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Investor Tim Draper Pushes Ballot Measure Splitting California Into 3 States (sfgate.com)

"One of several proposals aiming to split California into multiple smaller states has reportedly reached an important new goal thanks in large part to the efforts of its billionaire champion," writes schwit1. SFGate reports: Venture capitalist Tim Draper, who previously pushed a proposal that would split California into six states, says that his three-state proposal has enough signatures to qualify for the November ballot. On Thursday, Draper said in a statement that the "CAL 3" initiative has collected over 600,000 signatures from Californians who would like to see the state split into three. An initiative needs 366,000 signatures to appear on the ballot. "This is an unprecedented show of support on behalf of every corner of California to create three state governments that emphasize representation, responsiveness, reliability and regional identity," Draper said.
The U.S. Congress would still need to approve the change -- and it's probably useful to remember what happened when Draper tried splitting California into six states. He ultimately turned in 1.3 million signatures for a ballot measure in 2014, "only to see nearly half of them disqualified.

"He ended up about 100,000 short of the valid signatures he needed."

3 of 429 comments (clear)

  1. Re: Senators by ooloorie · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I don't see how he fails to understand anything. It's a weird system, essentially making some people in extremely rural areas have a massively disproportionate influence on the 99% of the rest of the country.

    It's not a "weird system" at all: the US is a union of states. If you want the rural states to be part of the union, then those rural states want to be assured that they can't steamrolled by the high population states. It works the same way in the EU. It's the way free and voluntary associations between states work.

    The kind of majoritarianism you believe in, extended to the rest of the world, would mean that China and India get to tell everybody else in the world how to live their lives. I don't think that's a good idea.

  2. Re: Senators by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I've been saying this for years. The only way to fix the problems is to add about 2000 new Congressmen. But do you think any of the 435 wants to dilute their power?

    Hell no. Why would they. The failure to pass the Apportionment Amendment was the greatest failure of the Republic, it doomed us from the start.

  3. Even So Cal is Blue ... see county map by drnb · · Score: 3, Interesting

    California is running a budget surplus ...

    Temporary, and having more to do with the national economy than anything done in California.

    ... and has the most successful economy in the country.

    Irrelevent, the legislature/governor have little to nothing to do with that.

    If you're so concerned over the effectiveness of state governments maybe you should try generally voting for Democrats.

    You suffer from a reading comprehension problem don't you, is it politically inspired? One party control is the problem. One ideological extreme getting all they want is the problem. You don't want either part in supermajority control. You want balance, you want them to have to compromise, that moderates the stupidity.

    Furthermore, you don't seem to know how California divides politically. "Southern California" would most certainly be red.

    You are amazingly ignorant of the facts. Examine the blueness on the county results map.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...