Civics and Elections: Saving Our Democracy Begins with Young Voters

In Athens of antiquity, the inventors of democracy set up a law that required every person to vote. Anyone found not voting would be publicly marked and labeled an idiot; someone who thought their own personal needs trumped those of the society around them, wrote Isaac DeVille.

I begin here by asserting that the one certain measure of any democratic society is the measurement of those who vote and those who don't.

Is Obamacare Holding Down the Costs of Health Care?

NATIONAL -- One of the primary selling points for the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) was affordable insurance premiums with guaranteed issuance. Guaranteed issuance is great for unhealthy people, but is also seen as having the potential of increasing health care costs.

Lower premiums are enticing to healthy people, but anyone who has to use their insurance knows: total cost = premiums + co-pays + deductibles.

As Congress Closes Curtain on One Funding Crisis, It Sets Stage for the Next

CAPITOL HILL -- The U.S. Senate failed to override President Obama's veto of the Keystone XL pipeline on Wednesday, missing the two-thirds threshold by 5 votes in a 62-37 vote. It was the first time the U.S. Senate voted to override a veto from Obama.

Republican lawmakers are still determined to pass Keystone in 2015. However, on its own, there are not many avenues for success, which means it will need to be attached to a must-pass bill to have a fighting chance, and supporters have already decided what bill they will attach it to.

John Hrabe: The Politics of 'Journalism'

CalNewsRoom writer John Hrabe is up to his usual yellow journalism, writing articles with little regard to facts or accuracy. Hrabe's most recent fiction is a politically-motivated attack on Assemblymember Don Wagner (R-Irvine). Wagner is a candidate for the vacant Orange County Senate seat in the 37th State Senate District.

Benjamin Netanyahu's 'Non-Political' Speech Targets Partisan Divide in Washington

CAPITOL HILL -- In the most polite, folksy manner possible, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu came to Washington with a simple message: our policy on a nuclear-free Iran is wrong.

Alluding to the upcoming festival of Purim, Netanyahu warned Congress of a significant modern Persian threat -- an Iran that is single-minded in its goals to obtain nuclear weapons with intercontinental missile capability.

Why Proportional Representation Would Strengthen Third Parties in America

Just about every election in the United States follows the 'winner-take-all' principle, whereby the voters for the candidate who receives the most votes win representation and those who voted for the other candidate(s) win nothing.

While this may be "business as usual," the winner-take-all system carries with it a deep flaw: While most Americans want a viable third party, they know full well when they enter the ballot box that the winner will be a Republican

Expanding the Role of Uncle Sam: The Excesses of the Great Society

In the last article we covered how short-term thinking and the here-and-now instinct in American politics institutionalized by Franklin Roosevelt combined with the utopian rationalism of the Woodrow Wilson presidency to create the part-beneficial and part ignorantly-malevolent monster that was and is the New Deal.

In this article, we will cover the further institutionalization of that instinct with Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society, and observe how a plan formulated on the best of intentions can so profoundly backfire upon those who planned it.