The Scales of Justice depicts a figure that, in order to achieve a fair measure and balance, is blindfolded. The method of redrawing legislative district lines every decade that is currently in place 
is not a fair measure or balanced. The only blindfold involved is the one that those defending this system try to keep pulled over the voters on this issue. Politicians drawing their own district lines is too great a temptation and self-interest to entrust to them as just a cursory look at the map from 2001 would reveal.
A measure back in the 80’s to remove this self-interest from politicians was defeated after heavy runs of TV ads featuring Jack Lemmon and others. Speaker Willie Brown later cackled about how they pulled a fast one on California voters.
The measure last year with similar goals, Prop 77 was defeated with heavy opposition from Democrat leadership as well as a smattering of Republicans. All sorts of reasons were concocted about the makeup of the panel, 3 retired judges, being too out of touch or too white to draw district lines "fairly." Whatever. This was one of the main reasons to defeat 77 and come back next year and "do it right." That year has come and gone with a half-hearted attempt to do something at the very end of session, with little committee review or public input. Being legislators, many were seeking that term limits extensions would be part of the deal, to sweeten the package for the legislature to do the right thing as a reward for taking away their corrupt system of drawing districts.
Since the need for the reform is due by a timeline that would make it available for the reapportionment to be done after the 2010 census, I suppose legislators and others feel comfortable that there is plenty of time. Which, there is…but the glacial pace at which things move around here, well, you know. Since any measure that changes redistricting will require voter approval constitutionally, either a legislative one or an initiative, we have 2 primaries and 2 general elections, 4 shots at making the 2011 post-census deadline in which these rules need to be in place.
Heaven forbid that any more special elections take place…but wait, what is the Speaker talking about when he says that we need to have a "three part package" that includes with redistricting reform, a term limit change and an earlier January or February Presidential primary for 2008? Can people that call themselves fiscally responsible justify another "horribly expensive statewide special election?" Which will beget yet another statewide election in early 2008 for the Presidential-only primary, then June, then November…hmm, maybe we could have regularly scheduled quarterly elections. Not to mention we just moved the California Prez primary back to June a couple years ago when the March one was declared a failure.
The piece that seems to be typically missing from the argument is the criteria used. You can name panels of 3 judges or 11 citizens or 435 Martians to do the work and someone will find fault with it. 
Isn’t the bigger issue the criteria that is to be followed in drawing lines by whosoever does them? That this criteria is impartial? A group called Voices of Reform says it must have a few things. Bi-partisan input. OK. Transparency. Yup, need more Windex around here. Respecting existing county and city boundary lines and "communities of shared interest." Sounds real good, depending how broadly "shared interest" is defined. And compliance with federal laws on voting rights of minority groups. Of course. All legal US citizens need and deserve the same opportunity to vote. But what they probably mean is the Voting Rights Act, which is a whole other story on how to skew elections in favor of one type of group or candidate over others. Not a blindfolded way of doing business, but instead putting one’s finger on the scale.
The Governor’s proposal sounds like it’s on the right track [as does Mike Villines outline for one] and seeking the legislative solution is commendable. An eleven person panel from a pool nominated by County Clerks and winnowed down to eleven by the legislature would probably work fine. Already, there is flimsy criticism of the Clerks as "being political" as they serve county supervisors that would want to influence the selection of the pool of candidates. Last I looked, the clerks are elected and serve their county citizens that elect them, not at the whim of the supervisors. Yeah, we wouldn’t want this process to become political or anything. These people crack me up.