Is This the Most Dysfunctional City Council in California?

Santa Clara’s Conflicts Include Letterhead Battles, Midnight Meetings, and a Threatening Reading of a Picture Book

During a Santa Clara City Council meeting last year, Councilmember Kevin Park gestured to a local business owner in the audience and started reading aloud from the illustrated book All My Friends Are Dead, about a dinosaur who’s still around, even though the other dinosaurs are extinct.

But Park altered the text to read “All My Friends Are Termed Out.” The message was menacing. The business owner was deeply engaged with the city and once had many allies on the council. But Park was reminding this man …

California’s Ballot Measures Don’t Need to Be a Hot Mess

A Swiss-Style Model of Counterproposals Could Make for Smarter Voting and Better Public Policy

No man is happy but by comparison.

– Thomas Shadwell, poet laureate, United Kingdom (1689-1692)

If you want to better understand the true nature of a proposal, consider a …

California Farmworkers Stand on Uneven Ground

I’ve Picked Broccoli and Tended Grapes in the Salinas Valley Since I Was 18. Sometimes I Wonder How Much Longer I Can Survive Doing It

This piece publishes as part of the Zócalo/The James Irvine Foundation public program and editorial series, “What Is a Good Job Now?” which investigates low-wage work across California. Watch the event …

California Has Got This, America

Kamala Harris Survived San Francisco and the Golden State. She’s Ready for Three Months Against Trump

Don’t worry, America.

We got this.

By “we,” I mean California.

By “this,” I mean this presidential election.

And by “got,” I mean that we are sending you the best possible candidate to weather …

California Democrats Need Real Opposition | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

Why Is Gavin Newsom Invoking a Failed World War Two-Era Governor?

Culbert Olson Talked A Good Game About Democracy, But He Failed to Protect Californians’ Civil Liberties

If you’re ever inside the Great Mausoleum at Forest Lawn cemetery in Glendale and hear laughter ringing through the hallways, it’s probably me visiting the tomb of Culbert …

Retired California Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye

You Make Your Joy

Tani Cantil-Sakauye was the 28th Chief Justice of the State of California. The first Asian Filipina American and the second woman to serve as the state’s chief justice, she is …