Real Education Reform for the South Bay

Responding to the disturbing, unethical pay package which now-fired superintendent Jose Fernandez was taking (including a $1 million no interest loan), Assemblyman Al Muratsuchi authored a bill which would limit salaries to school district superintendents.

Muratsuchi did nothing for our schools

For a man who trumpets his support for local schools, why did he approve Governor Brown's Local Control Funding Formula, which is depriving South Bay Schools of much-needed funding?

Hermosa Beach City School District is one of the highest performing school districts in the state, and now they get the lease amount of per-pupil funding. Torrance Unified will have to wait until 2020 until the district funding returns to 2007 levels. However, district leaders have stated repeatedly that even then, the district was drastically underfunded. Residents in Palos Verdes expressed outrage that in spite of supporting Prop 30, their schools are getting less money, yet the state legislature wants to extend those taxes indefinitely.

Why are strong districts in the South Bay getting less money? Al Muratsuchi did not deliver on his promise to fund our schools and spare them from the cost-cutting and spend-thrift failures of Sacramento.

Republican challenger David Hadley has pressed another issue in connection with local control: granting the cities of Lomita and Gardena the authority to establish their own school districts free from Los Angeles Unified.

This measure is a brilliant move, politically as well as economically and morally.

There is no issue which drives civic-minded minority communities than access to a quality education. Gardena High School has struggled with high dropout rates. In 2011, a student brought a gun on campus, which discharged and wounded students. The dysfunction in Los Angeles Unified has hindered local leaders from helping their schools in the area.



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Lomita is safe and welcoming community, yet wealthy families choose to downsize and live in Torrance because they do not want their children going to LA Schools. Granting the cities of Gardena and Lomita the opportunities to found their own school districts would ensure more accountability from local leaders. Families looking for a welcoming community will consider Lomita because many couples look for good schools when relocating.


Why hasn't Assemblyman Muratsuchi pressed this issue? Wiseburn School District leaders and parents worked tirelessly for years to break away from Centinela Valley Union High School District. Depite lawsuits and environmental reports, local activists persevered. Independent superintendent Donald Brann worked with lawmakers in Sacramento as well as bureaucrats in Los Angeles County Office of Education to bring more students into the district from underserved communities. This district had closed the achievement gap between white and minority students, yet lawmakers were not paying attention. While Centinela Valley was spending millions on lawsuits and administrative perks, Wiseburn continued to serve students and help them excel.

Following a voting initiative 2013, 91% of Wiseburn residents voted to break away from Centinela Valley and form their own unified school district. Democratic lawmakers in Sacramento helped push these reforms through the legislature to the Governor's desk. Assemblyman Muratsuchi certainly could have done something to get the process started for Lomita and Gardena.

Yet he did nothing.

The South Bay needs representatives who will work as hard as Wiseburn residents to help Lomita and Gardena form their own school districts. Muratsuchi's claims of working across the aisle for the South Bay is hollow rhetoric, especially when residents face the grim prospects of moving to expensive neighborhoods or suffering in poorly-administered LAUSD schools.

The South Bay deserves better, read education reforms.

Al Muratsuchi: Tea Party "Extremist"

Before his election to the California State Assembly, Al Muratsuchi served as a prosecutor for the California Department of Justice, and then as a Torrance School Board member.

Assemblyman Al Muratsuchi

Every lawyer in the state of California takes the following oath upon admission to the state bar:

I solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of California, and that I will faithfully discharge the duties of an attorney and a counsel at law to the best of my knowledge and ability.

Every school board member takes a similar oath once installed in their elected office:

"I, ______, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of California against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of California; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties upon which I am about to enter...."

In both of these oaths, whether for attorney or school board member, the supremacy and integrity of the United States Constitution is unquestioned and upheld.

Muratsuchi took these two oaths. Regardless of whether he lived up to the promises he made in those oaths, he served in two public capacities with the express intention of upholding and defending the United States Constitution.

Where does the Tea Party Movement stand on the United States Constitution?

From the Tea Party Movement Platform:

5. Abide by the Constitution of the United States - The U.S. Constitution is the supreme law of the land and must be adhered to without exception at all levels of government. This includes the Bill of Rights and other Amendments to the U.S. Constitution and their provisions designed to protect states’ rights and individual liberties.

The Tea Party Movement respects the Constitution, and recognizes the instrument as the final legal authority, one which must be adhered to. In contrast to a federal government which has overreached into education (Bush), health care (Obama), military interventions (Bush and Obama), as well as aggravated deficit spending and soaring national debt (Bush and Obama), the Tea Party Movement mobilized across the country demanding that politicians in Washington abide by the clearly enumerated powers delegated to the federal government in the United States Constitution, and nothing more.

Tea Party "Extremist"

So, on this essential and crucial element, Muratsuchi and the Tea Party are actually in full agreement.

Therefore, Muratsuchi himself is a Tea Party "Extremist", even though he has cast his opponent under a negative pall with Tea Party taunts in mailer after mailer.

How can he attack a movement, and a support of that movement, when by his words and his office he supports the same causes?


Hirabayashi - Tea Party Extremist?

On another note, a well-known Japanese-American dissenter, Gordon Hirabayashi, refused to obey the federal government's curfew during World War II. Acting on his strong beliefs, including his fervent stance in the Constitution, he found that friends and family did not support his decision to resist unjust, prejudiced curfews.

Notwithstanding the setbacks he faced, he claimed a higher authority:

The United States Constitution is supposed to protect us.

He was eventually jailed for violating curfew, and spent time in federal camps. In the decades which followed, Hirabayashi challenged the convictions, which were later vacated, although the federal government never overturned the laws which criminalized individuals for their presence in public places in connection with their ethnic status.

Hirabayashi resisted those laws by appealing to the United States Constitution. He recognized that document as the supreme law of the land.

Would Muratsuchi have branded Hirabayashi a Tea Party "Extremist" as well?

Peaceful dissenter Gordon Hirabayahi
Would Assemblyman Muratsuchi consider him an extremist, too?

Money Heats Up in the 66th

Al says to the CA Dems: "Show me the money!"

 

Despite budget shortfalls, layoffs, and declining readership, the Los Angeles Times continues to carry water for the demeaning Democratic Party brand in the state of California.

In their latest piece on the vulnerable freshman Democrats in Sacramento, the paper published an impressive photo of Assemblyman Muratsuchi seated in the cockpit of an airplane.

Free advertising, free campaign literature for the Democratic candidate, courtesy of the Los Angles Times.

Vulnerable Assembly Democrats are locked in tight fundraising races with their GOP challengers, according to campaign finance reports filed Monday. 
 
Assemblyman Steve Fox, a Democrat from Palmdale, raised nearly $540,000 from July 1 to Sept. 30, and spent just under $530,000. Fox, a freshman legislator who won his 2012 race by just 145 votes, had nearly $160,000 at the end of the reporting period.

Steve Fox should not have won that seat in 2012. The district is majority Republican to begin with, and bad politicking lost this otherwise easy pick-up.

Republican challenger Tom Lackey, a Palmdale city councilmember, brought in almost $660,000 in that time. He spent $737,000 and had just under $170,000 cash on hand on Sept. 30.

Heads will roll in the California Republican Party leadership if they do not regain this seat.

In a contested Orange County race, incumbent Democrat Sharon Quirk-Silva of Fullerton spent heavily in the last quarter, more than $950,000. She raised more than $560,000 in the same time period and entered the final campaign stretch with just under $130,000 in the bank.

Her opponent, Young Kim, a former aide to Rep. Ed Royce (R-Fullerton), brought in around $460,000. She spent $470,000 and had $545,000 on hand at the end of September.

 

Chris Norby lost this seat in 2012, in part because he did not campaign as though there would be a major challenge to the seat. The California GOP should not have lost this seat, either.

 

The first priority is get rid of Fox, and the Republicans should have no problem doing that. Young Kim should be able to score an upset against Quirk-Silva.

 

Then there's the third Assembly Seat Target: the 66th Assembly seat in the South Bay:

 

Republicans are also aiming to unseat Assemblyman Al Muratsuchi (D-Torrance). The freshman Democrat raised almost $440,000 last quarter and spent more than $700,000. He had more than $510,000 in his coffers as of Sept. 30.

David Hadley. a Manhattan Beach businessman, is the GOP contender. He brought in just over $300,000 and spent around $200,000. He ended the reporting period with more than $470,000 cash on hand.

Hadley beat his opponent in the primary by five hundred votes, in a race where there were no other Republican or Democratic candidates. Independent fiscal conservative Seth Stodder was interested in the state assembly seat, too, but switched to the state senate race once Lieu switch his campaign to replace the retiring Congressman Henry Waxman.

Hadley has a clear pathway to the general election so far. He also caught statewide attention for unifying dispersed groups and interests. Operatives within the district reckoned that the California Democratic Party would spend two million dollars on this seat.

And it looks as if their investment may not pay off this year.

Muratsuchi Calls Tea Party "Extremist" - Is This True?

Assemblyman Al Muratsuchi (D-Torrance) is facing a heated reelection challenge this cycle.

In one of his latest mailers, he tarnished his opponent as a Tea Party extremist.

Is the Tea Party movement extreme?

From the last days of the Bush Administration to today, this movement has protested the rapid expansion of the federal government into the economy (bailouts for banks and corporations), our health care system (ObamaCare), and our financial systems (Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, the Dodd-Frank bill).

These incursions have created a sluggish recovery which has benefited the wealthy and well-connected, a health care system frustrated with bureaucracy, doctor shortages and cost increases, and a financial sector which profits Wall Street at the expense of Main Street.

For extremism, look no further than a Democratic legislature which has brought transgenderism to our public schools, granted drivers licenses to illegal immigrants, forced the minimum wage, and imposed regulatory burdens on small businesses.

In other words, Assemblyman Muratsuchi’s agenda in Sacramento.

So, why label a movement extreme? The Tea Party Movement has pushed back against the role of the state in our lives. The politicians in Washington have frustrated the aggressive advancement of the government into our lives, as well.

Frustration means gridlock, and produces a "do-nothing" Congress.

The economy is not strong, and people are still looking for work, or they have given up. They expected Congress to do something, even extending unemployment benefits and food stamps, but the federal government has stood in the way of these measures, too.

Voters are angry because the government is getting anything done to alleviate their immediate sufferings, or their economic setbacks.

People get angry at anyone who seems to prevent solutions to their problems. Yet more government has created the problems people are struggling with in their lives.

The last time one party had complete control over Congress and the White House, they tried to force Cap-and-Trade on the country, followed by the Affordable Care Act, which has forced employees into part-time status, while pressuring businesses to raise their operation costs or close down. How does a sluggish economy recover when insurance mandates make it more difficult to turn a profit and earn a living?

Democratic candidates do not debate issues. They attack their opponents with personal slights. Tea Party Extremism is an easy line which emboldens a liberal base to turn out and vote against a challenger.

Muratsuchi needs all the help he can stir up this year. President Obama has depressed his ardent supporters, and his policies are grossly unpopular. His low approval ratings in  his sixth year rival the poor polling numbers of President George W. Bush and Bill Clinton during their sixth year in office.

No, the Tea Party Movement is not extremist, yet the tag-line "extreme" is the last-ditch effort to get disaffected Democrats to vote.

Will it work in 2014? Probably not, with a GOP surge rising across the country, and some strong Republican statewide contenders (whom the major California newspapers have endorsed), Muratsuchi is facing a wave of Republican enthusiasm and a receding tide of Democratic disappointment.