Chicken little

From CIO magazine, the alarmist business perspective on California privacy legislation:

Like a large hurricane sweeping in off the Pacific, these laws will wreak havoc on all kinds of business processes, including how websites can collect personal data and the management of databases that store personal information on customers. They will influence how companies share personal data with third parties and restrict their ability to contact consumers via cell phones and faxes.
...
So what can CIOs do? You may not be able to divert this threatening tidal wave, but you can be prepared for it. To reduce your company's vulnerability, educate yourself about the legislation so that you can talk intelligently with your corporate counsel and CEO. And you can insulate yourself from some of the laws altogether by using encryption. Encryption is one solution to California's disclosure laws. Companies are not required to notify customers in the event of a security breach if customer data is encrypted.

Circumventing legal requirements is key, folks.

You can also adhere to best practices discovered by CIOs who have run afoul of some of these laws and learned from the experience. Such practices include communicating with the public on what information you collect, and following that up with clear, honest answers to questions from customers and the media in the event of an information leak.

Definitely haven't seen any evidence in my research of an effort on the part of telecommunications corporations to promote transparency and communicate with the public on information sharing.

The truth is that legislation hasn't gone far enough to hold business accountable in protecting sensitive consumer information.

Grist snowed by Gov's executive order on carbon emissions

Flexing His OPECs
Schwarzenegger, E.U. unveil new carbon-cutting schemes

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) may be hobbled by a broken leg, but his mind is still strong. (File that under Sentences We Never Thought We'd Write.) In his State of the State address last week, the green-leaning Governator announced a plan to cut carbon in transportation fuel 10 percent by 2020. "Our cars have been running on dirty fuel too long. Our country has been dependent on foreign oil for too long. I ask you to set in motion the means to free ourselves from oil and from OPEC," he said. " California has the muscle to bring about such change. I say use it." The effort, hailed as an "innovative and exciting" world first, will likely mean ramping up ethanol and other renewables, and could cause a transitional increase in gasoline prices. Across the pond, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso unveiled a plan that would require member states to cut greenhouse-gas emissions 20 percent from 1990 levels by 2020. Oh, E.U., that is so 2006. Arnie's been there, capped that.

Funny, Schwarzenegger's campaigns have been dependent on dirty oil money too long as well. With a history of industry appointments, vetoes of environmental bills, and let's not forget the Hummers (put your money where your mouth is, gov), the Sierra Club has called his record a "shade of green"--not true blue.

The man's remade himself more than Madonna--a bodybuilder, an actor, a politician, a centrist, an environmentalist--none of which he can honestly identify as now. This executive order doesn't erase his record and grant him green cred. Same goes for AB 32--Schwarzenegger had little choice in an election year but to jump on the bandwagon with the democrats in the state legislature. They're the ones who deserve recognition for consistent work on greening California.

UPDATE: TIME falls into the same trap, piling on undue praise for Bush's rhetorical green shift.

What post-partisanship?

In spite of all the press fanfare last week over Schwarzenegger's proposal to insure all children in CA, I was skeptical that it signalled a move towards real healthcare reform, or that it could possibly be anything more than a political gesture. After all--

"It's the low-hanging fruit of the health-care reform debate," said Dr. Bob Ross, president of the California Endowment, a private foundation in Los Angeles that was created to push for expanded access to health care.

Now on the day before his address to the state, Schwarzenegger reveals his true colors:

Gov. to seek cuts in aid to families on welfare

"It's ironic that the governor is proposing healthcare for poor kids while taking away their breakfasts," state Senate leader Don Perata (D-Oakland) said of the cuts, which would affect more than 40,000 families. "Even Republican Gov. [Pete] Wilson, at the time he negotiated welfare reform, agreed that children should not suffer for the behavior of their parents."

Calitics highlights this absurd contradiction:

So they can go to the doctor for a check-up, but they can't eat and they can't have a roof over their heads? I really don't get this. If this is "post-partisan cooperation", then I'm not particularly impressed.

Schwarzenegger's alienating people across the spectrum. Even though his welfare proposal proves his policies remain decidedly right-leaning, we're told the governor's loudest critics are Republican hardliners who feel betrayed by the governor's centrist self-styling. Their protest would seem to enable the governor to swing right and appease his base the moment they accuse him of "surrender" or "weakness" for supposed compromise. Meanwhile, the media pay far less attention to critics of the governor's disingenuous calls for cooperation on the left.

Centrism is worthless when the balance is tipped so radically in one direction.

UPDATE: CNA critiques the gov's overall healthcare plan. Here's the bottom line--

A market-based system always puts increased revenues and profits over the health and well-being of those patients it is supposed to serve. As was the clear intent of a number of the free-market architects of the plan, it reinforces and expands the role of the market in health care, the very source of the present crisis. If the governor's goal is truly universal health coverage, improved quality and effective cost controls, the state should embark on the same tried-and-true course taken by every other industrialized nation, either a national health system, or a single-payer approach as embodied in the single-payer bill, SB840 authored by state Sen. Sheila Kuehl. Kuehl's bill was vetoed by the governor last year. It will be reintroduced this year.

Media take notice of opposition to CPUC Commissioner Chong

Not that it will make much difference in whether she's confirmed, but it's encouraging to see challenges to anti-regulatory ideology gaining traction in the political discourse.

Battle Brewing Over PUC Nominee

Groups urge nominee defeat
By STEVE LAWRENCE
Associated Press

SACRAMENTO - Consumer groups urged a Senate committee Wednesday to reject Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's appointment of a former telecommunications industry attorney to the California Public Utilities Commission.

The Consumer Federation of California, The Utility Reform Network and other groups said Commissioner Rachelle Chong's views were too close to those of the companies she is supposed to regulate.

''Her track record in the past year shows she will not be with consumers,'' Ignacio Hernandez, legislative director for the Consumer Federation of California, told the Senate Rules Committee. ''She's for free markets, less regulation, less consumer protection.''

***

Chong said she cares ''very much for consumers, particularly ones that are the most helpless.'' But she added that she has philosophical differences with consumer groups about how to deal with competitive markets.

She said her approach was ''trust, but verify. You hope that the market works, but if it doesn't, the PUC steps in.''

vs.

"We have decided to not take a more regulatory approach that was better suited to monopoly days and instead to trust the carriers to do the right thing given the market will demand it." --Chong, 3/30/06

"I believe that decision makers everywhere should step back from old style 'command and control' regulation and instead think 'regulatory light' where markets are competitive." --Chong, 10/26/06

''If the marketplace was practicing as you're arguing (it is), there would not be a need for a... bill of rights,'' Senator Alex Padilla (D-Los Angeles) said. ''These problems would not be happening. The fact is, they are.''

CFC on KPFA

CA Prop Voting Recommendations

á la CAP.