Bipartisan group hopes to improve political climate in Calif.
By LAURA KURTZMAN | Wednesday, Mar 26 2008 4:26 PM
Last Updated: Wednesday, Mar 26 2008 4:27 PM
Calling state government dysfunctional, a bipartisan group launched a reform effort Wednesday that it said would be backed by its own political action committee.
The group, called California Forward, will push for passage of a proposed November ballot initiative supported by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to take away the Legislature's power to draw political districts and give it instead to an independent panel. Advocates say this will help moderates get elected.
The reform group also plans to address the state budgeting process.
Leon Panetta, a former Democratic congressman from Monterey and chief of staff to former President Bill Clinton, is leading the group with Thomas McKernan, a Republican donor who is chief executive of the Automobile Club of Southern California.
Panetta acknowledged it would be difficult, if not impossible, to change the way government functions. He said many had tried before, only to have their recommendations ignored, a reality the speakers illustrated with a three-foot-high stack of old reports on good governance that they piled next to the lectern.
But Panetta said lawmakers should heed the message of voters who have grown tired of the political paralysis that breeds chronic budget deficits and that killed efforts last year to reform health care.
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"A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself."
Tullius Cicero (106-43 BC)
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