Brian Leubitz Posts

As many have stated, marriage equality isn't the end of the fight for LGBT rights or civil rights more broadly, there isn't such thing as the end of that fight. We've seen too much over the past weeks and months to think that is the case. Even within the LGBT community, there are a litany of lines that are arbitrarily drawn, yet the results are all too real. Yet, for one day, love wins. And that makes this a good day. And for my fellow San Franciscans, what a happy #SFPride this will be.

As many have stated, marriage equality isn't the end of the fight for LGBT rights or civil rights more broadly, there isn't such thing as the end of that fight. We've seen too much over the past weeks and months to think that is the case. Even within the LGBT community, there are a litany of lines that are arbitrarily drawn, yet the results are all too real. Yet, for one day, love wins. And that makes this a good day. And for my fellow San Franciscans, what a happy #SFPride this will be.

If you are in the Bay Area, you won't be surprised to hear that the beverage association and its member companies have spent quite the hefty total on the two measures. But the number still may seem excessive: a top soda lobbyist — yes, of course that's a real thing — has spent $9.4 million in the Berkeley and San Francisco blasting the tax.

Neel Kashkari made a big speech this weekend at the California Republican Party's convention. It was meant to do two things: shore up his base and project a vision of a moderate party that could face California's future challenges. These goals are diametrically opposed to each other.

Opponents of California's Proposition 46, a law requiring doctors to enter prescriptions into a centralized database, have come up with a doozy of a smear ad.

Child refugees from South America have become a hot-button issue. And while many border-abutting states like Texas are taking a hard line, putting up fences and calling in the big guns, California is actually trying to help.

For better or worse, Jerry Brown's water bond from yesterday is still the leading candidate to replace what is tentatively scheduled to be on the ballot as Prop 43. But a coalition, mainly culled from the environmental community, has another plan.

Way back in 2012, a group of conservative nonprofit groups with connections to the Koch Brothers poured around $15 million into the efforts to defeat California's Prop 30 and pass Prop 32. The groups were fined an unprecedented $1 million by the state's FPPC, but it's done little to stop the flow of dark money. Now, a constitutional amendment requiring nonprofit disclosure has gone on ice, allowing politics as usual to stay the course.

A referendum to overturn California's bill that guarantees equal rights for transgender students has failed to acquire sufficient signatures for placement on the ballot this November. However, the fight to keep AB 1266 as the common sense, decent law of the land is far from over. There's big industry in hate- and fear-mongering.

Sandra Fluke, who in testimony before Congress called for birth control to be included in the health care bill (and slut-shamed by Rush Limbaugh for it), decided to run for an open California state senate seat, rather than attempt to get the Democratic nod for the soon-to-be-vacated Congressional seat of outgoing Henry Waxman.

California State Senator Rod Wright was convicted of lying about his place of residency – claiming to live in the district in which he was elected, but actually living outside the area. Sen. Wright faces up to eight years at sentencing.

A new California law that gives transgender students a fair chance in public schools by allowing them to use gender segregated facilities and participate in activities for their chosen gender has turned into a lightening rod for transgender rights. Often the forgotten part of this country's growing LGBT acceptance, transgender individuals face some of the harshest discrimination. Conservatives are using the new California law as a wedge issue, but many in the state are fighting to keep the protections on the books.

The gas station company Valero has admitted to egregious air quality violations in California. The company was fined just over $300,000 for the infractions, but this was too little, too late for the many who've contracted serious respiratory ailments from the contaminated air.

While the odds have been better for Democratic legislation under Gov. Brown than the previous administration, some Democratic legislators have been a little frustrated with Gov. Brown's vetoes of major legislation. With that being said, the two year session that ended last year ended up with the Governor vetoing about 13 percent of the 1,866 bills that reached his desk.

California increased the state's minimum wage by 50 cents Thursday, bringing it up to $8 an hour. While not nearly enough to help pay for a small family's daily expenses, it is a step in the right direction.

California has made dramatic steps in curbing its teen pregnancy rates. Comprehensive sex education and other tools have helped, but key is a general best practices regimen that keeps what works, and tosses what doesn't.

The key to the Senate Democrats' plans to get real reform in California's corrections system was a three year delay on the court ordered return to 137.5 percent of prison capacity. Gov. Brown has now gone ahead and asked the court for the delay. If it's rejected, the administration would spend $315 million this fiscal year to house the inmates in private prisons and county jails instead of turning them loose.

A bill passed the California legislature that would allow undocumented immigrants to apply for and receive drivers' licenses. This is part of the effort local and state officials are making toward immigration reform. The same reform has stagnated at the federal level.

Republicans don't go out of their way to support LGBT Californians. That being said, it is hard for them to vote against veterans, no matter the cause. So, it was quite the conflict when Richard Pan's AJR 19 rolled through the Legislature.

Once there was a real split in the environmental community over fracking legislation. The National Resources Defense Council, CLCV and a number of other organizations were supporting Sen. Fran Pavley's SB 4 to regulate the process. Others were calling for a complete moratorium to ensure safety while sufficient data was gathered.

It seems that split ended when the oil and gas friendly amendments made it into the bill in the Assembly.