And got nowhere.

A combination of the agricultural, banking, real estate, and automotive industries have been in control of California since ... well ... forever.  Allied with the GOP they have stymied taxation of the income producers: agriculture, banking, real estate, & etc. by foisting the ever increasing tax burden on individuals.  They then 'flipped' the debate by forbidding any increase in taxation on anybody which starved necessary infrastructure and other Public Works.  

Almost simultaneously the damn fools passed Term Limits which shifted political power from elected officials to political insiders, of various sorts, which has resulted in political power being concentrated in people that do not, are not, and cannot be held publicly accountable.

Thus real political power in California is essential private.  Thus elections are essentially meaningless.


She believed in nothing; only her skepticism kept her from being an atheist. -- Jean-Paul Sartre