Ventura most closely matches California elections

And so goes California

• The interesting thing to me is how the rather wealthy middle class of California has completely abandoned the GOP.
• Solid middle class areas all over the state from Sacramento to Ventura, Santa Barbara, Palm Springs, Glendale and San Diego have thrown the GOP overboard and elected Democrats to the state legislature and to Congress.
• The super rich in the Bay Area & Los Angeles vote Democrat. The poor districts vote Democrat. If the GOP can't even manage to appeal to middle class voters then the party is over.

(Sacramento Bee)  -  Pollsters and campaign consultants trying to discern California’s true bellwether for political proclivities may want to look no further than Ventura.

In last November’s election, the city of 108,000 was one of five where voters matched the preferences of California as a whole for all 19 statewide contests – president, U.S. Senate, and 17 ballot measures, according to the California Secretary of State’s recently released supplement to the statement of vote.

Moreover, Ventura’s vote totals differed from the statewide numbers by less than 1.4 percentage points per statewide contest on average.

In the campaign for Proposition 53, which sought to require a public vote on revenue bonds of $2 billion or more, 50.8 percent of Ventura voters voted no, just 0.2 percentage points more than the 50.6 percent overall no vote. For Proposition 55, which extended higher income taxes on wealthy filers, 63.6 percent of Ventura voters backed it, slightly above the initiative’s 63.3 percent approval statewide.

The largest disparity came in the race for president, where 58.3 percent of Ventura voters supported Democrat Hillary Clinton. Clinton carried California with 61.7 percent of the vote, 3.4 percentage points more. About 34.6 percent of city voters preferred Republican Donald Trump, roughly 3 percentage points above his statewide total.

Pleasanton, Monrovia, Martinez and La Mesa were also 19-for-19 on the November ballot measures, with 16 other cities 18-for-19 and 43 cities 17-for-19.

Besides Ventura, the cities with vote percentages most in line with statewide tallies were Monrovia, Gilroy, La Mesa and West Sacramento.

For a microcosm of non-California, on the other hand, head to Taft. Voters in the Kern County city of 9,500 duplicated the statewide outcome on just seven contests. And when it came to total percentage point disparity, voters in Berkeley strayed a whopping 448.4 percentage points from the 19 statewide tallies.

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article144056054.html#storylink=cpy

Read More . . . .

The Golden State Olden Days
President Ronald Reagan (R-California) with Ventura GOP
Congressman Bob Lagomarsino in the center and some pussy no new
taxes liar on the right.  Now Ventura is represented by Democrats.

Ventura, Calif. - The Best Place in America to Live

California has the top ten counties in the United States to live

• Ventura County, Humboldt, Santa Barbara, Mendocino and Del Norte are the top five counties in the United States.  Followed by 6 to 10:  San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, Monterey and Orange Counties.
• These studies are always subjective.  For example, beautiful San Luis Obispo County only ranks #21 while super, overpopulated Los Angeles ranks #7.  Still just about any California county rightly ranks higher than most of the rest of the U.S.

By Christopher Ingraham

(Washington Post)  -  Ventura County, Calif., is the absolute most desirable place to live in America.

I know this because in the late 1990s the federal government devised a measure of the best and worst places to live in America, from the standpoint of scenery and climate. The "natural amenities index" is intended as "a measure of the physical characteristics of a county area that enhance the location as a place to live."

The index combines "six measures of climate, topography, and water area that reflect environmental qualities most people prefer." Those qualities, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, include mild, sunny winters, temperate summers, low humidity, topographic variation, and access to a body of water.

These "natural aspects of attractiveness," as the USDA describes them, are intended to be constant and relatively immutable. They're not expected to change much over time, so the USDA hasn't updated its data beyond the initial 1999 scoring. "Natural amenities pertain to the physical rather than the social or economic environment," the USDA writes. Things like plants, animals or the human environment are excluded by definition. "We can measure the basic ingredients, not how these ingredients have been shaped by nature and man." I stumbled on these numbers after reading about a recent study linking natural amenities to religiosity. (U.S. counties with nicer weather and surroundings tend to have less religious residents.)

I've mapped all the counties above according to where they rank on the natural amenities index -- mouse over to check out how desirable (or not) your own county is. You'll see that Sun Belt counties fare pretty well -- especially ones in California and Colorado. In fact, every single one of the 10 highest-ranked counties is located in California. After Ventura County, Humboldt, Santa Barbara, Mendocino and Del Norte counties round out the top five.

Ranking of counties in America based on the quality of life.
High quality is in blue.

By contrast, the Great Lakes region fares poorly, with most of the lowest rankings clustered around the Minnesota/North Dakota border region -- hey there, Fargo! The absolute worst place to live in America is (drumroll please) ... Red Lake County, Minn. (claim to fame: "It is the only landlocked county in the United States that is surrounded by just two neighboring counties," according to the county Web site).

Now, if you spend even a few minutes with the map above you can probably find a few things to quibble with in the methodology. If you hate summer, like me, it may seem that there's an inordinate emphasis on warm weather and ample sunshine. How else to explain that Inyo County, Calif. -- home to Death Valley, a place so inhospitable to human life that it literally has death in its name -- ranks so much higher than, say, the bucolic rolling hillsides of New England?

Or that Maricopa County, Ariz. -- home to Phoenix, a place that feels like the inside of a hot car for half the year -- ranks higher than Iowa's stunningly beautiful and criminally underappreciated Loess Hills region? Or that Washington D.C. -- home of sweltering summers, miserable winters, swampy humidity and little natural beauty to speak of -- ranks higher than any place at all?

On the other hand, it turns out that this index correlates well with a lot of human behaviors that researchers and politicians are constantly trying to understand better. For instance, the USDA's original report on the natural amenities index found that these measures "drive rural population change." The USDA found that rural areas with a lot of natural amenities saw the greatest population change between 1970 and 1996.

"The relationship is quite strong," the study found. "Counties with extremely low scores on the scale tended to lose population over the 1970-96 period, while counties with extremely high scores tended to double their populations over the period."

Read More . . . . .

San Francisco ranks #6 in the U.S.

San Diego ranks at #8 in the U.S.

Democrat Joe Baca switches to GOP

Former Congressman Joe Baca

The GOP welcomes Joe Baca

• The former Chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus leaves the Democrat Party.
• Meanwhile, a former GOP Assemblyman goes to work for the Democrats.

(Sacramento Bee)  -  Two former state legislators from Southern California switched political teams, so to speak, last week.

Former Assemblyman Jeff Gorell, a Ventura County Republican who made a strong bid for Congress last year, challenging Democratic Rep. Julia Brownley, was chosen by Eric Garcetti, the Democratic mayor of Los Angeles, to be a deputy mayor handling homeland security and public safety issues.

Joe Baca, who was a Democratic assemblyman, senator and congressman for several decades, representing San Bernardino County, announced that he was switching parties and becoming a Republican.

Gorell brings his experience as a Ventura County prosecutor and a military intelligence officer to his new position, which pays $182,768 a year. By accepting Garcetti’s appointment, he passes up an opportunity to run for the Ventura County Board of Supervisors next year.

Baca was a “blue dog” Democrat in Congress, often at odds with liberals. He said his switch of parties “follows my core Christian values and how I voted the majority of the time.”

It also follows two losses to Democratic rivals in congressional races in 2012 and 2014.  Read More . . . .

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article24516031.html#storylink=cpy

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article24516031.html#storylink=cRead More . . . . 

Paychecks Always Come First
Former GOP Assemblyman Jeff Gorell abandons his Ventura County
voters to go to work for the Democrat Mayor of Los Angeles. 

SHOCK - 530 votes apart with 52,000 ballots to be counted

GOP Assemblyman Jeff Gorell
Jeff is a Lt. Commander in the Navy Reserve.

It Ain't Over Yet

• This is one of those solid middle class districts that are a must win if the GOP is to continue to exist as a viable party.
• What is shocking is how narrow the race is when the GOP has everything in the world going for them. That speaks loudly about how middle class voters look at the GOP.

Update  -  The Republican is losing ground in the counting and in now 1,000 plus votes behind.

In one of the nation’s closest and most closely watched races for the House of Representatives, Democrat Rep. Julia Brownley is locked in a tight contest with Republican Assemblyman Jeff Gorell to represent the 26th Congressional District which includes Ventura County and western Los Angeles County.

Semi-official results from Tuesday’s election showed Brownley with 50.2 percent of the vote, with 63,811 votes, to Gorell’s returns of 49.8 percent and 63,281 votes — a margin of 530 votes.

Gorell has refused to concede the election, which became a battleground race in the national contest between Republicans and Democrats over control of the House reports the Los Angeles Daily News.

Both sides have observers looking to oversee the processing of uncounted ballots. Officials estimate there are more than 52,000 vote-by-mail and provisional ballots left to be tallied.

“We won election night and are confident we will win when the process is played out,” Brownley spokeswoman Rachel Estrada said. “But we do want to make sure all votes are counted.”

Gorell aides said they also will be closely monitoring the processing of the ballots.

Republicans have been in control of the House but were looking to expand their numbers to beyond the record 246 it had at the end of World War II.

Democrats put a lot of money and effort in trying to keep Brownley in office including a get-out-the-vote rally last week with former President Bill Clinton in a district with a long history of being represented by Republicans.

Jessica Levinson, a professor at Loyola Law School and an expert in campaign law, said she believes the Brownley-Gorell race says more about the district.

“I think it is an example of having a competitive district in an area that has always been more right of center,” Levinson said. “I think, from the start, everyone thought this would be a toss-up race and Gorell has proven to be a palatable Republican for California.”

Latino Republican backed in open Assembly seat

Mario for Assembly.com

The Big Bucks Are Pouring In

• Independent groups have spent $534,000 so far to elect Latino Republican Mario de la Piedra to an open State Assembly seat.

With only days before the primary election, the campaign for Ventura County's open 44th Assembly District has become a million-dollar contest -- $1.18 million, to be exact.

Reports filed with the secretary of state on Thursday show that the three candidates -- Democrat Jacqui Irwin and Republicans Mario de la Piedra and Rob McCoy -- have combined to take in more than $600,000 in contributions and special interest groups have spent $534,000.
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All of the independent expenditures made by interest groups have been in support of de la Piedra.With only one Democrat on the ballot, it is likely the key decision to be made by voters on June 3 will be to select which of the two Republicans will advance to the general election in November to face Irwin reports McClatchy-Tribune News.
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Republican Rob McCoy
Endorsed by Rand Paul & Tom McClintock

The 44th District, which includes Thousand Oaks, Moorpark, Camarillo, Oxnard and Port Hueneme, is expected to be one of the most competitive legislative races in California this year. The seat became open when incumbent Republican Jeff Gorell decided to run for the House of Representatives.
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The reports show Irwin is the leading fundraiser, having taken in $315,295 in contributions this year, including $153,878 during the most recent reporting period, from March 18 through May 17. As she geared up for the election over the past two months, Irwin also has been a prolific spender, reporting expenditures of $255,288 over the period. Those expenditures left her with an account balance of $49,235.
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McCoy took in $103,152 in contributions over the period, bringing his year-to-date fundraising total to $219,452. He reported $167,264 in expenditures. Because his expenditures include $68,121 in unpaid bills, he was able to end the period with a substantial balance in his account, $93,330.
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De la Piedra, the last to enter the race when he filed just before the early March deadline, continues to lag behind in fundraising. He reported $72,987 in contributions over the two-month period, to bring his total contributions this year to $106,883.
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He spent $77,170 during the period, to end it with an account balance of $61,468.

44th State Assembly District
West of Los Angeles, Ventura County's 44th Assembly District is a "swing" seat that is 38% Democrat, 36% Republican and 26% Independents and smaller political parties.