ELECTION 2013 - When the Los Angeles Times editorial board called Proposition C “a primal scream” and advised voters to cast a “no” vote, they did something so colossally out of step with the city they are charged with covering and so needlessly incendiary that it has warranted a spotlight and a response.
The entirety of the Op Ed can be found here.
Prop C was written by the City Attorney, voted on to the ballot by the City Council (11-1) and has been endorsed by every candidate running for every office in the May 21st city election (Garcetti and Gruel, Feuer and Trutanich, Galperin and Zine, and all the candidates in all the council races.)
In fact, if one were to search the Official Sample Ballot for the argument against Prop C, all that would be found is the line on page 20 “No Argument Against This Measure Was Submitted.”
And yet The LA Times, writing on April 29th, concluded that “Proposition C is essentially a primal scream about the role of corporate (and other) money in politics. But its message would be a muddled one.”
Supporters of the measure, like me, were stunned by the dismissive tone and a little less surprised at the mischaracterization (has there ever been a more straightforward ballot measure in the history of California?), but found it very curious that the LA Times had gone out of its way to go on the record as the only voice in Los Angeles in opposition. Why?
City Council Member Richard Alarcon was asked this question at a Prop C event in Mt. Washington last weekend: “What was The Times thinking?” “I don’t know what they were thinking,” he replied, “but I know it was about money.”
Many of us had reached the same conclusion. Letters to the Editor were written en masse. We even organized a march on the Times’ downtown building which we dubbed “Operational Primal Scream” that did include some cathartic screaming.
The Times heard us apparently, because on Friday, May 17th, they doubled down with an online article by LAT contributor Michael McGough, who has a long history covering legal issues. Noting that “The Times may be right or wrong on Proposition C,” Mr. McGough then makes all their original arguments and more before again urging voters to vote “no,” sounding more like Charles Barkley’s 2003 book title “I May Be Wrong, But I Doubt It,” than anyone genuinely considering the possibility of being in error.
The full text of that article is here.
Mr McGough’s opening line is “The Times editorial board offended some liberal readers when it urged a no vote on Prop C…” This is an assumption on a mission. Is there any more eviscerating pejorative in today’s American Corporate Media Complex (ACMC) than “liberal?” Is there anything that discredits an argument or idea so thoroughly in the ACMC than to say it comes from “liberals?”
It is also an erroneous assumption. The Times can’t possibly know the political ideology of the readers who voiced their displeasure, but they could have done the math.
In Colorado and Montana, statewide, non-binding (like LA’s) ballot measures in November of 2012, calling for an end to the twin fictions of “corporate personhood” and “money equals speech” passed with over 70% of the vote in both states. Colorado was a hotly contested swing state that wound up going for President Obama by a little over four percentage points and Mitt Romney carried Montana with 55% of the vote, proving that this issue is not about ideology.
The article also featured UC Irvine law school dean Erwin Chemerinsky, who is becoming the go to guy when corporations want to make the case that they should have Constitutional rights (see, even “liberals” think corporations are people) citing concerns over the “[T]aking of property by the government, for example, triggers constitutional protections including from a corporation."
Hard to know here whether Prof. Chemerinsky is concerned here about the 4th Amendment protection from searches and seizures or the “takings clause” of the 5th Amendment, but corporate claims of 4th Amendment protections from searches and seizures is why we are struggling to inspect and regulate everything from unsafe conditions for workers to unsafe methods of food production, and it’s killing people, literally.
If it’s the “takings clause” that concerns him, perhaps he should review Kelo v. New London, the 5 to 4, 2006 SCOTUS decision that upheld the right of the city of New London, Ct. to transfer land from one private owner to another for the purposes of economic development. Is he suggesting that corporations should be insulated from this (arguably terrible) decision and be granted more rights than people?
The Times and Mr. Chemerinsky argue that legislation is the way to solve the corrupting influence of money in our political processes, but the Times chose not to interview any of the many legal scholars who would point out that as long as corporations have 1st Amendment rights, and money equals speech, no legislation that is passed will hold up in the courts.
The current arrangement works out very nicely for Media Corporations. Revised estimates are that an astonishing 7 billion dollars was spent on the 2012 election cycle (up from an earlier estimate of 6.28.)
A conservative projection would be that the ACMC received half that amount, or 3.5 billion dollars in advertising revenue and those numbers are only trending up. Owning media in the post Citizens United age is an investment as impervious to economic vicissitudes as a funeral home. Council Member Alarcon’s assessment of The Times’ motivation is dead on.
It’s therefore unsurprising that that The Tribune Company would urge its Los Angeles readers not to prune its money tree and the company took the opportunity on Sunday (5/19) to make their strangest argument so far. In telling Angelenos how to vote on Prop C for a third time they claim that “[T]his measure… serves only to take the wind out of the sails of those working for real-world solutions to keep political money in its place.”
Passage of Proposition C will do exactly the reverse. It will put the wind at the backs of those seeking to make politicians and corporations accountable to the people.
It’s also no secret that The Tribune Company is looking to sell the Los Angeles Times (and a number of other newspapers in strategically interesting markets like Orlando, Florida and Hartford, Connecticut) and would certainly want its holdings to appear attractive to a potential buyer. A “no” vote on Prop C would prove that Angelenos are persuadable and not as unruly as has been reported.
Be unruly. Vote.
(Michele Sutter is a volunteer organizer with The Money Out Voters In Coalition and lives in Venice.)
-cw
CityWatch
Vol 11 Issue 41
Pub: May 21, 2013
