Long time California Libertarian Party activist and IPR writer Gene Berkman writes at California Libertarian Report:
California’s recently implemented “Top Two” all party primary system has created an unusual situation in this year’s contest for U.S. Senate. With Senator Barbara Boxer retiring, voters selected as their top two candidates for November two Democrats. California Attorney-General Kamala Harris, endorsed by the California Democratic Party, faces a challenge from Rep. Loretta Sanchez, who represents Anaheim, Santa Ana, Orange and Garden Grove in the U.S. Congress.
Republicans and Libertarians are shut out of this Senate race by the top two primary; many plan to skip this race in November. But Independents, Republicans and Libertarians should consider Rep. Sanchez because of her record in Congress.
Rep. Sanchez voted against the Authorization for Use of Military Force in Iraq. The AUMF provided a legal justification for George W Bush’s war on Iraq. The pre-emptive invasion of Iraq was justified by claims that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction and claims of ties to Al Qaida. Both claims have been proved false. The war has resulted in nearly 5000 American casualties, more than 40,000 wounded Americans, and trillions of dollars in new federal debt to pay for a war of choice.
In voting against a pre-emptive war on Iraq, Rep. Sanchez split with many leaders of the Democratic Party. Sen. Hilary Clinton, Sen. Joe Biden, Sen. John Kerry, Sen. John Edwards and Sen. Joe Lieberman all voted in favor of Bush’s war.
In the wake of the 9/11 terror attack, The Bush administration proposed the Patriot Act, to provide new powers to the federal government to investigate questionable activity, in the hopes of stopping future attacks. Opponents, including Rep. Ron Paul, warned of the threat to the freedom of all Americans. Rep. Loretta Sanchez voted against the Patriot act, along with Ron Paul and a minority of Congress. Sen. Hilary Clinton joined with 48 other Democrats and 49 Republicans and one Independent to pass the Patriot Act in the Senate.
In the last year of the Bush Administration, a speculative bubble fed by low interest rates maintained by the Federal Reserve, posed a threat to major financial institutions that took part in the bubble. President Bush and Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson proposed a $700 billion tax funded bailout of major banks. Rep. Loretta Sanchez voted against the bailout of the banks, again breaking with Democrat leaders including Sen. Barack Obama, Sen. Hilary Clinton, Sen. Joe Biden and others who voted to give $700 billion in taxpayers money to badly managed banks.
In her votes against the Iraq War, the Patriot Act and the Bank Bailout, Rep. Loretta Sanchez sided with Rep. Ron Paul, and voted in opposition to Sen. Hilary Clinton. Rep. Loretta Sanchez is the best choice in California’s Senate race. We hope that Libertarians, Republicans and Independents will join with antiwar Democrats to elect Loretta Sanchez on November 8, 2016.
This is not to judge whether TARP was right or wrong…
Well, this is: TARP was a perfect example of the bipartisan commitment to plutocracy, and an obvious violation of libertarian principles. If someone “borrows” money from you without your permission, that’s theft, even if they later pay it back.
I remember the Republican’s dismissing Dornan’s challenge. I also remember conservative commentators (e.g., Rush Limbaugh) saying the Republicans caved because they were afraid to publicly oppose a Latina woman. The GOP dismissed Dornan’s claim for political reasons, not for legal reasons.
When Loretta Sanchez defeated Rep. Bob Dornan in 1996, Mr Dornan challenged the election, claiming that non-citizens, including possibly illegal aliens, had voted in the election. A 13 month investigation did show some non-citizens had voted, but not enough to change the results of the election. A committee with a Republican majority voted 8 to 1 to dismiss Rep. Dornan’s challenge
http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/1998/02/13/cq/sanchez.html
Of course these three issues are cherry picked. All three involve expansion of government power, and in all three cases Democrats joined with Republicans to expand government power.
The Iraq War and the Patriot Act are particularly important because after November, we will have a President firmly committed to international political and military interventionism. See my overview of Hilary Clinton’s interventionist record @ https://calibertarianreport.com/2016/10/03/tim-kaines-bogus-antiwar-appeal/
Yes, Rep. Sanchez has talked about Islamic extremists, some of whom have resorted to terrorist acts. She might be overestimating popular support among Muslims for Jihad, or maybe not. But it certainly is an issue that needs to be dealt with. Her worries about Islamic extremism did not cause her to vote for the Iraq War or the Patriot Act, and fear of Islamic terrorism was used to promote support for both Bush initiatives.
“who voted to give $700 billion in taxpayers money to badly managed banks.”
As I recall, the amount of TARP going to the banks was more on the order of $250 billion and it wasn’t “given.” It came with payback strings attached and the taxpayers eventually profited by more than $25 billion. This is not to judge whether TARP was right or wrong, but to clear up a common misconception among conservatives and libertarians of how it operated vis a vis the banks.
Would Mr. Winger and/or Mr/Ms RTAA like to submit an article regarding their endorsements/recommendations in this race? Any other prominent California Libertarians?
It would need to be a state constitutional amendment, so the higher number of signatures would be needed.
I won’t be voting in the California US Senate race. Polls show approximately 25% of the people who cast a vote expect to leave US Senate blank. A massive number of voters who show up, but leave the ballot blank, will be a vote against the top-two system. I urge every Californian to leave this race blank.
“Republicans and Libertarians are shut out of this Senate race by the top two primary; many plan to skip this race in November. ”
I have brought this up here before, but I am going to bring it up again for anyone here who forgot, or anyone here who missed this when I brought it up on the past.
This election cycle presents the best opportunity to repeal Top Two Primary in California that we may have via the ballot initiative process. Why?
1) The petition signature requirement in California dropped to the lowest level it has been at in 20 plus years due to low voter turn out in the 2014 Governors race (they base the petitioning requirements in California on how many people vote in the Governors race).
2) A law was recently passed in California that is going to automatically register everyone who has a California drivers license or state ID card, to vote, if they are legally qualified to vote (this will add millions of people to the California voter rolls).
Voter turn out is likely going to increase in the 2018 California Governors race, and this will mean that petition signature requirements will shoot up for putting issues (or candidates) on the ballot from 2020-2022, and they may never go back down as low as they are right now.
So if Libertarians and other supporters of minor parties and independent candidates, as well as anyone else who is upset over the unfair Top Two Primary law (I would imagine that some Republicans must be unhappy with this law now being that because of Top Two Primary, the only choices for US Senate in the general election are two Democrats), want to repeal Top Two Primary, this may be the best opportunity to do it, so it would be wise to strike while the iron is hot.
Getting an initiative to repeal Top Two Primary on the ballot, even under the reduced signature requirement from low voter turn out in 2014, would still be a pretty big job. I think that an initiative like this would have to be a constitution amendment, which means getting it on the ballot would require 585,407 valid petition signatures. If it could be done as a statutory initiative, the requirement is 365,880 valid petition signatures.
I would hope that Libertarians and Greens and supporters of other minor parties and independents would volunteer and contribute money for an initiative like this in California, and I would hope that Libertarians and Greens and other supporters of minor party and independent candidates around the nation would kick in money as well, because this terrible election law in California does have a negative impact on the rest of the nation, and if it could be repealed in California, which is the most populated state, it would strike a major blow against those who want to get Top Two Primary passed in every state (and there is most definitely a movement in place to do this).
If this is going to be done, Libertarians should be the ones who are leading the charge, but regardless of who does it, the plans need to come together in 2017 or it is probably not going to happen. Running a statewide initiative campaign is a lot of work, and if nobody does anything until 2018 it probably will not happen (and remember, after the signature requirements will likely shoot up quite a bit after the 2018 election, which will make it more difficult to get on the ballot). A few million dollars would have to be raised to qualify the initiative for the ballot and to run the Vote Yes campaign for it. The costs could be kept down a bit depending on how many volunteer hours people can do, but even if there are lots of volunteers, the fact of the matter is that it takes money to run a political campaign, so it will still be necessary to raise a few million dollars.
Going by my anecdotal evidence, which is pretty good anecdotal evidence being that I have talked to a lot of people about this in California, I think that an initiative to repeal Top Two Primary would stand a very good chance of passing if it made the ballot. I have not spoken to one person in California who likes Top Two Primary if they knew what it was, or after somebody explained to them what it is, and like I said above, I imagine that having the choice limited for a high profile US Senate race to two Democrats in this election is only going to turn more people against Top Two Primary.
Sanchez also played the anti-Vietnamese card in one of her races, when she was running against a Vietnamese candidate.
She went on Spanish language TV, and told her Spanish audience that the Vietnamese were “trying to take this seat away from us [Latinos].”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WUIgEWwIeeU
Encouraging Latinos to hate Vietnamese. Not nice.
Sanchez’s idiot Native American war whoop:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YxAzkbrbiA
I’ve been following Sanchez ever since she first won (I believe, stole) her House seat. I’ve heard her many sound bites on KFI’s John and Ken Show. The more I hear Sanchez speak, the dumber she sounds. She makes George W. Bush and Donald Trump look and sound like urbane sophisticates.
I don’t plan to vote in the Senate race. But if I did, I’d sooner vote for the Marxist Harris than the sleazy, pro-“national security,” retard Sanchez.
I also recall allegations that Sanchez originally won her House seat through election fraud. I googled, and found articles about those allegations:
http://soundpolitics.com/archives/003321.html
http://wc.arizona.edu/papers/91/108/04_2_m.html
Are these votes a consistent pattern, or isolated cherry picks?
Sanchez has recently been portraying herself as tougher on “national security,” more “anti-terrorist,” and even more anti-Muslim, than her opponent: http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article49136475.html
California Democratic Rep. Loretta Sanchez, a candidate for the U.S. Senate, said as many as 20 percent of Muslims desire to form an Islamic caliphate, “to institute that in any way possible,” and go after Western norms, “our way of life.”
“We know that there is a small group, and we don’t know how big that is – it can be anywhere between 5 and 20 percent, from the people that I speak to – that Islam is their religion and who have a desire for a caliphate and to institute that in any way possible, and in particular go after Western norms,” Sanchez said on the program “PoliticKING with Larry King.”
“They are not content enough to have their way of looking at the world, they want to put their way on everybody in the world,” she added. “And again, I don’t know how big that is, and depending on who you talk to, but they are certainly, they are willing to go to extremes. They are willing to use and they do use terrorism.”
Islam is the world’s second-largest religion with an estimated 1.6 billion adherents, or 23 percent of the world’s population, according to the Pew Research Center. Taking Sanchez’s high estimate, that would be 320 million Muslims want to caliphate and are willing to resort to extremes and terrorism to satisfy their goal. Academics said the number is exceedingly difficult to know because there are no worldwide surveys but they questioned the range she provided as overly broad and likely too high.
Thank you for writing this, Gene. I haven’t had time to research either one. I’ll be voting for Sanchez, as per your recommendation, and will mention this article to my group at our meeting Wednesday.