This past Tuesday, California voters passed Proposition 14, that among other things will make it easier for rich people, with lots of money to spend, to get elected and will make it harder for grassroots candidates to gain footing. Well, it already is hard for truly grassroots candidates to gain a footing in California, and already is easy for the rich to win elections. Running state wide in California is so expensive, who else can afford to run, but the rich and Jerry Brown, who has been around so long that practically everybody in the state knows who he is.

What Proposition 14 will do as of 2011, is to get rid of party primaries and bring in the so-called wide-open primary. All the candidates will be lumped together in one race. The top two vote-getters in the race will face off in the general election. The top two vote getters most likely will be the two best financed candidates. And with no party primaries, and with no opportunity for qualifying independent candidates to freely enter the general election, the public will get one or maybe a couple of less chances to influence the outcome of elections.

The New York Times reported that Christina Tobin, chair of StopTopTwo.org, a leading opponent of Proposition 14, which was heavily outspent by the “Yes” side, said, “Big business and big government won ..."

Both the Democratic and Republican parties opposed Proposition 14 and are planning to challenge it in court.