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Signatures are being collected on an initiative that would allow state regulators to control the price of health insurance. The measure would let the state insurance commissioner reject excessive rate hikes.
The California Legislature voted down a similar measure last year.
The proposal would ban both corporations and labor unions from collecting political funds through “payroll deduction”. Dan Schnur is the former Chair of the California Fair Political Practices Commission and a former Republican strategist. He said in an era of independent expenditure committees, money won’t stop flowing to campaigns. “The great irony is that even if this initiative were to pass, under the current rules for campaign finance, it probably wouldn’t have nearly as much of an impact today as it might of in years past, because it’s so much easier to raise large sums of money from other sources,” said Schnur.
Organizers of the SAFE California campaign say they believe voters are ready to abolish the death penalty and replace it with life in prison without the possibility of parole. The Campaign to collect signatures to place an anti-death penalty initiative on the 2012 ballot was launched across the state, including here in San Diego, today. The initiative is aimed not so much toward saving lives, as redirecting millions spent on death penalty cases to solving more crimes.