Election season: a time for careful and nuanced debate about the issues of the day and how they'll honestly affect vot--oh, sorry.  Must have hit my head on something. No, as Virginia Ellis and Dan Morian explain in an article on the raging campaign spending in California, the battle on November 7th is all about the money.

California is in a class of its own when it comes to spending on campaigns, and with a series of high-profile initiatives on the ballot this year, wealthy interests are sparing no expense to buy a big bullhorn in the debate.  Looking at what that money will buy, Kim Alexander, president of the California Voter Foundation observes, "The real tragedy of campaign financing in the initiative process is that hundreds of millions of dollars are being spent to 'educate' voters, and yet most of the money is used to buy television ads that confuse, mislead or scare voters and do just about anything but inform them."

Of course, all that could change with Proposition 89.