So, California Forward has released with fanfare its 1.5 page list of reform ideas.  What a disappointment. Oh, sure they have some good ideas in there, one's long pushed by various organization around the state, including pay as you go, results based budgeting, and a 2-year budget. 

But that is the sugar they hope will mask their fouler ideas:

--eliminate the 2/3 vote requirement to pass a budget.

--eliminate the 2/3 vote requirement to raise taxes and fees.

--eliminate the requirement for public vote on new local fees and taxes.

You can bury that inside a 200lb jelly doughnut and it will still taste like crap.  Those are awful, awful ideas that will remove the protections taxpayers have fought so hard for over the years.  The solution to dysfunction in Sacramento is not to give the legislators more power and less constraints!

The problem is Sacramento is more a political one than an institutional one. A majority of the legislature just cannot stand the fact that there are some limits on their power, that they are not able to simply do what they please and bill the taxpayers for it. Until that changes, all these reforms, all real reforms, are a ship looking for somewhere safe to land.