EDITORIAL TERM-LIMITS TRICKERY SACRAMENTO LAWMAKERS LOOK TO SPECIAL INTERESTS FOR HELP.SENIOR members of the California Legislature who will soon be termed out of office want the state's term limits watered down. They want it desperately, but they don't want you to know that. After all, that would make them look like the self-serving power-mongers they are. So they've decided to farm out the job to some of their most trusted special interests -- er, supporters. The Legislature could, if it wanted to, put an anti-term-limits measure on the ballot through a simple vote. But Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez's political consultants have reasoned that voters would be more likely to approve the measure if it made it to the ballot by way of initiative, suggesting an air of grass-roots support. So now an effort is under way to collect 1.1 million signatures to put the plan on the ballot, bankrolled by the California Chamber of Commerce and the California Teachers Association The California Teachers Association (CTA), initially established in 1863 as the California Educational Society, is by far the largest teachers' union in the state of California. It is considered by many to be the most powerful union in California. , among others. Everybody wins: The politicians get a shot at keeping their offices longer, while technically keeping their distance, and the special interests chalk up a big political IOU IOU An abbreviation of the phrase "I owe you." Notes: An IOU in the business community is actually a legally binding agreement between a borrower and a lender. The terms of the loan are set out in a contract, and, once it's signed, the two parties must abide by the terms in Sacramento. All in all, it's estimated that this gift to our leaders will cost the special interests some $2.5 million. If this trickery Trickery See also Cunning, Deceit, Humbuggery. Bunsby, Captain Jack trapped into marriage by landlady. [Br. Lit.: Dombey and Son] Camacho cheated of bride after lavish wedding preparations. [Span. Lit. sounds familiar, it's because the L.A. City Council used a similar ruse Ruse (r  `sĕ), city (1993 pop. 170,209), NE Bulgaria, on the Danube River bordering Romania. The chief river port of Bulgaria, it is also an industrial and communications center. when it went after term limits through last year's Measure R. Rather than drafting the measure itself, the council gave that job to its lackeys on the L.A. Chamber of Commerce and League of Women Voters League of Women Voters, voluntary public service organization of U.S. citizens. Organized in 1920 in Chicago as an outgrowth of the National American Woman Suffrage Association, it had as its original nucleus the leaders of the latter organization. . But if legislators think such deception deception n. the act of misleading another through intentionally false statements or fraudulent actions. (See: fraud, deceit) will help their public images, they're fooling only themselves. Now their power-mongering seems not only self-serving, but dishonest, too. |
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