Proposition 22--Vote YES

There are so  many negative ads on TV with politics and political issues in general, that the truth of the matter is difficult to sort out.

Even the pro-Bernie facebook page is urging a "NO" vote on this proposition, incorrectly claiming it will take away app-based drivers rights and protections.  Not true; it is actually under current law that they have neither.

Read on--I've excerpted by direct copy and paste from the actual text of the proposed law, and highlighted and/or placed in red and/or boldface type the relevant portions disproving the position of the "no on 22" crowd.  

"Section 7449:(f) App-based rideshare and delivery drivers deserve economic security. This chapter is necessary to protect their freedom to work independently, while also providing these workers new benefts and protections not available under current law. These benefts and protections include a healthcare subsidy consistent with the average contributions required under the Affordable Care Act (ACA); a new minimum earnings guarantee tied to 120 percent of minimum wage with no maximum; compensation for vehicle expenses; occupational accident insurance to cover on-the-job injuries; and protection against discrimination and sexual harassment. (g) California law and rideshare and delivery network companies should protect the safety of both drivers and consumers without affecting the right of appbased rideshare and delivery drivers to work as independent contractors. Such protections should, at a minimum, include criminal background checks of drivers; zero tolerance policies for drug- and alcoholrelated offenses; and driver safety training

"7450. Statement of Purpose. The purposes of this chapter are as follows: (a) To protect the basic legal right of Californians to choose to work as independent contractors with rideshare and delivery network companies throughout the state. (b) To protect the individual right of every app-based rideshare and delivery driver to have the fexibility to set their own hours for when, where, and how they work. (c) To require rideshare and delivery network companies to offer new protections and benefts for app-based rideshare and delivery drivers, including minimum compensation levels, insurance to cover on-the-job injuries, automobile accident insurance, health care subsidies for qualifying drivers, protection against harassment and discrimination, and mandatory contractual rights and appeal processes. (d) To improve public safety by requiring criminal background checks, driver safety training, and other safety provisions to help ensure app-based rideshare and delivery drivers do not pose a threat to customers or the public.

"7453. Earnings Guarantee. (a) A network company shall ensure that for each earnings period, an appbased driver is compensated at not less than the net earnings floor as set forth in this section. The net earnings floor establishes a guaranteed minimum level of compensation for app-based drivers that cannot be reduced. In no way does the net earnings floor prohibit app-based drivers from earning a higher level of compensation. (b) For each earnings period, a network company shall compare an app-based driver’s net earnings against the net earnings floor for that app-based driver during the earnings period. In the event that the app-based driver’s net earnings in the earnings period are less than the net earnings foor for that earnings period, the network company shall include an additional sum accounting for the difference in the app-based driver’s earnings no later than during the next earnings period.

"Article 4: Benefits

Healthcare Subsidy. (a) Consistent with the average contributions required under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), a network company shall provide a quarterly health care subsidy to qualifying app-based drivers as set forth in this section. An app-based driver that averages the following amounts of engaged time per week on a network company’s platform during a calendar quarter shall receive the following subsidies from that network company: 22 (1) For an average of 25 hours or more per week of engaged time in the calendar quarter, a payment greater than or equal to 100 percent of the average ACA contribution for the applicable average monthly Covered California premium for each month in the quarter. (2) For an average of at least 15 but less than 25 hours per week of engaged time in the calendar quarter, a payment greater than or equal to 50 percent of the average ACA contribution for the applicable average monthly Covered California premium for each month in the quarter.

"7455. Loss and Liability Protection. No network company shall operate in California for more than 90 days unless the network company carries, provides, or otherwise makes available the following insurance coverage: (a) For the benefit of app-based drivers, occupational accident insurance to cover medical expenses and lost income resulting from injuries suffered while the app-based driver is online with a network company’s online-enabled application or platform. Policies shall at a minimum provide the following: (1) Coverage for medical expenses incurred, up to at least one million dollars ($1,000,000). (2) (A) Disability payments equal to 66 percent of the app-based driver’s average weekly earnings from all network companies as of the date of injury, with minimum and maximum weekly payment rates to be determined in accordance with subdivision (a) of Section 4453 of the Labor Code for up to the frst 104 weeks following the injury."

For further in depth information, here is the link to the text from which I took the above references:

Text of Proposed Prop. 22 Law

Danger! ICE is on the Loose!

April 1, 2017.
 Evening  all,  yes its been a while since I've Blogged.  I have been busy  with the Delta Dems, and setting up work shops on  Safe Havens, AKA, Sanctuary cities.

Being back into Politics at age 61 is a lot harder than I remember from the 70's.

Ok,  whats new; the investigation into Twitter fingers trump and his Russian connection is under way, if you say it fast. And, we have the old saying of:  'The fox guarding the chicken coop!'  The only way the truth is going to come out, is if they have an independent investigation! Trump insiders are not going to find any wrong doing. Of that, you can be sure. Anyone with an once of working brain matter knows that trump is in bed with Putin and Russian agents. "Where there is smoke, there is sure to be fire."  If you doubt this collusion, then look no further than all the Russians who could testify, suddenly ending up dead.

In CCC, or (Contra Costa County), we are fighting a jail expansion to house ICE victims, and lock up people with mental issues.  In my research, locking up people with mental issues NEVER WORKS. It just creates more problems for the individual.   This lock up comes at a two fold price: first, the cost to the tax payers is prohibitive. It costs more to house people in prison  than it does for walk-in mental health programs.  Second, in lockups, there are never any good quality services for the inmates.
ICE is violating human rights at every turn. It's gotten so bad that they are locking up American Citizens now.  Arresting legal aliens, and locking them up in conditions that no human being should be made to suffer.  Crowded holding cells with as many as 30 people for days, no beds, cold food, one toilet, and forced to sleep on a concrete floor. They are doing this to men, women and CHILDREN!   Today, April 1st, they arrested LEGALS trying to update their green cards. Within the past few days, ICE has been trolling court houses, picking up people they suspect of being without legal status just because of how they look or sound!

Where does it end? With everyone locked up in FEMA  camps ? Forced to do slave labor?  Strong hints of Nazi Germany are going on here.      

Trump and His Trumpeteers

Having not yet reached his first 100 days in office, this pleonastic individual has already seen fit to taking a vacation.  It's all about him, and always has been.

He rails about budget, and spending money; but only where it concerns the health and well-being of others.  He has no problem spending millions and billions upon himself and his cronies.  Tax breaks for the wealthy equal tax burdens on the poor and middle class.

His most egregious act so far, besides the "Muslim countries" ban, and the random detaining of people going about their own business, is the withdrawal of support for military families stationed abroad.

He has no compunction about this at all.  A psychiatrist from Johns Hopkins Medical Center has described this impostor of a president as a "malignant narcissist."  It means he just does not care about anyone who is not of his own income bracket or social class.

That last is the oxymoron of all oxymorons.  He has no class; never has, and never will.  Unfortunately, the turn of events that placed (not voted, but placed) him in the highest office in the land saw the state of the occupant go from first class to white trash.

In his rush to fulfill his ill-advised campaign promises, he has made several executive orders which are ignorant at best, and unconstitutional at worst, and he has alienated large segments of the population.  
This is easily seen in the mass protests happening all over, and the cowardly withdrawal of his fellow Republicans from attending their own 'town hall' meetings.  There has also been a notable exodus from the White House of those whom he sought to appoint to his cabinet.

The tables will turn; they are turning, slowly, but picking up speed.  He thinks he is the center of the universe, but he is far from it; he'd better watch out, or, like the old fashioned fun house big disk ride, he will be flung off to the side.

It's time for change within the DNC......

 OK, we tried it their way, and we were spanked, its time for a new direction within the DNC.  WE need a much more PROGRESSIVE WAY OF THINKING.   And so far, Pete Buttigieg seems to fit the bill.

The old ways, "go high when they go low", ONLY makes it all the more painful when you fall. This past election has shown this. The OLD ways do NOT work anymore. A new direction is needed.

We did not lose this past election, it was stolen, with Gerrymandering, and voter suppression.

I say that the Cheetos man-child  was NOT elected, he was installed by the elite. He lost by over 3 million votes! And the PEOPLE  know this. This is why you are seeing protest after protest and angry people showing up at Town Hall Meetings.  People are angry, they are scared, and unsure what the future holds.

Trump has done more to divide this country, than all the Terrorist groups could ever hope to.!!!

1984 Is Here!

George Orwell was correct:  he just got the year wrong!  Welcome to the United Police States of America!

The video shown below includes violations of many of our constitutional guarantees, not the least of which is freedom of movement within the state, between states, and freedom to live where one chooses.

Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas, (1898 - 1980) explained it well:

"The right to travel is a part of the 'liberty' of which the citizen cannot be deprived without due process of law under the Fifth Amendment. If that "liberty" is to be regulated, it must be pursuant to the law-making functions of the Congress. . . . . Freedom of movement across frontiers in either direction, and inside frontiers as well, was a part of our heritage. Travel abroad, like travel within the country, . . . may be as close to the heart of the individual as the choice of what he eats, or wears, or reads. Freedom of movement is basic in our scheme of values."

What is happening in too many parts of our country,  most notably in the southwest, is beyond appalling, and in clear violation of this clause of the Fifth Amendment.

Furthermore, these actions also involve violations of the Fourteenth Amendment, as they both address 'due process.'  From Wikipedia:

"Due Process Clause:

The Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution each contain a Due Process Clause. Due process deals with the administration of justice and thus the Due Process Clause acts as a safeguard from arbitrary denial of life, liberty, or property by the Government outside the sanction of law. The Supreme Court of the United States interprets the Clauses as providing four protections: procedural due process (in civil and criminal proceedings), substantive due process, a prohibition against vague laws, and as the vehicle for the incorporation of the Bill of Rights."

If what you see in this video does not make your blood boil, you are either dead or part of the problem.

No More Jails!

Sheriff Livingston of Contra Costa County wants a jail expansion. His (skewed) logic is that the current jail in west county is overcrowded.  Well, of course it is.  He has seen fit to rent beds to ICE for their detainees.  This is not the use for which prisons were intended.  

This idea is a multi-million dollar boondoggle, and a total waste of taxpayers' money.  Interestingly, Livingston managed to be away in D.C., hobnobbing with Drumpf's nominee for attorney general, Jeff Sessions, on the day the vote was held concerning a grant to build the facility he wants.

There are already far too many people languishing in jail for such minor offenses as to border on the ridiculous.  The people of whom I speak were incarcerated for non-violent, minor crimes.  Mandated community service work would be a better sentence, less costly, and free up beds to boot.

However, it is difficult to keep people out of jail when there is a monetary incentive for making arrests.  This miserable scenario came about due to the privatization of many prisons around the nation.  The corporation runs them for a profit!  So, if they don't fill beds, they don't get paid.  That is just plain predatory!

Instead of more jails, let's stand up and demand investment in quality education, renew such older practices as the apprenticeship programs, (on the job training), and trade schools.  Let's have community centers for youth.  Let's reopen the treatment facilities closed during the Reagan administration to offer real help to people with  mental health issues.  Putting them in jail does not help them.  We need treatment facilities (with mandatory attendance) for people who have committed crimes while on drugs or alcohol. 

Livingston's plan is short-sighted, and wrongly focused.  We don't need to rent beds to ICE.  Let them build their own facilities for detainees.  In the long term, more and better treatment programs and community services of various kinds will serve better to keep people out of jail in the first place, and at a lower cost. 

Very important call to action!  Mark down this date!  

Friday, February 17th, 2017

This is something everyone can do.  It costs zero money, and you don't even have to get out of your comfy chair.  You don't even have to get dressed, if you don't want to!

This is the "ordinary people's protest."  For those of us who cannot join marches and roadblocks, this protest is done from your own home.

On this date, is a nationwide boycott everything  protest.  The action is to shut everything down, as far as possible.    Here's how it will happen:

1. Stay home all day!
2. If there is any reasonable chance that you can call in sick to work, do so.  
3. Do not purchase anything!  (Including online shopping)

Hopefully, this will send a strong message to the right-wing extremists trying to turn our nation into a dictatorship and oligarchy.