The government on Wednesday assured the Supreme Court that it would ensure pictorial warnings like the skull and cross bones or a cancer-disfigured face were carried on the packets of cigarettes and other tobacco products from May 31.
Additional Solicitor General Gopal Subramaniam told the bench of Justice B N Agrawal and Justice G S Singhvi that the government will not defer beyond May 31 the implementation of the law mandating pictorial warnings on cigarette packets.
"The Union of India undertakes to implement the Cigarette and Other Tobacco Products (Packing and Labeling) Rules, 2008, from May 31, 2009," the government’s law officer said.
"Its implementation will not be further delayed in any case," he added.
Approving of the government’s commitment, the bench ruled, “No court in the country can pass an order that might hinder the implementation of the law.”
The rider came on a plea by senior counsel Indira Jaisingh, who said that the powerful tobacco lobbies that had been behind repeated deferments of the law's implementation for the last three years might still delay this.
The government's undertaking came during the hearing of a lawsuit by NGO Health for Millions seeking implementation of the law on pictorial warnings on the packets of all tobacco products. The pictorial warning would occupy 40 percent of the space on the front of all packets.
The undertaking came a day after the court queried the government on Jaisingh's charge that despite a Group of Ministers (GoM) at its meeting Feb 3 deciding that the pictorial warning should be carried on both sides of the packet, the government notification only provided for this on the front.
Jaisingh contended that this was due to the pressure of the tobacco lobby and was much against the wishes of former health minister A. Ramados, a staunch supporter of the "No Smoking" cause.
Thereafter, the bench Tuesday sought the minutes of the Feb 3 GoM meeting.
Producing these in the court Wednesday, Subramaniam explained that though the agenda mentioned that the displays would be on both sides of packets, the minutes of the meeting did not specify this.
The GoM chairman had wanted to convene another meeting to rectify the lacunae but this did not happen due to the paucity of the time in the run-up to the general elections, Subramaniam said, adding that had another meeting been convened, the May 31 deadline would have been missed.
Lauding the court order, Bhavana Mukhopadyay, director (Health Promotion) at the Voluntary Health Association of India, said: "Since the 2006 act (mandating pictorial warnings) was passed, the issue was being diluted or delayed for one reason or another. Even now, had the Supreme Court not stepped in, there would have been further delay."
"There is no question of any hiccups now. Whichever government comes to power (after the general elections) will have to follow the court's order and the warnings will be there from June 1. And then, there is the injunction that no court can pass an order inconsistent with today's order," Mukhopadyay told IANS.
P.C. Gupta, director of the Healis Sekhsaria Institute for Public Health, said: "It is most unfortunate that the GoM, since its constitution in early 2007, had delayed the implementation of the law for two whole years, not to mention having diluted the stronger warning for a milder one."
According to a health ministry official, the pictorial warnings are a crucial step to protect the public from the hazards of tobacco and second-hand smoke, and to reduce the use of tobacco by the youth
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Thursday, May 7, 2009
The woman who saved Delhi from Pappus
On Thursday, when 53 per cent voters turned out to choose their leader, Delhi not only outdid other metros like Mumbai and Bangalore, it also created a record of achieving the highest poll percentage in the last 20 years.
So, how did Delhi achieve this feat? If you believe Satbir Silas Bedi, Delhi’s Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) and the brain behind the catchy Pappu Can’t Vote campaign, it is not merely the ad that resulted in the high polling percentage.
“Much of the credit also goes to my colleagues and staff. Like the Block Level Officers who went to each and every residential colony to ensure citizens get themselves registered for voting,” she said.
The groundwork to ensure better polling had started much before, Bedi said.
“Election management in metro cities is a different ballgame. A team of 80 officials has been constantly on the job since October 2007 — revising and updating electoral rolls. Finally the dedication of my staff paid off,” she said.
Bedi said the Pappu Can’t Vote campaign also hit the right chord with voters, especially young voters. “The campaign had a high recall value. It touched a chord with Delhiites psyche. It was not a preachy campaign but very subtly motivated voters. Through radio, television and newspapers we were constantly hammering it in people’s mind,” she said.
“The awareness created by the campaign was so much that the call centre of the CEO office received more than 2,000 calls per day with voters wanted to clear their voting-related queries”, she added.
“I am very happy today. Common citizens have been calling up our office since evening saying they saw our ad and were motivated to vote,” added Bedi.
After the gruelling session that lasted over a month, she is now looking forward to relaxing with her family. “Though we live in the same house I hardly spoke to my son. Now I am looking forward to some quality time with him before counting day on May 16,” she said.
So, how did Delhi achieve this feat? If you believe Satbir Silas Bedi, Delhi’s Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) and the brain behind the catchy Pappu Can’t Vote campaign, it is not merely the ad that resulted in the high polling percentage.
“Much of the credit also goes to my colleagues and staff. Like the Block Level Officers who went to each and every residential colony to ensure citizens get themselves registered for voting,” she said.
The groundwork to ensure better polling had started much before, Bedi said.
“Election management in metro cities is a different ballgame. A team of 80 officials has been constantly on the job since October 2007 — revising and updating electoral rolls. Finally the dedication of my staff paid off,” she said.
Bedi said the Pappu Can’t Vote campaign also hit the right chord with voters, especially young voters. “The campaign had a high recall value. It touched a chord with Delhiites psyche. It was not a preachy campaign but very subtly motivated voters. Through radio, television and newspapers we were constantly hammering it in people’s mind,” she said.
“The awareness created by the campaign was so much that the call centre of the CEO office received more than 2,000 calls per day with voters wanted to clear their voting-related queries”, she added.
“I am very happy today. Common citizens have been calling up our office since evening saying they saw our ad and were motivated to vote,” added Bedi.
After the gruelling session that lasted over a month, she is now looking forward to relaxing with her family. “Though we live in the same house I hardly spoke to my son. Now I am looking forward to some quality time with him before counting day on May 16,” she said.
Round four of polling ends, hunt for allies intensifies
The two major contenders for the Delhi throne — the Congress and the BJP — appear to have intensified their hunt for allies as the likelihood of a hung Parliament increased after the fourth round of polling on Thursday.
An estimated 57 per cent voters braved the heat to cast their votes for 85 Lok Sabha seats spread across eight states in the largely peaceful polling, barring West Bengal, where four voters were killed in poll violence.
One person died in Rajasthan when security forces opened fire to foil an attempt to capture a booth.
With voting now over for 457 of the 543 Lok Sabha seats and only 86 seats left for voting on the last round on May 13, the focus has now shifted to post-poll alliances.While West Bengal recorded the highest voting percentage (75 per cent), Jammu and Kashmir capital Srinagar recorded the lowest turnout (24 per cent), mainly due to a boycott call by separatists.
Capital Delhi saw a 50 per cent turnout on a typical summer day. In terms of voting, the city scored over Mumbai, which had seen a mere 41 per cent voting a week back, considered to be lowest since 1977.
President Pratibha Patil, Vice-President Hamid Ansari, Congress president Sonia Gandhi, her children Rahul and Sonia, and Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit were among those who cast their votes in the capital.
The ruling Congress is defending six of the seven seats in Delhi which it had won in 2004. “We are going to do well this time also. The assembly elections held five months back had shown which way the wind is blowing,” Dikshit said.
With voting now over for 457 of the 543 Lok Sabha seats and only 86 seats left for voting on the last round on May 13, the focus has now shifted to post-poll alliances.
The BJP’s managers are counting on Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati to spring a surprise and gravitate towards them. The Uttar Pradesh chief minister is at present inclined towards the so-called Third Front, a loosely knit formation of regional parties propped up by the Left.
Her rival and Samajwadi Party chief, Mulayam Singh Yadav, put forward a pre-condition for those looking for his support. “We will support whoever dismisses the Mayawati government in Uttar Pradesh,” he said after casting his vote in Mainpuri. The Congress was quick to reject such a demand but kept the door open for the SP. Amar Singh, SP general secretary, also hinted at supporting the Congress.
But, the Left parties appeared to adopt a wait and watch policy. The focus now shifts to the final round next week. The most crucial state in this phase will be Tamil Nadu where all 39 seats will go for polls. Polling for 14 seats in Uttar Pradesh, 11 in West Bengal, 4 in Himachal Pradesh and 5 in Uttarakhand will also be held the same day.
An estimated 57 per cent voters braved the heat to cast their votes for 85 Lok Sabha seats spread across eight states in the largely peaceful polling, barring West Bengal, where four voters were killed in poll violence.
One person died in Rajasthan when security forces opened fire to foil an attempt to capture a booth.
With voting now over for 457 of the 543 Lok Sabha seats and only 86 seats left for voting on the last round on May 13, the focus has now shifted to post-poll alliances.While West Bengal recorded the highest voting percentage (75 per cent), Jammu and Kashmir capital Srinagar recorded the lowest turnout (24 per cent), mainly due to a boycott call by separatists.
Capital Delhi saw a 50 per cent turnout on a typical summer day. In terms of voting, the city scored over Mumbai, which had seen a mere 41 per cent voting a week back, considered to be lowest since 1977.
President Pratibha Patil, Vice-President Hamid Ansari, Congress president Sonia Gandhi, her children Rahul and Sonia, and Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit were among those who cast their votes in the capital.
The ruling Congress is defending six of the seven seats in Delhi which it had won in 2004. “We are going to do well this time also. The assembly elections held five months back had shown which way the wind is blowing,” Dikshit said.
With voting now over for 457 of the 543 Lok Sabha seats and only 86 seats left for voting on the last round on May 13, the focus has now shifted to post-poll alliances.
The BJP’s managers are counting on Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati to spring a surprise and gravitate towards them. The Uttar Pradesh chief minister is at present inclined towards the so-called Third Front, a loosely knit formation of regional parties propped up by the Left.
Her rival and Samajwadi Party chief, Mulayam Singh Yadav, put forward a pre-condition for those looking for his support. “We will support whoever dismisses the Mayawati government in Uttar Pradesh,” he said after casting his vote in Mainpuri. The Congress was quick to reject such a demand but kept the door open for the SP. Amar Singh, SP general secretary, also hinted at supporting the Congress.
But, the Left parties appeared to adopt a wait and watch policy. The focus now shifts to the final round next week. The most crucial state in this phase will be Tamil Nadu where all 39 seats will go for polls. Polling for 14 seats in Uttar Pradesh, 11 in West Bengal, 4 in Himachal Pradesh and 5 in Uttarakhand will also be held the same day.
In-N-Out: Can perfection survive?
My life as a fast-food consumer pretty much ended the moment my kids became old enough to drive themselves to the nearest hamburger stand.
But even back then I knew that all such chains could be divided into two categories: There was In-N-Out, and there was everybody else.
The In-N-Out cult -- is there any other word for it? -- is rooted in its patrons' appreciation for its simple menu and its sedulous devotion to fresh, high-quality ingredients.
To be sure, there are other fascinations. These include the mystique created by its management's traditional refusal to ever speak to the press (including for this column).
Then there are the biblicalcitations imprinted on the edges and seams of its burger wrappers and disposable cups, a practice started by the late Richard Snyder, the born-again younger son and onetime heir apparent to In-N-Out's founders, Harry and Esther Snyder.
Finally, there are the intertwined issues of In-N-Out's colorful past and its unsettled future, which are touched on in a new book titled simply "In-N-Out Burger," by BusinessWeek writer Stacy Perman.
Perman observes that In-N-Out has prospered by hewing close to the stolid principles of controlled growth, limited menu, fresh food and regional focus -- with the exception of one store in Utah, its 232 locations are all in California, Nevada or Arizona -- set in stone by its founders, like commandments. (Harry died in 1976, his widow in 2006.) As a private company, In-N-Out doesn't release financial figures, though the trade press estimated sales in 2005 at $370 million -- a healthy sum for a small chain.
Southern Californians have grown up appreciating the company's virtues, while the rest of the country slavers from afar: In-N-Out generally pays better than other burger chains, in return for which employees are held to rigorous standards of appearance and behavior. It's a fair bet you'll never see a video on YouTube of workers adulterating In-N-Out food even in jest, as recently befell another chain.
In-N-Out management, from corporate headquarters in Baldwin Park and Irvine down to store level, is first class.
"The executive corps is the key to their success at weathering problems," says Perman, who didn't get the company's help with her book.
The menu never changes -- burgers that can be piled high like flapjacks, fries and shakes or soda. The provisions are all fresh thanks to the chain's fabled quality control and a tight geographic footprint that keeps all stores within a few hundred miles of regional distribution centers. There's no denying that next to an In-N-Out burger, the fare at McDonald's, despite the latter's relentless menu experimentation and customer research, tastes like premasticated garbage.
That's not to say that In-N-Out serves health food. I don't have room here for a detailed analysis of its nutritional value, other than to say that a normal adult should be able to cross the Sahara fueled by the caloric, fat and sodium content of a standard dose double-double with fries and a shake. I believe the In-N-Out meal I ingested a week ago Tuesday (submitted as a reporting expense) is still burbling about in my system somewhere, not that I didn't enjoy it to the utmost.
Yet In-N-Out's history is anything but dull. The Snyders established a line of succession skipping over their older son, Guy, in favor of the more stable Richard. That well-laid plan dissolved with Richard's death in a 1993 plane crash. The inheritance passed to Guy, who had a history of drug abuse and died from an overdose of a prescription painkiller in 1999. With Esther's death seven years later, majority control became vested in two family trusts. It will pass after 2011 to Guy's only natural child, his daughter Lynsi Martinez, 27.
What little has been said about Martinez for public consumption comes from the 2006 court battle between the company and Richard Boyd, a former executive who said he had grown close to Esther, only to be shouldered aside by Lynsi and In-N-Out Chief Executive Mark Taylor, the husband of one of her half-sisters.
The fight aired a pile of In-N-Out's dirty laundry, which goes to prove that no matter how hard you work to keep your public image sewn up tight, it can blow at any seam.
Boyd alleged that Taylor and Martinez kept the nearly bedridden Esther Snyder a virtual prisoner in her home, screening and intercepting phone calls and visitors. He depicted Martinez as an immature religious fanatic with a taste for "partying hard" who cast him from the company after concluding he was no "man of God."
The company dismissed these assertions as "conspiracy theories" and said Boyd had been dismissed for fraud and embezzlement. Boyd called the allegations against him "demonstrably false."
The dueling lawsuits were eventually settled on confidential terms, though the courthouse allegations animate Perman's book. Boyd, for his part, remains upbeat about the company where he worked for more than 20 years.
"It's a great company," he told me this week. "When Rich Snyder died, he had so many good people in place that it never missed a heartbeat."
But that still leaves the question of how forcibly Martinez might impose her will on the company and -- even more intriguing -- what is her will? Once she takes formal ownership, if she declares In-N-Out will henceforth sell only Buffalo Burgers or Broccoli Burgers, or will dispense prayers rather than food, her word will be law. Indeed, given the inviolability of the trusts, her word probably already is law.
What should keep the chain's fans up at night is whether In-N-Out can continue to tread the fine line between modern business imperatives and its own traditions. Taylor has been quoted as saying he intends to stick to a pattern of opening 10 to 12 new stores a year, though Boyd claimed in his lawsuit that he had heard him express national ambitions.
An expansion across the Mississippi would probably strain In-N-Out's self-generated financial resources to the limit -- the chain doesn't even accept franchisees. But a public offering, much less a buyout by a public company, would almost certainly render it unrecognizable. The homogenizing cost-cutting of corporate number-crunchers ("let's drop the beef by a grade; the customers won't notice") could mean the end of In-N-Out as we know it.
That suggests the company's best option might be to remain the happy prisoner of its own success. Boyd may be right when he says: "If they leave it exactly as it is and don't make any changes, they'll last forever
But even back then I knew that all such chains could be divided into two categories: There was In-N-Out, and there was everybody else.
The In-N-Out cult -- is there any other word for it? -- is rooted in its patrons' appreciation for its simple menu and its sedulous devotion to fresh, high-quality ingredients.
To be sure, there are other fascinations. These include the mystique created by its management's traditional refusal to ever speak to the press (including for this column).
Then there are the biblicalcitations imprinted on the edges and seams of its burger wrappers and disposable cups, a practice started by the late Richard Snyder, the born-again younger son and onetime heir apparent to In-N-Out's founders, Harry and Esther Snyder.
Finally, there are the intertwined issues of In-N-Out's colorful past and its unsettled future, which are touched on in a new book titled simply "In-N-Out Burger," by BusinessWeek writer Stacy Perman.
Perman observes that In-N-Out has prospered by hewing close to the stolid principles of controlled growth, limited menu, fresh food and regional focus -- with the exception of one store in Utah, its 232 locations are all in California, Nevada or Arizona -- set in stone by its founders, like commandments. (Harry died in 1976, his widow in 2006.) As a private company, In-N-Out doesn't release financial figures, though the trade press estimated sales in 2005 at $370 million -- a healthy sum for a small chain.
Southern Californians have grown up appreciating the company's virtues, while the rest of the country slavers from afar: In-N-Out generally pays better than other burger chains, in return for which employees are held to rigorous standards of appearance and behavior. It's a fair bet you'll never see a video on YouTube of workers adulterating In-N-Out food even in jest, as recently befell another chain.
In-N-Out management, from corporate headquarters in Baldwin Park and Irvine down to store level, is first class.
"The executive corps is the key to their success at weathering problems," says Perman, who didn't get the company's help with her book.
The menu never changes -- burgers that can be piled high like flapjacks, fries and shakes or soda. The provisions are all fresh thanks to the chain's fabled quality control and a tight geographic footprint that keeps all stores within a few hundred miles of regional distribution centers. There's no denying that next to an In-N-Out burger, the fare at McDonald's, despite the latter's relentless menu experimentation and customer research, tastes like premasticated garbage.
That's not to say that In-N-Out serves health food. I don't have room here for a detailed analysis of its nutritional value, other than to say that a normal adult should be able to cross the Sahara fueled by the caloric, fat and sodium content of a standard dose double-double with fries and a shake. I believe the In-N-Out meal I ingested a week ago Tuesday (submitted as a reporting expense) is still burbling about in my system somewhere, not that I didn't enjoy it to the utmost.
Yet In-N-Out's history is anything but dull. The Snyders established a line of succession skipping over their older son, Guy, in favor of the more stable Richard. That well-laid plan dissolved with Richard's death in a 1993 plane crash. The inheritance passed to Guy, who had a history of drug abuse and died from an overdose of a prescription painkiller in 1999. With Esther's death seven years later, majority control became vested in two family trusts. It will pass after 2011 to Guy's only natural child, his daughter Lynsi Martinez, 27.
What little has been said about Martinez for public consumption comes from the 2006 court battle between the company and Richard Boyd, a former executive who said he had grown close to Esther, only to be shouldered aside by Lynsi and In-N-Out Chief Executive Mark Taylor, the husband of one of her half-sisters.
The fight aired a pile of In-N-Out's dirty laundry, which goes to prove that no matter how hard you work to keep your public image sewn up tight, it can blow at any seam.
Boyd alleged that Taylor and Martinez kept the nearly bedridden Esther Snyder a virtual prisoner in her home, screening and intercepting phone calls and visitors. He depicted Martinez as an immature religious fanatic with a taste for "partying hard" who cast him from the company after concluding he was no "man of God."
The company dismissed these assertions as "conspiracy theories" and said Boyd had been dismissed for fraud and embezzlement. Boyd called the allegations against him "demonstrably false."
The dueling lawsuits were eventually settled on confidential terms, though the courthouse allegations animate Perman's book. Boyd, for his part, remains upbeat about the company where he worked for more than 20 years.
"It's a great company," he told me this week. "When Rich Snyder died, he had so many good people in place that it never missed a heartbeat."
But that still leaves the question of how forcibly Martinez might impose her will on the company and -- even more intriguing -- what is her will? Once she takes formal ownership, if she declares In-N-Out will henceforth sell only Buffalo Burgers or Broccoli Burgers, or will dispense prayers rather than food, her word will be law. Indeed, given the inviolability of the trusts, her word probably already is law.
What should keep the chain's fans up at night is whether In-N-Out can continue to tread the fine line between modern business imperatives and its own traditions. Taylor has been quoted as saying he intends to stick to a pattern of opening 10 to 12 new stores a year, though Boyd claimed in his lawsuit that he had heard him express national ambitions.
An expansion across the Mississippi would probably strain In-N-Out's self-generated financial resources to the limit -- the chain doesn't even accept franchisees. But a public offering, much less a buyout by a public company, would almost certainly render it unrecognizable. The homogenizing cost-cutting of corporate number-crunchers ("let's drop the beef by a grade; the customers won't notice") could mean the end of In-N-Out as we know it.
That suggests the company's best option might be to remain the happy prisoner of its own success. Boyd may be right when he says: "If they leave it exactly as it is and don't make any changes, they'll last forever
Report: Farrah Fawcett in "Last Stages" of Cancer Battle
Actress Farrah Fawcett is in the last stages of her battle against anal cancer, according to friends close to the star.
While doctors for the 62 year old actress have recently made public statements indicating her condition has not changed, Ryan O'Neal revealed that her "treatment" has "pretty much ended" and she stays in bed and is on IV's.
...Celebrity website RadarOnline is reporting that the former "Charlie's Angels" star can drink only a little liquid and can't keep food down.
The website also reports that Fawcett's 91 year old father, James, is flying to Los Angeles to say goodbye to his daughter and that a priest has visited Fawcett's Malibu home in recent days.
Fawcett was diagnosed with anal cancer in 2006. She was declared in remission on February 2 2007, but three months later scans showed "not only had it recurred, it metastasised to her liver", according to doctors.
Fawcett's son, Redmond, with actor and partner Ryan O'Neal is currently behind bars following his recent drug arrest. He was allowed to leave jail last month to visit his ailing mother whom he claimed weighed only 86 pounds.
Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department spokesman Steve Whitmore says O'Neal's family paid roughly $1,300 so that deputies could supervise the three-hour visit.
Fawcett was hospitalized in March suffering from internal bleeding. There had been reports that she was unconscious at the time.
Doctors said the illness was a complication from her medical treatment and was not directly related to her cancer battle.
Fawcett was discharged from the hospital on April 9th.
While doctors for the 62 year old actress have recently made public statements indicating her condition has not changed, Ryan O'Neal revealed that her "treatment" has "pretty much ended" and she stays in bed and is on IV's.
...Celebrity website RadarOnline is reporting that the former "Charlie's Angels" star can drink only a little liquid and can't keep food down.
The website also reports that Fawcett's 91 year old father, James, is flying to Los Angeles to say goodbye to his daughter and that a priest has visited Fawcett's Malibu home in recent days.
Fawcett was diagnosed with anal cancer in 2006. She was declared in remission on February 2 2007, but three months later scans showed "not only had it recurred, it metastasised to her liver", according to doctors.
Fawcett's son, Redmond, with actor and partner Ryan O'Neal is currently behind bars following his recent drug arrest. He was allowed to leave jail last month to visit his ailing mother whom he claimed weighed only 86 pounds.
Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department spokesman Steve Whitmore says O'Neal's family paid roughly $1,300 so that deputies could supervise the three-hour visit.
Fawcett was hospitalized in March suffering from internal bleeding. There had been reports that she was unconscious at the time.
Doctors said the illness was a complication from her medical treatment and was not directly related to her cancer battle.
Fawcett was discharged from the hospital on April 9th.
California could be broke by July, state official warns
California has an unprecedented cash crisis and could run out of money as soon as July if lawmakers and the governor do not act to stop the financial hemorrhaging, according to a new forecast by the Legislature's chief budget analyst.
"Without additional legislative measures to address the state's fiscal difficulties or unprecedented amounts of borrowing from short-term credit markets, the state will not be able to pay many of its bills on time for much of its 2009-2010 fiscal year," Taylor wrote.
The budget package that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed into law in February, averting an earlier cash crisis, was intended to keep the state solvent through June of next year. But the deterioration of the economy quickly knocked that spending plan out of balance. The analyst cautioned lawmakers against asking the federal government to help the state secure loans that might provide relief. In such a scenario, the federal government would guarantee lenders that it would repay them if California defaulted. The analyst said such provisions would be likely to have strings attached and could give the federal government too much authority over state affairs.
"The difficult decisions to balance the state's budget now are preferable to Californians losing some control over the state's finances and priorities to federal officials for years to come," Taylor wrote.
He further warned that if lawmakers put off acting until well into summer, state finance officials could be forced to take measures even more extreme than those taken during the winter budget impasse, when taxpayer refunds, student grants, welfare checks, money owed to vendors and other payments were suspended.
This summer, Taylor said, the state may need to suspend employees' pay and cut off funds to local governments.
California lawmakers have few options to address the problem beyond deep spending cuts and more tax hikes. Republican lawmakers vowed to block any further tax increases after billions of dollars in new and higher taxes on sales, motor vehicles and personal income were approved as part of the February budget package. And both the Senate and Assembly Republican caucuses now are led by lawmakers who have never negotiated a state budget.
Assembly Speaker Karen Bass (D-Los Angeles) said the latest news underscores that California is "in a world of hurt," and that upcoming budget negotiations will have to focus on "devastating cuts."
Speaking from Washington, D.C., where she has been lobbying federal officials for more financial help, Bass said she was hopeful the state would obtain more stimulus money. She also suggested Democrats may revive an earlier effort to use legal maneuvers to revise the state's spending plan on a simple majority vote rather than the two-thirds majority normally required. That process would skirt the need for any GOP votes, but Republicans say such a move would be unconstitutional.
The debate over what budget actions to take is expected to intensify once Schwarzenegger issues his revised spending plan later this month.
courtsey.latimes
"Without additional legislative measures to address the state's fiscal difficulties or unprecedented amounts of borrowing from short-term credit markets, the state will not be able to pay many of its bills on time for much of its 2009-2010 fiscal year," Taylor wrote.
The budget package that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed into law in February, averting an earlier cash crisis, was intended to keep the state solvent through June of next year. But the deterioration of the economy quickly knocked that spending plan out of balance. The analyst cautioned lawmakers against asking the federal government to help the state secure loans that might provide relief. In such a scenario, the federal government would guarantee lenders that it would repay them if California defaulted. The analyst said such provisions would be likely to have strings attached and could give the federal government too much authority over state affairs.
"The difficult decisions to balance the state's budget now are preferable to Californians losing some control over the state's finances and priorities to federal officials for years to come," Taylor wrote.
He further warned that if lawmakers put off acting until well into summer, state finance officials could be forced to take measures even more extreme than those taken during the winter budget impasse, when taxpayer refunds, student grants, welfare checks, money owed to vendors and other payments were suspended.
This summer, Taylor said, the state may need to suspend employees' pay and cut off funds to local governments.
California lawmakers have few options to address the problem beyond deep spending cuts and more tax hikes. Republican lawmakers vowed to block any further tax increases after billions of dollars in new and higher taxes on sales, motor vehicles and personal income were approved as part of the February budget package. And both the Senate and Assembly Republican caucuses now are led by lawmakers who have never negotiated a state budget.
Assembly Speaker Karen Bass (D-Los Angeles) said the latest news underscores that California is "in a world of hurt," and that upcoming budget negotiations will have to focus on "devastating cuts."
Speaking from Washington, D.C., where she has been lobbying federal officials for more financial help, Bass said she was hopeful the state would obtain more stimulus money. She also suggested Democrats may revive an earlier effort to use legal maneuvers to revise the state's spending plan on a simple majority vote rather than the two-thirds majority normally required. That process would skirt the need for any GOP votes, but Republicans say such a move would be unconstitutional.
The debate over what budget actions to take is expected to intensify once Schwarzenegger issues his revised spending plan later this month.
courtsey.latimes
Campaign Trail Leads to the Web
They figured out how to get New Mexico residents to vote for George W. Bush in 2004. Now, some of the nation’s top political strategists are creating an online-advertising company, hoping to apply to the Web what they know about aiming messages on the campaign trail.
Harold Ickes, left, former deputy chief of staff to President Bill Clinton, is an investor in Resonate Networks.
The company, Resonate Networks, was co-founded by Sara Taylor, the White House political director under Mr. Bush. Its investors include Harold Ickes, the former deputy chief of staff to President Bill Clinton, who runs the database that Democratic strategists rely on; Steve McMahon, the prominent Howard Dean consultant; and Alex Gage, who advised Karl Rove on Mr. Bush’s re-election in 2004.
Resonate is an ad network, which that means it signs up advertisers, along with publishers like Frommers.com and BobVila .com, and matches advertisements with specific sites, taking a cut of what publishers charge the advertisers. More than 300 ad networks have similar models, though all have different recipes.
Resonate differs in its political targeting. This is a strategy that has been used by politicians for years. In 2004, for instance, Mr. Gage’s analysis found a group of New Mexico mothers, Hispanic and lower- to middle-class, who largely voted for Democrats. But the data suggested that they were supportive of Mr. Bush’s No Child Left Behind public school legislation. The campaign sent those women messages about Mr. Bush’s policies on education. In part because of tactics like that, Mr. Bush won New Mexico.
Resonate is trying to do the same thing online for both political issues and corporate ones. It researches sites the way a campaign adviser would research a battleground state, finding which sites have visitors who would be receptive to a certain message.
“We can target an audience that supports a particular issue,” said Bryan Gernert, the chief executive of the company. Because the company can identify the makeup of a site —the percentage of site visitors who support, oppose or have mixed views on a certain issue — it can choose sites that, say, gay marriage opponents do not really visit for a strong advertisement supporting gay marriage.
“You can have a pretty aggressive message that won’t inflame your opposition, but you’ll still mobilize your support base,” Mr. Gernert said. “We can also identify the middle, the persuadable, where you can do an education campaign and move them toward your position on an issue.” That leads to interesting pairings: for a group promoting domestic drilling, Resonate found the most sympathetic visitors were not on a conservative site, but on Egreetings.com.
Resonate gathers about 4,000 survey takers every quarter, and asks them questions about their opinions on issues like gun control or unions, along with questions about their habits and their involvement level in political issues.
Resonate adds information about each panelist from other sources, including voting and campaign contribution history and demographic information, collecting about 1,100 pieces of data per panelist. It then tracks which sites the panelists visit on the Web for four months — the panelists allow Resonate to track their movements, some receiving a small fee in return. With the information about which of their panelists are visiting which sites, Resonate compiles profiles of each site’s visitors.
Advertisers have a range of ways to direct their messages online. They can aim based on someone’s registration information on a site, or by time of day, or by what type of site the ads will appear on or what sites that visitor has looked at recently.
But, advertisers said, this was the first company they were aware of that added visitors’ probable political behavior.
“If you look at the typical microtargeting approach, you have to be a very large national campaign to really afford it,” said Tim Ryan, the general manager of Sawyer Miller Advertising, which has handled public affairs campaigns for Microsoft. “For the public affairs context, I think we’re excited about this, and excited about the ability to better target our audiences at a lower cost point, and get better engagement, and that’s the goal,” he said.
Resonate executives said that they thought the company would be attractive for corporate social responsibility campaigns, or for companies’ advertisements that reflected an issue, like a fast-food company that wanted to advertise a healthy snack to moms worried about obesity
Resonate, which has been operating since the fall, does not have any corporate clients yet; its formation is scheduled to be announced Thursday. Executives said it had sales of about $1 million in its first months, to public affairs groups.
Mr. Ickes, the president of Catalist, which sells national voter data to Democratic and progressive organizations, said he invested in the company because having an Internet version of what he did seemed logical.
“People who are selling things or want to promote something, whether it’s a candidate or a product, are always looking for ways to figure out what audience to target,” he said.
Harold Ickes, left, former deputy chief of staff to President Bill Clinton, is an investor in Resonate Networks.
The company, Resonate Networks, was co-founded by Sara Taylor, the White House political director under Mr. Bush. Its investors include Harold Ickes, the former deputy chief of staff to President Bill Clinton, who runs the database that Democratic strategists rely on; Steve McMahon, the prominent Howard Dean consultant; and Alex Gage, who advised Karl Rove on Mr. Bush’s re-election in 2004.
Resonate is an ad network, which that means it signs up advertisers, along with publishers like Frommers.com and BobVila .com, and matches advertisements with specific sites, taking a cut of what publishers charge the advertisers. More than 300 ad networks have similar models, though all have different recipes.
Resonate differs in its political targeting. This is a strategy that has been used by politicians for years. In 2004, for instance, Mr. Gage’s analysis found a group of New Mexico mothers, Hispanic and lower- to middle-class, who largely voted for Democrats. But the data suggested that they were supportive of Mr. Bush’s No Child Left Behind public school legislation. The campaign sent those women messages about Mr. Bush’s policies on education. In part because of tactics like that, Mr. Bush won New Mexico.
Resonate is trying to do the same thing online for both political issues and corporate ones. It researches sites the way a campaign adviser would research a battleground state, finding which sites have visitors who would be receptive to a certain message.
“We can target an audience that supports a particular issue,” said Bryan Gernert, the chief executive of the company. Because the company can identify the makeup of a site —the percentage of site visitors who support, oppose or have mixed views on a certain issue — it can choose sites that, say, gay marriage opponents do not really visit for a strong advertisement supporting gay marriage.
“You can have a pretty aggressive message that won’t inflame your opposition, but you’ll still mobilize your support base,” Mr. Gernert said. “We can also identify the middle, the persuadable, where you can do an education campaign and move them toward your position on an issue.” That leads to interesting pairings: for a group promoting domestic drilling, Resonate found the most sympathetic visitors were not on a conservative site, but on Egreetings.com.
Resonate gathers about 4,000 survey takers every quarter, and asks them questions about their opinions on issues like gun control or unions, along with questions about their habits and their involvement level in political issues.
Resonate adds information about each panelist from other sources, including voting and campaign contribution history and demographic information, collecting about 1,100 pieces of data per panelist. It then tracks which sites the panelists visit on the Web for four months — the panelists allow Resonate to track their movements, some receiving a small fee in return. With the information about which of their panelists are visiting which sites, Resonate compiles profiles of each site’s visitors.
Advertisers have a range of ways to direct their messages online. They can aim based on someone’s registration information on a site, or by time of day, or by what type of site the ads will appear on or what sites that visitor has looked at recently.
But, advertisers said, this was the first company they were aware of that added visitors’ probable political behavior.
“If you look at the typical microtargeting approach, you have to be a very large national campaign to really afford it,” said Tim Ryan, the general manager of Sawyer Miller Advertising, which has handled public affairs campaigns for Microsoft. “For the public affairs context, I think we’re excited about this, and excited about the ability to better target our audiences at a lower cost point, and get better engagement, and that’s the goal,” he said.
Resonate executives said that they thought the company would be attractive for corporate social responsibility campaigns, or for companies’ advertisements that reflected an issue, like a fast-food company that wanted to advertise a healthy snack to moms worried about obesity
Resonate, which has been operating since the fall, does not have any corporate clients yet; its formation is scheduled to be announced Thursday. Executives said it had sales of about $1 million in its first months, to public affairs groups.
Mr. Ickes, the president of Catalist, which sells national voter data to Democratic and progressive organizations, said he invested in the company because having an Internet version of what he did seemed logical.
“People who are selling things or want to promote something, whether it’s a candidate or a product, are always looking for ways to figure out what audience to target,” he said.
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