in the healthy and educated democracy i envision, with only 9 DAYS left until the election i’d hope everyone has studied the candidates and propositions, read some material, listened to or watched some debates, and had many dinner-table discussions about the handful of admittedly heavy things we’ll be voting on soon.
however, in the real world in which i live, i see and hear lots of personal and partisan shit-slinging (apologies to sensitive eye-ears, but some of the campaign ads are so offensive that mud just isnt strong enough), a sound-byte culture that over-simplifies tough issues, and well-funded disinformation campaigns that – should they go unchallenged – unfortunately tend to work.
so, i’ve spent long hours creating the rather modest document below, which i hope will hold some value to you in regard to your voting decisions.
OPC voting guide

some notes/caveats:
1. there are seven official Parties in California, but Natural Law and American Independent are not included because neither had published an election guide. for some insight into these little-heard-from Parties, i see a lot of great progressive values in the Natural Law party, and i like to think of American Independent as Republican+Democrat+steroids (the worst of both, and rabid about it).
2. the OPC “recommendations” are my best attempt at evaluating the propositions based on their peace and social justice merit, using both my own value code and what information i’ve been able to gather from reading publications and attending a discussion forum. If you have ANY questions on what i’ve put down, please contact me.
3. the bottom section represents candidate recommendations by a number of groups. Many of them, however, are not by-name endorsements but rather a listing of the candidates who scored the highest by the groups’ individual ratings.
4. in the OPC column for candidates, i chose only a select few, and those are based on my own sensibilities and those candidates whose values matched the OPC’s the best. I’m not interested in arguing over their merit…take what you will and leave the rest. Ketelsen gets my support for School District because he’s the only non-incumbent and i like change. That position gets three votes though, so choose two incumbents to go with him. Klaif, LaFollette, and Leary are the three challengers (non-incumbents) running together for Ojai City Council. All three are members of the Ojai Peace Coalition, so to the degree to which their values are reflected by that membership, they have my support.
i will note also that OPC-member Michael Stettler is running as a Democratic write-in candidate for the 24th District House seat currently occupied by Elton Gallegly.
5. This guide is link-ful….click on anything underlined to learn more!