Furlough ruling: Sacramento Superior Court Judge Patrick Marlette
issued
a
tentative ruling
Thursday allowing Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to furlough about 15,000 state workers employed by elected
constitutional officers
and the
Board of Equalization. The ruling rejects arguments that because constitutional officers are independently elected they should control their own employees.
Change that works: Two important portions of SEIU’s
Change That Works
campaign made news this week. First, the Employee
Free Choice
Act (EFCA) was
introduced
in the House of Representatives and the Senate, which received
national
media coverage. The bill would make it easier for workers to seek union representation and is backed SEIU, virtually all
labor unions
and most progressive organizations. It is opposed by wide array of
business groups
who are spending
millions
to keep it difficult to join unions. Next Thursday there will be a noon rally in
support
of EFCA in Sacramento on the north steps of the Capitol.
Health care that works: Another key plank of the Change that Works campaign is
universal
health care. In California, state Sen. Mark Leno (D-San Francisco) introduced
SB 810
– a
single-payer
health care bill. Leno said it will “
guarantee
comprehensive health care benefits to every California resident and streamline claims and reimbursements” and “every Californian would have medical, dental, vision, hospitalization and prescription drug benefits. The bill also preserves a patient’s right to choose his or her own doctors and hospitals.” The bill is very similar to last year’s
SB 840
by then Sen. Sheila Kuehl (D- Santa Monica), who was termed out last year. In the U.S. Congress, Rep.
John Conyers
(D-Michigan) introduced
legislation
to enact
single-payer
health insurance
at the
federal
level. Most
industrialized
nations
have some
form
of single-payer health care coverage that is administered or closely regulated by the national government.
Business
groups
are split on this issue, which is a
big change
from the 1990s when health care
reform failed. People have referred to America’s health care dilemma as the “
elephant in
the room
” but how about a “
moose on the roof
” that really happened to Ward Nostdahl of Minot, North Dakota. Police said the moose was last seen heading north.