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      California governor skipped Cop26 to spend more time with his kids

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      CaliforniaCalifornia governor skipped Cop26 to spend more time with his kidsAfter canceling his trip for ‘family obligations’, Gavin Newsom said he chose to take his children trick-or-treating Dani Anguiano and agencies@dani_anguianoWed 10 Nov 2021 15.14 ESTLast modified on Wed 10 Nov 2021 15.31 ESTCalifornia’s governor made his first public appearance in nearly two weeks on Tuesday, after days of mounting speculation about his decision to abruptly cancel a trip to Cop26 and largely recede from public view.Gavin Newsom said he chose to take his children trick-or-treating on Halloween rather than travel to Scotland to discuss the climate crisis with world leaders, explaining his decision was driven by the simple desire of a working parent to spend more time with his kids.Newsom’s comments, delivered Tuesday at an economic summit in Monterey, came after increasing media coverage and criticism from Republicans about his whereabouts and what he was doing. His last public event had been on 27 October when he got a coronavirus booster shot. Two days later his office issued a brief statement saying he was canceling his travel plans for unspecified “family obligations”.California town declares itself a ‘constitutional republic’ to buck Covid rulesRead moreHis staff would not answer questions about where he was or what he was doing for much of that time, sparking criticism from conservatives who spread rumors that Newsom was experiencing difficult side effects after his booster shot and rallied on social media around the hashtag #wheresgavin.Photos over the weekend published in Vogue showed Newsom attending the lavish wedding of Ivy Love Getty, the granddaughter of the late billionaire oil tycoon J Paul Getty, whose family members have been large donors to Newsom’s campaigns.Jennifer Siebel Newsom, Newsom’s wife, added to the intrigue on Sunday night with a since-deleted tweet telling people to “please stop hating and get a life”.But Tuesday, Newsom said his absence was nothing more than a chance to recharge with his family after a frenetic three years in office that included an unprecedented pandemic, record-breaking destruction from wildfires, a drought and fighting for his political life in only the second gubernatorial recall election in state history. Newsom beat back the recall in September and then spent the next several weeks considering hundreds of bills passed by the legislature.Newsom, who routinely has multiple public appearances each week, relishes his role as leader of the nation’s most populous state, which if it were its own country would have the world’s fifth-largest economy, making his absence after the sudden withdrawal from the climate conference so unusual.And the climate crisis is a signature issue for the governor, who many believe has aspirations of running for president some day. Attending the conference would have given him the opportunity to tout his climate change initiatives, which include banning sales of new gas-powered cars and trucks by 2035, and would raise his profile with world leaders. But as the trip neared, his children took the initiative, he said.“I’ve been on this damn treadmill, we’ve gone from crisis to crisis,” Newsom said. “The kids, literally, they kind of had an intervention. They said they couldn’t believe that I was going to miss Halloween.”Newsom said for his kids, who range in age from 5 to 12, missing Halloween is worse than missing Christmas. “I had no damn choice; I had to cancel that trip,” he said. Newsom’s comments earned applause from the audience and praise from his fellow Democrats in the state legislature, many of whom blamed the governor’s political opponents and the media for blowing the story out of proportion.Assemblyman Ash Kalra tweeted that had Newsom attended the conference, he would have been criticized “for traveling overseas instead of staying home attending to the state”.“He just can’t win,” Kalra said.Wesley Hussey, a political science professor at Sacramento State University, said Newsom could have prevented much of the fuss if he had simply said at the outset why he wasn’t attending the conference and taking a step back from public appearances.“I think this is an example of where the governor and his press operations need to be aware of social media and distortions and always being in front of the story,” he said. “I think we should know what the governor is up to and give the governor space when he needs family time. And I think that those can go together.”Neither the governor nor his representatives said why they didn’t offer details about Newsom’s whereabouts before this week. On Monday, Newsom’s office said the governor had been working in the Capitol on “urgent issues, including Covid-19 vaccines for kids, boosters, ports, the forthcoming state budget and California’s continued economic recovery”.When he emerged Tuesday, Newsom added details of his week out of the spotlight. He went to his childrens’ soccer tournament and took them trick-or-treating, having quickly found a pirate costume to join them. He said he brought his children to the Capitol last week, participating for the first time in tourist traditions like taking a selfie with the statue of a grizzly bear – the animal that appears on the state flag – outside the governor’s office.The children also got coloring books that are regular handouts from the senate president pro tempore’s office.“It’s been probably the most productive week I’ve had since I’ve been governor,” Newsom said.TopicsCaliforniaGavin NewsomCop26US politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      California town declares itself a ‘constitutional republic’ to buck Covid rules

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      CaliforniaCalifornia town declares itself a ‘constitutional republic’ to buck Covid rulesOroville’s city council adopted a resolution stating it would oppose state and federal orders that it deems to be government overreach Dani Anguiano in Los Angeles@dani_anguianoFri 5 Nov 2021 06.00 EDTLast modified on Fri 5 Nov 2021 10.00 EDTA northern California town has declared itself a “constitutional republic” in response to Covid-19 health restrictions imposed by the governor, in the latest sign of strife between the state’s government and its rural and conservative regions.The city council in Oroville, located at the base of the Sierra Nevada foothills about 90 miles from the capital of Sacramento, adopted a resolution this week stating it would oppose state and federal orders it deems to be government overreach.Oroville leaders said the designation was a way of affirming the city’s values and pushing back against state rules it doesn’t agree with, although a legal expert said the designation was merely a gesture and did not grant the city any new authority.Religious exemptions threaten to undermine US Covid vaccine mandatesRead moreTensions have existed throughout the pandemic between the rural north and California’s leadership, which has been among the first to implement lockdowns, mask mandates and vaccination requirements.In Butte county, fierce opposition to Covid lockdowns and school closures drove support for recalling the state’s governor, Gavin Newsom, with 51% of voters in the county backing the ultimately failed effort. Newsom’s policies, however, appear to have worked and the state had the lowest Covid infection rate in the US last month.Last year, Oroville refused to enforce state requirements prohibiting indoor dining. Butte county, where Oroville is located, declined to recommend a mask mandate earlier this fall, even as cases surged and a a local medical center reported treating more patients than at any other point during the pandemic.Before passing the resolution, council members argued they were taking a stand and advocating for residents to make their own health choices.“I assure you folks that great thought was put into every bit of this,” the city’s mayor, Chuck Reynolds, said. “Nobody willy-nilly threw something to grandstand.”But the city’s declaration does not shield it from following federal and state laws, said Lisa Pruitt, a rural law expert at the University of California, Davis, who said it was not clear what the designation meant.“A municipality cannot unilaterally declare itself not subject to the laws of the state of California,” Pruitt said. “Whatever they mean by constitutional republic you can’t say hocus pocus and make it happen.”Leaders in the city of 20,000 say the resolution is an effort to push back against state government and affirm the city’s values and commitment to the constitution. Oroville drafted its resolution from scratch after not finding any examples of other cities with similar resolutions, said Scott Thomson, the city’s vice-mayor.“I proposed it after 18 months of increasingly intrusive executive mandates and what I felt to be excessive overreach by our government,” said Thomson. “After the failed recall in California, our state governor seems to [be] on a rampage and the mandates are getting more intrusive. Now he’s going after our kids and schools.”The majority of speakers at the Oroville city council meeting expressed their support for their resolution – applauding its introduction and calling council members “heroes” – with several specifically citing the state’s vaccine requirement for schoolchildren.“We’re hoping that becoming a constitutional republic city is the best step in order to regain and maintain our inalienable rights protected by the constitution of the United States. What will be left if we don’t have that? if we don’t have bodily autonomy?” one speaker said in tears. “What else are they gonna want me to let them do to my kids? Where does it stop?”The resolution does not affect local schools, which fall under the purview of the school district, Thomson said, but is a way for the community to declare it will not use city resources to implement state rules it does not agree with. “We’re not ignorant that there are serious issues at hand, we just do not agree with the way it’s being handled.”One council member argued that mandates were “political theater” and that the immune system is the best defense against disease. The best protection against against Covid-19 is vaccination – Butte county has a vaccination rate of 48%, according to New York Times data.The council approved the resolution by a 6-1 vote on Tuesday, even as one member who voted in favor of it warned residents it had “no teeth” and was a “political statement”.The city’s efforts tap in to a common sentiment in rural northern California that the region is ignored, but also over-governed by the state, Pruitt said. Signs for the state of Jefferson, a movement to secede from California, are common here. But, Pruitt says, the city’s gesture does not grant it more power or the ability to ignore state law.“It seems to make the people of Oroville feel better that their city council has made this gesture but as a practical matter it doesn’t make any difference,” Pruitt said.TopicsCaliforniaCoronavirusUS politicsGavin NewsomnewsReuse this content More

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      Bill Clinton says he is ‘glad to be home’ after hospital admission

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      Bill ClintonBill Clinton says he is ‘glad to be home’ after hospital admissionFormer US president releases video thanking staff at California hospital where he was treated for infection01:08Associated PressThu 21 Oct 2021 06.21 EDTFirst published on Thu 21 Oct 2021 06.18 EDTBill Clinton has released a video saying he is on the road to recovery after being hospitalised in southern California for six days to treat an infection unrelated to Covid-19.Clinton, 75, who arrived home in New York on Sunday, said he was glad to be back and that he was “so touched by the outpouring of support” he had received while in hospital last week.An aide to the former US president said he had a urological infection that spread to his bloodstream but was on the mend and never went into septic shock, a potentially life-threatening condition.Clinton thanked the doctors and nurses at the University of California, Irvine medical center.Clinton has faced health scares in the years since he left the White House in 2001. In 2004, he had quadruple bypass surgery after experiencing prolonged chest pains and shortness of breath. He returned to hospital for surgery for a partially collapsed lung in 2005, and in 2010 he had a pair of stents fitted in a coronary artery.He responded by embracing a largely vegan diet that resulted in him losing weight and reporting improved health.TopicsBill ClintonCaliforniaUS politicsHealthnews More

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      Bill Clinton released from hospital after infection treatment

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      Bill ClintonBill Clinton released from hospital after infection treatmentFormer US president was admitted to California hospital on Tuesday with an infection unrelated to Covid Associated PressSun 17 Oct 2021 11.19 EDTLast modified on Sun 17 Oct 2021 15.35 EDTBill Clinton was released Sunday from the Southern California hospital where he had been treated for an infection.The former US president was released around 8am from the University of California Irvine medical center.Clinton, 75, was admitted Tuesday to the hospital south-east of Los Angeles with an infection unrelated to Covid-19, officials said.Clinton spokesperson Angel Urena had said on Saturday that Clinton would remain hospitalized one more night to receive further intravenous antibiotics. But all health indicators were “trending in the right direction”, Urena said.An aide to the former president said Clinton had a urological infection that spread to his bloodstream. In the years since Clinton left the White House in 2001, the former president has faced several health scares.In 2004, he underwent quadruple bypass surgery after experiencing prolonged chest pains and shortness of breath. He returned to the hospital for surgery for a partially collapsed lung in 2005, and in 2010 he had a pair of stents implanted in a coronary artery.Clinton has responded to worries over his health by embracing a largely vegan diet that has seen him lose weight and report improved health.TopicsBill ClintonUS politicsCalifornianewsReuse this content More

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      A US small-town mayor sued the oil industry. Then Exxon went after him

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      Climate crimesClimate crisisA US small-town mayor sued the oil industry. Then Exxon went after him The mayor of Imperial Beach, California, says big oil wants him to drop the lawsuit demanding the industry pay for the climate crisisSupported byAbout this contentChris McGreal in Imperial BeachSat 16 Oct 2021 06.00 EDTSerge Dedina is a surfer, environmentalist and mayor of Imperial Beach, a small working-class city on the California coast.He is also, if the fossil fuel industry is to be believed, at the heart of a conspiracy to shake down big oil for hundreds of millions of dollars.Imperial Beach, CaliforniaExxonMobil and its allies have accused Dedina of colluding with other public officials across California to extort money from the fossil-fuel industry. Lawyers even searched his phone and computer for evidence he plotted with officials from Santa Cruz, a city located nearly 500 miles north of Imperial Beach.The problem is, Dedina had never heard of a Santa Cruz conspiracy. Few people had.“The only thing from Santa Cruz on my phone was videos of my kids surfing there,” Dedina said. “I love the fact that some lawyer in a really expensive suit, sitting in some horrible office trying to find evidence that we were in some kind of conspiracy with Santa Cruz, had to look at videos of my kids surfing.”That’s where the laughter stopped.The lawyers found no evidence to back up their claim. But that did not stop the industry from continuing to use its legal muscle to try to intimidate Dedina, who leads one of the poorest small cities in the region.The mayor became a target after Imperial Beach filed a lawsuit against ExxonMobil, Chevron, BP and more than 30 other fossil-fuel companies demanding they pay the huge costs of defending the city from rising seas caused by the climate crisis.Imperial Beach’s lawsuit alleges the oil giants committed fraud by covering up research showing that burning fossil fuels destroys the environment. The industry then lied about the evidence for climate change for decades, deliberately delaying efforts to curb carbon emissions.The city’s lawsuit was among the first of a wave of litigation filed by two dozen municipalities and states across the US that could cost the fossil-fuel industry billions of dollars in compensation for the environmental devastation and the deception.Dedina says his minority majority community of about 27,000 cannot begin to afford the tens of millions of dollars it will cost to keep at bay the waters bordering three sides of his financially strapped city. The worst of recent storms have turned Imperial Beach into an island.One assessment calculated that, without expensive mitigation measures, rising sea levels will eventually swamp some of the city’s neighbourhoods, routinely flood its two schools and overwhelm its drainage system.Imperial Beach’s annual budget is $20m. Exxon’s chief executive, Darren Woods, was paid more than $15m last year.“We don’t have a pot to piss in in this city. So why not go after the oil companies?” he said. “The lawsuit is a pragmatic approach to making the people that caused sea level rise pay for the impacts it has on our city.”InteractiveThat’s not how Exxon, the US’s largest oil company, saw it. Its lawyers noted that Imperial Beach filed its case in July 2017, at the same time as two California counties, Marin and San Mateo. The county and city of Santa Cruz followed six months later with similar suits seeking compensation to cope with increasing wildfires and drought caused by global heating.Exxon alleged that the sudden burst of litigation, and the fact that the municipalities shared a law firm specialising in environmental cases, Sher Edling, was evidence of collusion.Exxon filed lawsuits claiming the municipalities conspired to extort money from the company by following a strategy developed during an environmental conference at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, 25 miles north of Imperial Beach, nine years ago.The meeting, organised by the Climate Accountability Institute and the Union of Concerned Scientists, produced a report outlining how legal strategies used by US states against the tobacco industry in the 1990s could be applied to cases against fossil fuel companies.Dedina was also targeted by one of the US’s biggest business groups at the forefront of industry resistance to increased regulation to reduce greenhouse gases, the National Association of Manufacturers, and a rightwing thinktank, the Energy & Environment Legal Institute.The manufacturing trade group was behind the efforts to obtain data from Dedina’s phone and documents in 2018. In its public disclosure request to the mayor’s office, NAM called Imperial Beach’s lawsuit “litigation based on political or ideological objections more appropriately addressed through the political process”.Exxon is attempting to use a Texas law that allows corporations to go on a fishing expedition for incriminating evidence by questioning individuals under oath even before any legal action is filed against them. The company is trying to force Dedina, two other members of Imperial Beach’s government, and officials from other jurisdictions, to submit to questioning on the grounds they were joined in a conspiracy against the oil industry.“A collection of special interests and opportunistic politicians are abusing law enforcement authority and legal process to impose their viewpoint on climate change,” the oil firm claimed. “ExxonMobil finds itself directly in that conspiracy’s crosshairs.”How cities and states could finally hold fossil fuel companies accountableRead moreA Texas district judge approved the request to depose Dedina, but then a court of appeals overturned the decision last year. The state supreme court is considering whether to take up the case.The target on Dedina is part of a wider pattern of retaliation against those suing Exxon and other oil companies.In an unusual move in 2016, Exxon persuaded a Texas judge to order the attorney general of Massachusetts, Maura Healey, to travel to Dallas to be deposed about her motives for investigating the company for alleged fraud for suppressing evidence on climate change. The judge also ordered that New York’s attorney general, Eric Schneiderman, be “available” in Dallas on the same day in case Exxon wanted to question him about a similar investigation.Healey accused Exxon of trying to “squash the prerogative of state attorneys general to do their jobs”. The judge reversed the deposition order a month later and Healey filed a lawsuit against the company in 2019, which is still awaiting trial.But similar tactics persuaded the US Virgin Islands attorney general to shut down his investigation of the oil giant.Patrick Parenteau, a law professor and former director of the Environmental Law Center at Vermont law school, said the attempt to question Dedina and other officials is part of a broader strategy by the oil industry to counter lawsuits with its own litigation.“These cases are frivolous and vexatious. Intimidation is the goal. Just making it cost a lot and be painful to take on Exxon. They think that if they make the case painful enough, Imperial Beach will quit,” he said.If the intent is to kill off the litigation against the oil industry, it’s not working. Officials from other municipalities have called Exxon’s move “repugnant”, “a sham” and “outrageous”, and have vowed to press on with their lawsuits.Dedina described the action as a “bullying tactic” by the oil industry to avoid accountability.“The only conspiracy is [that] a bunch of suits and fossil-fuel companies decided to pollute the earth and make climate change worse, and then lie about it,” he said. “They make more money than our entire city has in a year.”The city’s lawsuit claims it faces a “significant and dangerous sea-level rise” through the rest of this century that threatens its existence. Imperial Beach commissioned an analysis of its vulnerability to rising sea levels which concluded that nearly 700 homes and businesses were threatened at a cost of more than $100m. It said that flooding will hit about 40% of the city’s roads, including some that will be under water for long periods. Two elementary schools will have to be moved. The city’s beach, regarded as one of the best sites for surfing on the California coast, is being eroded by about a foot a year.Imperial Beach sits at the southern end of San Diego bay. Under one worst-case scenario, the bay could merge with the Tijuana River estuary to the south and permanently submerge much of the city’s housing and roads.The city has received some help with creating natural climate barriers. The Fish and Wildlife Service restored 400 acres of wetland next to the city as a national wildlife refuge which also acts as a barrier to flooding, and is expected to restore other wetlands together with the Port of San Diego. A grant is paying for improved equipment to warn of floods.But that still leaves the huge costs of building new schools and drainage systems, and adapting other infrastructure. Dedina said that without the oil companies stumping up, it won’t happen.“People ask, how did you go against the world’s largest fossil fuel companies? Isn’t that scary? No. What’s scary is coastal flooding and the idea that whole cities would be under water,” said the mayor.“Honestly, bring it on. I can’t wait to make our case. I can’t wait to take the fight to them because we have nothing to lose.”This story is published as part of Covering Climate Now, a global collaboration of news outlets strengthening coverage of the climate storyTopicsClimate crisisClimate crimesCaliforniaUS politicsExxonMobilOil and gas companiesFossil fuelsfeaturesReuse this content More

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      Bill Clinton to remain in hospital as he recovers from urological infection

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      Bill ClintonBill Clinton to remain in hospital as he recovers from urological infectionFormer president to remain in California hospital at least another night, his spokesperson said Friday ReutersFri 15 Oct 2021 20.48 EDTThe former US president Bill Clinton’s health is improving but he will remain in a California hospital for at least another night to receive antibiotics intravenously for a urological infection that spread to his bloodstream, his spokesperson said on Friday.The 75-year-old Clinton, who served as president from 1993 to 2001, entered the University of California, Irvine, medical center on Tuesday evening after suffering from fatigue. He spoke with Joe Biden on Friday.Clinton’s spokesperson Angel Ureña said that Clinton’s white blood count has decreased, indicating his health is improving.“All health indicators are trending in the right direction, including his white blood count which was decreased significantly,” Ureña said on Twitter. “In order to receive further IV antibiotics, he will remain in the hospital overnight.”Since his admission to the intensive care unit at the hospital, Clinton has received fluids along with antibiotics, his doctors said.His wife, a former secretary of state and 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, was at the hospital on Thursday and Friday, and the two read books and talked about politics, Ureña told Reuters.It remained unclear when Clinton would be released.Biden said Clinton would likely go home soon, though it was not clear whether he would be released on Saturday or later.“He is getting out shortly. … Whether that’s tomorrow or the next day, I don’t know,” Biden told reporters in Connecticut. “He’s doing fine. He really is.”On Thursday, Ureña said Clinton was “up and about, joking and charming the hospital staff”.Clinton has dealt with heart problems in the past, including a 2004 quadruple bypass surgery and a 2010 procedure to open a blocked artery.The Democrat served two terms in the White House, overseeing strong economic growth while engaging in bruising political battles with congressional Republicans.TopicsBill ClintonUS politicsCaliforniaDemocratsReuse this content More

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      No, California Isn’t Doomed

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      California has been struggling. It has stumbled through the Covid-19 pandemic and recession, afflicted by wildfires, an epidemic of homelessness and stratospheric housing prices. Last year it experienced its first population decline in records going back to 1900. Its latest mess was a costly and unsuccessful campaign to recall Gov. Gavin Newsom.The state’s problems are real. Nevertheless, there are positive signs. The first step toward fixing problems is recognizing them, and on that score, Californians have grown increasingly aware of what’s wrong. California is also blessed with abundant resources that enable it to fix problems that would be daunting for less endowed states.Housing is a good example. Prices are crazy: On Sept. 16, the California Association of Realtors announced that the median sale price in the state in August was $827,940, up 17 percent from a year earlier. Only 23 percent of California households could afford to buy a median-priced home in the second quarter, down from one-third a year earlier, the association announced in August.To make ends meet, many Californians scrimp and save and commute long distances from exurbs; others give up and move to cheaper states. Employers struggle to lure out-of-state recruits. Homeowners can swap one high-priced house for another, but renters can’t buy starter homes because they have no housing equity to use for a down payment. And California’s epidemic of homelessness can be traced in part to a lack of affordable housing.The upside is that almost everyone in California understands that building more housing is essential. More homes are being built in Houston, Dallas, Fort Worth and Austin combined than in the entire state of California, says Dan Dunmoyer, president and chief executive of the California Building Industry Association.One of Newsom’s first acts after surviving the recall attempt was to sign three bills to increase housing supply. Senate Bill No. 8 extends a 2019 law that accelerates approval of housing projects. Senate Bill No. 9 allows homeowners to build up to three additional housing units on their land. And Senate Bill No. 10 allows environmental review to be sped up for multiunit projects near transit hubs or in urban developments. Those are the latest of dozens of housing bills signed by Newsom and his predecessor, Jerry Brown.The California Environmental Quality Act, signed into law in 1970 by Ronald Reagan, who was then the governor, is valuable on the whole but enables people to use environmental pretexts to resist housing developments in their neighborhoods that they could not as easily oppose otherwise. There’s widespread agreement that this needs to change.Progress, though, is halting. The pace of issuance of permits for housing construction in California is slower now than in 1975, according to data compiled by the state’s Department of Finance and the U.S. Census Bureau. Environmentalists fight efforts to circumscribe the environmental quality act, worrying that legitimate environmental concerns about new projects will be neglected. And local elected officials continue to push back against efforts to increase density, which they perceive as reducing the value of existing homes. In Palo Alto, the headquarters of Hewlett-Packard and Tesla, Mayor Tom DuBois expressed opposition to Senate Bill No. 10, writing that “such legislation echoes more of Russia than of California.”Up against such forces, Dunmoyer, the president of the building industry association, told me that he’s impressed by the “courage” shown by Newsom and the California State Legislature in enacting senate bills 8, 9 and 10. But, he added, “This is a marathon, and we’re still in the first quarter of the marathon race.”Other problems in California should be fixable with effort and good will. As I wrote in my Sept. 8 newsletter, the state’s water shortages could be alleviated by diverting a little water from agriculture to other purposes. Farms account for only 0.8 percent of the state’s gross domestic product but more than 80 percent of the water used by people (that is, not counting water that stays in streams, deltas and so on).Homelessness is caused partly by a lack of housing, but also by inadequate treatment of people experiencing mental illness and drug addiction. Many conservatives argue that the state has focused too much on low-income housing as the solution to homelessness. “Focus on treatment first rather than housing first,” says Wayne Winegarden, senior fellow in business and economics at the right-of-center Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy. “Otherwise all we’re doing is taking the problem from the street to the hotel room.”Chris Hoene, executive director of the left-of-center California Budget and Policy Center, disagrees with Winegarden, and calls for more spending on Homekey, the state’s program for housing the homeless. Social services should be “wrapped around,” or integrated with, a home, Hoene says. It’s unfortunate, he says, that “people on different sides of strategies pit the potential solutions against each other.”One advantage that California has in dealing with these and other challenges — fixing K-12 education, lowering the tax burden on families and businesses and so on — is that the state’s finances have improved. The state raised taxes and trimmed spending to brace for the Covid-19 recession, but tax revenues came in unexpectedly high because higher-income workers kept working and the financial markets did well, generating taxable capital gains. The $100 billion California Comeback Plan, which Newsom signed in July, is a Christmas tree of Democratic priorities, including stimulus checks for two out of every three Californians, renter assistance, housing for the homeless, tax relief and grants to small businesses, universal pre-K, college savings accounts for low-income students and investments in infrastructure and wildfire resilience.I bounced this optimistic line of thought off Joel Kotkin, a professor at Chapman University in Orange, Calif., who is an expert on cities. He was more pessimistic. “The way our economy is structured, there’s an incredible amount of wealth being minted for a small number of people,” he said. “We have the worst overcrowding. The schools are terrible and they’re going to get worse.” He added, “Used to be a young, ambitious person went to California. I don’t think that’s happening anymore.”It’s hard to argue with a veteran observer of California like Kotkin, who began writing about Silicon Valley in 1975. On the other hand, the bearishness can be overdone. Matthew A. Winkler, editor in chief emeritus of Bloomberg News, observed earlier this year that people love to declare California “doomed.” It ain’t.The readers writeHow you describe a bill depends upon what you are talking about. If you are concerned about too much fiscal stimulus, then taking note of the tax increases and spending cuts makes sense. If you are concerned with the size of government, taking note of spending cuts makes sense, but it does not make sense to reduce the size of the bill by the amount of the tax increases. Same way with a Republican tax cut. If they cut taxes by $1.5 trillion and fully offset it with $1.5 trillion in spending cuts, that is a $1.5 trillion tax cut and that is how it should be described. Only offsetting tax increases should be taken into account.Paul PecorinoTuscaloosa, Ala.The writer is a professor of economics at the University of Alabama.Quote of the day“According to Wittgenstein’s ruler: Unless you have confidence in the ruler’s reliability, if you use a ruler to measure a table you may also be using the table to measure the ruler. The less you trust the ruler’s reliability, the more information you are getting about the ruler and the less about the table.”— Nassim Nicholas Taleb, “Fooled by Randomness: The Hidden Role of Chance in Life and in the Markets” (2004)Have feedback? Send a note to coy-newsletter@nytimes.com. More