This is Part One of a two-part series.

The unusually speedy approval of a new NBA arena for the Kings basketball team in the heart of downtown Sacramento leaves many details and unanswered questions on the table, including how this arena project possibly will be completed and ready for opening by 2015.

Approved by the Sacramento City Council, the latest plan uses overstated revenue projections, grossly overstated projected attendance numbers and city-owned parking garages to sweeten the finances. As with all of the previous schemes to keep the Sacramento Kings in town in a luxurious arena, neither city officials nor local news… Read More

I write about and compare California with other states. While I cover many aspects, most have to do with monetary issues — taxes, regulation, litigation, utility costs, education funding, etc.

But we should also look at a broader index that includes not only the issues I highlight, but also compares the personal freedom factors among states. For years the Mercatus Center has done exactly that — comparing states on a more fundamental “freedom” level. They incorporate most of my concerns, while factoring in personal freedoms.

The new rankings are now out. Not good for the Golden State. Indeed, as Professor Mark Perry notes below, the results are not good for people living in Democrat states — period!

California continues its dismal freedom ranking of the last decade — second worst only because of totalitarian NY state. NJ is nipping at our heels in the 48th spot.

The three MOST free states? North Dakota (up from fifth best last year), South Dakota and (perhaps surprisingly) Tennessee in third place.

The Mercatus website has more detail on each state, and the factors considered. It’s worth… Read More

Big spending on California politics has become one of the state’s largest industries. But the return on investment is lousy.

California’s political system has become so heavily manipulated by labor unions and other big money interests that the system is broken. Legislators have become professional fundraisers instead of managing public policy. And the individual voter no longer has much voice or influence.

It may sound farfetched, but the only way to fix this system is to expand it. California needs more lawmakers.

For democracy to work, it must be representative democracy. It must be a government of, by and for the people.

The Neighborhood Legislature

Last year Assemblywoman Shannon Grove, R-Bakersfield, pushed an initiative for a part-time Legislature. She succeeded in bringing much needed attention to the broken… Read More

The recent RNC “Growth and Opportunity Project” report deserves a full read, both for what it gets right and for what it telegraphs about the party elites. I dissected the report as it relates to leap frogging the Democrats on data-analytics, but there are other fundamental issues.

The report suffers from category overlap, excessive length and wooden prose. Breitbart challenges it on many inconsistencies noting a lack of intellectual coherence that is the result—in part—of writing by committee. Breitbart criticises from the paleo-right, saying:

“… the fundamental flaw of the report [is] a failure to acknowledge… the successes of the recent past–all of which were built on conservative revival.”

On NRO online, Ramesh Ponnuru targets elitism, saying:

The Republican report reflects this elite conventional wisdom perfectly, just perfectly… The report does not, however,… Read More

Sacramento officials have lost all ability to reason, and instead are letting emotions and delusions of grandeur drive their decision over a downtown sports arena.

Arenas are nothing more that fields of schemes, and the joke is on taxpayers. And Sacramento is hardly a bastion of economic splendor. Despite some of the highest unemployment in the country, escalating business closures, widespread home foreclosures and short sales, and declining tax revenue, arena talks are all the rage in Sacramento.

Judith Grant Long’s data on full public cost of stadiums and arenas is groundbreaking. “Where most ‘stadium cost’ charts just rely on self-reporting by teams, Harvard researcher Long has actually attempted to calculate the public and private costs of every major-league stadium and arena in North America, including hidden subsidies like free land, lease breaks, and tax exemptions,” Field of Schemes Neil deMause wrote.

It’s as if the Mayor is so enamored of the idea of driving away from the car dealership in a new Maserati, he’s forgotten he can’t afford… Read More

At a secluded private campus outside London, conservative leaders from 26 nations have gathered for a conference aimed at ensuring groups advancing free market economics and traditional values have the resources necessary for victory.

The Leadership Institute, the well-respected American organization that has educated and trained conservative leaders for over 30 years, is hosting the event at Wellington College in Crowthorne. The program, now in its fifth year, brings international fundraising experts together with center-right political and organizational leaders for several days of intensive training and preparation in both the science and art of raising funds to achieve center-right objectives.

This… Read More

[Publisher’s Note: We are pleased to offer this column from longtime FR friend Clay Russell. A Los Angeles based writer, Russell served as Special Assistant to Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger from 2003-2010 – Flash]

“Pension reform” and “unfunded liability” are hardly phrases that turn up in most people’s dinner-table conversations. On the contrary – these are topics that, if examined closely, would more likely ruin a person’s appetite.

I was a political appointee in the Schwarzenegger administration for almost seven years. When I left that job I had a state pension coming to me…for life. Based on rough estimates, I would receive, starting as early as age 55, something in the neighborhood of $800-1000 per month, even more if I waited a few years to start collecting. This isn’t enough to live on but it’s significant when you consider that it’s for life.

It’s perfectly possible for an individual to buy an annuity that will pay a guaranteed amount after a certain age. A financial planner did some quick math recently and told me, based on my age and a target monthly… Read More

The San Francisco Bay Area is probably the most liberal in America. Democrats are typically favored over Republicans in elections by an 40 to 50 percent margins. The SF Bay is also perhaps the wealthiest region in America, with a GDP of over $500 billion, and more than 10% of the nation’s billionaires. Not least, as the global center of information technology, attracting top talent from around the world, the SF Bay region probably has one of the smartest populations in America.

So when are they going to take on their public sector unions?

One of the Silicon Valley’s newest billionaires is Mark Zuckerberg, who burnished his liberal credentials a few years ago by hosting President Obama at a town-hall meeting at Facebook headquarters. But earlier this year Zuckerberg committed to raising funds for embattled New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, who has vaulted to the national stage because of his refusal to bow to the demands of public sector unions.

Could it be that public sector union reform is a bipartisan issue? A lot of Democrats agree with that thought, mostly in private, but they aren’t billionaires, and they aren’t raising funds for Gov.… Read More