These are my links for June 26th from 15:59 to 16:03:
- President 2012: Presidential candidates will be frequent visitors to California – latimes.com – California voters will play a nominal role in the presidential campaign. But a steady stream of candidates is circling the state, wooing wealthy donors who will probably spend well over $100 million on the 2012 election.
Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney on Thursday finished a three-day, five-city swing, picking up checks from GOP lawmakers at a luncheon in Sacramento, tech titans at a barbecue in a tony Silicon Valley enclave, and moneyed Republicans at events in Southern California. Former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman will hold four events on Sunday and Monday, ending with a dinner at the upscale Island Hotel in Newport Beach. Former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty also recently visited the state.
"They're coming here because they're smart. California is home to the largest Republican donor base upon the planet, and any well-organized candidate who's going to work to raise money must include California," said Ron Nehring, former chairman of the state GOP.
Many candidates are more focused on donors than voters at the moment, as the fundraising quarter ticks to a close June 30, and candidates seek to demonstrate their fiscal might in disclosure reports. It's not limited to one side of the aisle: In recent weeks, President Obama and his wife, Michelle, headlined star-studded fundraisers here.
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Donors and the campaign cash are the most important priorities for the Presidential candidates. You have to go where the big money is and it is in California.
- California Death penalty pricetag: $308 million per man – Capital punishment’s supporters say death is a strong deterrent to crime.
Capital punishment’s detractors say it’s barbaric, and a colossal waste of money.
New ammunition to decide who is right comes in a new study titled “Executing the Will of the Voters? A Roadmap to Mend or End the California Legislature’s Death Penalty Debacle. ”
The study’s authors come from both sides of the debate: U.S. 9th Circuit Judge Arthur L. Alarcon has prosecuted death penalty cases, and Loyola Law School professor Paula M. Mitchell argues against them
They both agree that the system in California is horribly broken, and in dire need of reform.
“Since reinstating the death penalty in 1978, California taxpayers have spent roughly $4 billion to fund a dysfunctional death penalty system that has carried out no more than 13 executions,” they say. ” The current backlog of death penalty cases is so severe that most of the 714 prisoners now on death row will wait well over 20 years before their cases are resolved. Many of these condemned inmates will thus languish on death row for decades, only to die of natural causes while still waiting for their cases to be resolved.
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