Skelton: Proposition 32 is an attack on unions

No matter how you slice it, George Skelton says, Proposition 32 has only one goal -- reducing unions' political power in Sacramento and tilting the playing field in favor of businesses and the wealthy.

Skelton writes in his Thursday column that the problem with the ballot measure starts with the name: "The Stop Special Interest Money Now Act."

"Any ballot measure with a handle like that has to be automatically suspect," he writes. "Even a cursory look at Prop. 32 shows that it's about a covey of special interests from the right attacking a rival interest on the left, organized labor."

The only way to really curb special interest money in politics is to mandate public financing of campaigns, Skelton says. Right now that's not realistic, and other reform efforts have made little progress.

But the solution, Skelton says, is not to take unions out of the equation. 

"We're strongly in favor of wiping out special interest influence in politics," says Derek Cressman, regional director of California Common Cause. "We just don't think Prop. 32 does that. It wipes out one particular interest.

All of Skelton's columns are here.

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Photo: Service Employees International Union, Local 1000 members protest in Los Angeles in 2008. Credit: Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times