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Home » Our View » Prop. 82 defeat–rundown

Prop. 82 defeat–rundown

California’s preschool initiative went down in flames, 60% to 40%.  Link dump below the fold. 

Rob Reiner weeps bitter tears comments on the defeat here:

"I want to extend an invitation to our opposition, to those who voted against universal preschool, who have all said preschool is the right thing," Reiner said. "They might not agree with how we wanted to do it, but I’m here to ask them to help us — come up with another way."

Rob, we might just take you up on that idea.  (Hat tip on that to Sharon Hughes, who is pleased with the defeat.)

This is a bit dated (May 25), but still worth a link: if the San Francisco Chronicle opposes the idea (!), you just know it’s in deep trouble. 

LA Times postmortem here.  (And if you’re interested in the gorier details of this saga, School Me! has a handy timeline here.)  Meanwhile, Hit n’ Run over at Reason sums it up:

As Lisa Snell of the Reason Foundation (the nonprofit that publishes Reason Online) laid out in the great detail, Prop. 82 was a ridiculous waste of money that would have cost some $100,000 per new preschooler incarcerated. So good riddance to bad rubbish.

(Side note: Anti-82 site Tykes On Trikes appropriately listed Lisa–who blogs here–as one of their heroes in the fight against the proposition.)  Similar sentiments from Neal McCluskey over at Cato at Liberty: "Congratulations to California voters for keeping their preschools from becoming, well, like the rest of their schools."  More blogospheric joy (or maybe relief?) here, here, and here from Right on the Left Coast.  And Daryl Cobranchi is pleased. 

No statement yet over at Preschool California’s website.  How odd! 

Meanwhile, Holy Coast suggests that the pollsters botched it bad on Prop. 82:

This margin is hard to believe given that just a few days ago the pollsters were telling us that Prop. 82 had been polling with a slight lead for most of the campaign, but had dropped slightly behind in the final days of the campaign. The pollsters really kicked this one.