.

Proposition 53 prohibits the legislature from issuing or selling bonds without voter approval if the bond amount exceeds $2 billion. This proposition does not affect local projects, the University of CA, freeway construction or measures to address natural disas-ters. What it does do is keep unaccountable politi-cians and bureaucrats from spending money voters never authorized on boondoggle projects. Vote yes!

Proposition 54 is the best proposition on the ballot and is long overdue! Quite simply, it prohibits the leg-islature from passing any bill unless and until it has been printed and published giving the public 72 hours notice before being voted on! It also requires the leg-islature to make audiovisual recordings of their pro-ceedings and post them on the internet. Vote yes!

Proposition 55 is the result of yet another broken promise by California special interests groups as it extends a so-called temporary tax another 12 years! This tax has a severe impact on small busi-ness owners who get taxed on the gross income of their business albeit the measure is presented crassly as a class-warfare tax on rich people! The fiscal im-pact of this measure will result in a $100 billion hit to our economy! It extends Prop. 30 which was sup-posed to be a temporary tax hike to see us out of the 2008 recession. Extending it another 12 years is in-sult to injury considering the fact that our government initiated no meaningful reforms to curb pension debt and address infrastructure deficits in the mean-time. In other words, the more money you send to Sacramento, the more ways they manage to squan-der the same since they are not being forced to tight-en their belt or pay down their obligations! Please cut them off of this gravy train by voting no on Prop. 55!

Proposition 56 increases cigarette taxes by $2.00 per pack with equivalent increases on other smoking products including electronic cigarettes and vaping products. This measure is actually counterproductive to public health because vaping is considered 95% safer than smoking cigarettes. Accordingly, the rela-tive affordability of vaping products has encouraged millions of Americans to quit smoking! This measure is indicative of an addiction, an addiction to taxes by any number of special interest groups that no longer have the health and well-being of the public in mind. Vote no.

(Continued on page 18)

Page 17 Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine

You might think it’s too early to share my opinions

on the November election, however, the fact of the matter is upwards of half of the voters will be casting their ballots in the next week or so! I do want to re-mind the readers that these are my personal recom-mendations as COLAB does not endorse candi-dates.

In the meantime, I highly recommend a great refer-ence www.ballotpedia.org. It offers an analysis of each ballot measure which is vital in light of the fact that many of these measures are difficult to under-stand and in some cases deliberately deceptive.

Finally, on a side note, I don’t encourage voters to vote early because a lot can change in the last few weeks of an election cycle, but be that as it may, here are my personal recommendations on this year’s bal-lot measures.

Proposition 51 would raise $9 billion in general obliga-tion bonds for schools. This is problematic on a num-ber of fronts. First off, these bonds encumber the State General Fund and when you add the interest, this measure is going to cost upwards of $18 billion by the time the bonds are paid off. It is most unfortunate that voters think bonds are free money. They aren’t. They have to be paid off meaning we can’t afford other things, like repairing our roads and free-ways, or maintaining adequate capacity in our state prisons. Moreover, our state has already borrowed hundreds of billions of dollars in the last 15 years by way of State and local bond measures in order to build schools with no end in sight.

The reason the schools keep borrowing all this money in spite of receiving nearly half of all property tax reve-nues is because they can’t afford to pay for their pen-sion obligations. In essence, this is a shell game of fooling the voters into ostensibly paying extra for buildings when in reality they are subsidizing pen-sions. I am voting no on Prop. 51.

Proposition 52 is a bit difficult to understand. Howev-er, in a nutshell, this proposition keeps in place a hos-pital fee that secures $3 billion per year in matching money from the feds to help pay for care for poor peo-ple. The reason this ballot measure is on the ballot has to do with the fact that the State Legislature was stealing some of the federal monies for other purpos-es! Prop. 51 keeps the program in place while keep-ing the legislature’s hand out of the cookie jar. I am

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Analysis Of California's 17 Ballot Propositions

By Andy Caldwell

Proposition 63 is a superfluous gun control measure that has already been addressed by legislation al-ready signed into law earlier this year. It accomplish-es nothing constructive in stemming gun violence by gang bangers and terrorists who care not that killing people is already against the law. Vote no.

Proposition 64 legalizes marijuana use while raising taxes on both cultivation and retail sales. This meas-ure is dangerous to our society on a number of lev-els. Whereas, I don’t oppose the use of marijuana for authentic medical purposes including treating cancer patients, it is another thing altogether to acquiesce to people getting high. How so? First, driving under the influence fatalities have skyrocketed in the states which have approved similar measures. Second, there are serious long term consequences to mental health from smoking marijuana including the onset of schizophrenia in some. Third, when something becomes legal for adults it sends a message to chil-dren that the activity must be okay. This means more kids, who are particularly vulnerable to deleterious consequences due to their stage of development, will be encouraged to experiment. Vote No!

Proposition 65 redirects the state-mandated fees on grocery carry-out bags from the pockets of grocers and other retailers to the Wildlife Conservation Board. The $400 million per year generated by the bag fees can then be used to address drought condi-tions in our forests, increase clean drinking water sup-plies, beach cleanup, and other worthwhile endeav-ors. If voters don’t see fit to repeal bag fees altogeth-er (see Prop 67) at least this measure potentially makes better use of the money, so I am voting yes.

Proposition 67 repeals a proposed state-wide plastic bag ban on all retail outlets- not just large grocery stores. Plastic bags happen to be recyclable and re-usable- what’s not to love? The main argument we have heard over the years is that plastic bags threat-en sea creatures but that is a myth based upon a study having to do with plastic fishing gear not plastic bags! Morever, the fees charged by retailers for pa-per bags is nothing less than a punitive tax on con-sumers which is costing them billions of dollars. Fi-nally, there are legitimate health concerns associated with reusable bags that can’t and shouldn’t be ig-nored. Vote No! First Published in the Santa Barbara News Press

Page 18 Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine

Proposition 57 invites you to release another 25,000 felons from State prison before their sentence is up. Whereas, the proponents claim this only applies to non-violent felons, the District Attorneys of our State say otherwise. This all has to do with a previ-ous ballot measure that downgraded serious violent felonies to misdemeanor status. Only in California would we classify rapists, human traffickers, and child molesters as non-violent felons! Vote no!

Proposition 58 effectively repeals Prop. 227 which positively rid our schools of bilingual education. Nu-merous studies and test results that compare the re-sults of English immersion vs bilingual education points to the conclusion that our current policies of immersion work best for everyone involved! Vote no on Prop. 58.

Proposition 59 is a feel-good advisory vote that serves to encourage a constitutional amendment to overturn a Supreme Court decision affecting campaign contri-butions. There is no doubt big money is used to influ-ence the outcome of elections, however, both republi-can and democratic interests are equally guilty. I say play on! Vote no on Proposition 59.

Proposition 60 says a lot about California politics, pri-orities and values as it asks voters to require porn stars to wear condoms! This measure is an embar-rassment to the initiative process. I personally don’t care how people vote on this measure as the people engaged in this industry need more help than a con-dom will provide.

Proposition 61 is seriously flawed. It attempts to tie the cost of prescription drugs purchased with state dollars to the price that the Veteran’s administration pays for the same meds. It is opposed by Veteran’s groups, the California Medical Association and the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers association because the measure is virtually guaranteed to either backfire on vets, patients and taxpayers, if not all three groups! Vote no.

Proposition 62 and Prop 66 are tied together. Prop. 62 repeals the death penalty, whereas, Proposition 66 mends it! Knowing that more people die on Califor-nia’s death row from old age than by execution, we should be changing our laws to facilitate executions instead of eliminating the penalty altogether. Vote no on 62 and yes on 66.

(Continued from page 17)

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Hypocrisy, Thy Name Is Jerry Brown Cont.

passed SB 32.

And Gov. Brown signed it, along with the companion bill, AB 197.

The CARB designed the flawed cap-and-trade sys-tem, and set up carbon auctions, which do nothing to clean the supposedly dirty air we breathe – it’s just a big taxing scheme. Carbon trading is actually emis-sions trading by businesses forced into these “agreements.”

Cap and trade allows large corporations (deemed “polluters”), such as the gas and oil industry, to contin-uing doing business as long as they buy carbon cred-its – also known as “offsets.”

The actual goal for the California Air Resources Board

(Continued on page 21)

Page 19 Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine

first state to request an “innovation waiver” – a loop-hole in the Affordable Care Act—to expand coverage to illegal aliens as along as the state (taxpayers) pay the extra costs under Covered CA, the state Obamac-are exchange. This is expected to cost California tax-payers at least an additional $2 billion annually.

Less ‘Swag’ For Legal CA Residents

You may remember AB 32—in 2006, then-Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed this dubious climate-change legislation called California’s Global Warming Solutions Act.

AB 32 required the California Air Resources Board to develop new regulations and create “market mecha-nisms” to reduce California’s greenhouse gas emis-sions to 1990 levels, by 2020. But government cannot create “market mechanisms” – only the private sector really can, because market mechanisms are supply and demand. When government gets involved, it ma-nipulates naturally created demand.

AB 32 was supposed to be based on real climate sci-ence that proved that unless dangerous greenhouse gas emissions levels were reduced, the earth’s at-mosphere would diminish and we’d all die.

But at the crux of the issue is altered data and sci-ence. The data originally produced by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change scien-tists in the 1990s were altered by government bureau-crats in order to create a crisis, as well as a demand.

Ironically, California already achieved the lower emis-sions goals largely through advanced automobile technology. But no government program or agency goes away. So now a new bill, SB 32, calls for even further reductions bumped now to 40 percent below 1990 levels, by 2030. They keep moving the goal posts.

Both AB 32 and SB 32 essentially authorize the Cali-fornia Air Resources Board unlimited power to regu-late and even tax businesses without Legislative over-sight.

The same bill had been attempted and killed last ses-sion, because a group of “moderate Democrats” from economically depressed districts opposed it. This year, after receiving phone calls from the White House putting pressure on them to tow the Party line on climate change, these “moderates” voted for and

(Continued from page 3)

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Independent Optometrists

inside Costco Santa Maria

805-925-1092

San Luis Obispo

805-544-0450

California’s Roads Improve, But Still Are Troubled According To New Study Cont.

Development Committee – during a special session designed to come up with additional funding for transportation programs – reported that “54 of California’s 58 counties have an average pavement rating of ‘poor’ or ‘at risk,’ with much of this deterioration occurring over the past six years.”

Reason found California to top the national charts on bridge condition, but the state Senate pointed to 3,000 “structurally deficient bridges.” The committee pointed to an expected doubling of freight moved on California’s freeways (from 2002 to 2035), to suggest that the state’s infrastructure will face an accelerated level of deterioration.

The session failed to come up with a long-term funding solution, but that will no doubt be a top item for the Legislature next year. Steven Greenhut is Senior Fellow and Western Region Director for the R Street Institute.

Page 20 Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine

nationwide.

One of the survey’s authors, Reason Senior Fellow David T. Hartgen, told me Caltrans didn’t do anything dramatic between 2012 and 2013 to explain the rating improvement – but it did improve a significant number of bridges and roadways.

“A widening performance gap seems to be emerging between most states that are making progress and a few states that are finding it difficult to improve,” according to the report’s authors. “There is also increasing evidence that higher-level road systems (Interstates, other freeways and principal arterials) are in better shape than lower-level road systems, particularly local roads.”

The good news: California is among those states that are improving. The bad news: It has an extremely long way to go to reduce congestion and bring state and local roads up to snuff. On a controversial note, California’s recently released transportation plan seems to downplay the importance of expanding the state’s highway and road infrastructure.

The “California Transportation Plan 2040” focuses more on battling climate change than on expanding the state’s already clogged network of highways. “By 2040, California will have completed an integrated rail system linking every major region in the state, with seamless one-ticket transfers to local transit,” wrote Transportation Secretary Brian Kelly.

“Responding to the desires of millennials and aging baby boomers alike, we will further invest in complete, safe pedestrian and bicycle networks,” Kelly added. He also promised a new approach toward lowering maintenance costs on roads and bridges. But the state’s blueprint relies heavily on alternative transportation sources, rather than on freeways and road construction, given the “transportation system must do its part to reduce these threats (climate change) to our environment and health.”

Other reports paint a mostly gloomy picture of California’s transportation situation. Last year, the Senate Transportation and Infrastructure

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Page 21: October Issue: ELECTION EDITIONcolabsbcdev.azurewebsites.net/.../Upload/Newsletter/COLAB_Mag_1… · California's 17 Ballot Propositions 17 Inside the October Issue: October 2016

Volume 4 Issue 10 COLAB Magazine Page 21

Hypocrisy, Thy Name Is Jerry Brown Cont.

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is to redistribute money from wealthier legislative districts to poorer legislative districts via the cap-and-trade taxing scheme. Naturally, those lawmakers from the poorer legislative districts were convinced to vote for SB 32 with the promise that more money would flow into their district, and for which they can take the credit.

What IS Cap and Trade?

The “cap” in cap-and-trade is the legal limit on the quantity of green-

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house gases a business can emit each year, and “trade” means that companies can swap or trade emission permits among each other.

Prior to California developing a cap-and-trade program, one of the most important environmental programs tied to theUnited Nations Agenda 21, was the U.S. cap-and-trade legislation.

But when the cap-and-trade legislation failed to pass in the U.S. Senate, the Environmental Protection Agency instead took it upon itself to regulate greenhouse gases, ignoring Congress.

California is a Failure at Business

The CARB’s quarterly emission auctions have been dismal failures. The May auction only brought in $10 mil-lion, with the Air Resources Board anticipating hundreds of millions in “revenues.” The August auction gar-nered a little bit more, but was in no way successful. For that we should be thankful.

However, none of this failure has deterred Jerry Brown, who had counted on using the cap and trade revenue to fund his High Speed Train to Nowhere. Without it, he instead doubled down on Climate Change woo-woo taxing schemes, rather than choosing to act like the adult in charge of one of the largest economies in the world.

Apparently the 9,000 California companies which moved their headquarters or diverted projects to out-of-state locations in the last seven years because of California’s “hostile business environment” is not the environment Jerry Brown is interested in. Slapping businesses, property owners and taxpayers with additional costs and regulations imposed by CARB bureaucrats and illegal aliens’ healthcare costs is.

Hypocrisy, thy name is Jerry Brown. Katy Grimes, Investigative Reporter and Senior Correspondent at FLASHREPORT