Issues
Tech
AI is collapsing the cost of building software so fast that a quarter of YC startups now have 95% of their code written by AI—and some are hitting $10M in revenue with fewer than 10 people. The binding constraints have shifted upstream to energy infrastructure (data centers on track to consume 10% of US power by 2028) and persistent AI memory, with open-source projects like GBrain racing to solve the problem of agents that forget everything between sessions. For California founders, the window is still open: YC's S26 deadline just passed, but a Product Hunt launch this Friday gets you a direct review from a YC partner.
$215 Billion New City Gets Historic Labor Deal
Jan 28, 2026
California Is Killing the Golden Goose
Feb 06, 2026
Airbnb's Cofounder Is Redesigning America
Feb 06, 2026
SF Is Winning the AI Race. Politicians Want to Kill It.
Feb 13, 2026
Washington's Tax Blitz Could Kill the Sonics—And the Startup Economy
Feb 19, 2026
Bernie Sanders Can't Explain American Innovation
Feb 21, 2026
Anthropic's War on Its Own Power Users
Feb 25, 2026
Brain Computer Interfaces Are Now Giving Sight Back to the Blind
Mar 06, 2026
New York Wants to Ban the AI That Outscores Doctors
Mar 13, 2026
The BASED Act Comes for Big Tech
Apr 02, 2026
SFO Is Trying to Bury Waymo
Apr 07, 2026
From AI Doomerism to Molotov Cocktail
Apr 20, 2026
The Compute Is Ready. The Grid Isn't.
Apr 30, 2026
Personal AI Is in Its Homebrew Computer Club Phase
May 02, 2026
The Seeker and the Builder Are the Same Person
May 07, 2026
Miss the YC Deadline? Gustaf Is Watching Friday.
May 05, 2026
Your AI Forgets Everything. GBrain and MemPalace Don't.
May 06, 2026
State Capacity
Sacramento lawmakers killed two bipartisan bills that would have made lobbyist influence letters publicly visible in real time—joining a pattern of transparency failures that includes a $612 million SF transit project that quietly dropped 365 promised affordable housing units after admitting the funding never existed. Meanwhile, a bill that could let taxpayer-funded immigration nonprofits sue journalists who report on them is one committee vote from the Assembly floor. California's government accountability problems aren't abstract: they're active, they're bipartisan, and they're getting worse.
Sacramento Sabotages Prop 36 After Voters Spoke
Jan 20, 2026
Oakland's Coliseum Fiasco: Managed by Clowns
Jan 27, 2026
Stanford's Fake Disability Crisis Is America's Future
Feb 03, 2026
California Is Killing the Golden Goose
Feb 06, 2026
Airbnb's Cofounder Is Redesigning America
Feb 06, 2026
This Citizen's Union Is Throwing a Party March 4 in Mountain View, California
Feb 11, 2026
BART's 'Leave Them Be' Order Burned the Transbay Tube
Feb 25, 2026
The San Francisco Chinatown Grift: 29 LLCs, Political Power, and Too Few New Homes
Mar 01, 2026
Lurie's Charter Reset Is a Masterclass
Mar 05, 2026
Why Is Los Angeles Spending $20M on 32 Empty Housing Units?
Mar 26, 2026
BART Paid Consultants to Say Fare Evasion Didn't Matter — Then Lost the Receipt
Mar 26, 2026
California Auditors Confirmed Billions in Fraud. The State Ignored Them.
Apr 03, 2026
SFO Is Trying to Bury Waymo
Apr 07, 2026
A Tropical Disease Hit a Berkeley Homeless Encampment. Courts Blocked Cleanup.
Apr 12, 2026
SFMTA Promised 465 Affordable Units. There Was Never a Plan to Pay for Them.
Apr 17, 2026
After a Rigged Review Process, SFUSD Just Approved Its New Ethnic Studies Curriculum
Apr 28, 2026
Exposing Nonprofit Fraud Could Come With a Price Tag
May 01, 2026
Half a Billion in Lobbying, Zero Transparency
May 22, 2026
Public Safety & Policing
AI-related violence has escalated from threats to attempted murder, with a 20-year-old PauseAI member throwing a Molotov cocktail at Sam Altman's home and threatening OpenAI headquarters in April 2026—part of a pattern that also includes a shooting targeting a city councilman over data centers. Meanwhile, structural failures are compounding San Francisco's public safety crisis: SF courts have gone five years without reporting criminal case data to the state, clear only 32% of filed cases, and a Berkeley homeless encampment spread leptospirosis for months while courts blocked cleanup. Research from Oakland and Atlanta shows that less than 0.5% of residents drive the majority of gun violence—but cities keep funding broad interventions instead of targeting the specific individuals responsible.
Oakland's Crime Crisis by the Numbers
Jan 05, 2026
Lawsuit Wants to Ban the Tech That Caught My Wife's Hit-and-Run Driver
Jan 31, 2026
Matt Mahan Must Be California's Next Governor
Jan 30, 2026
NYC's Socialist Mayor Raids the Piggy Bank
Feb 18, 2026
While SF stopped Prosecuting Drug Dealers, 3,700 People Overdosed
Feb 24, 2026
Richmond Cut Its Crime Cameras. Car Thefts Jumped 33%.
Mar 05, 2026
A parole officer sent an email: "Agents must not search for violations." Then two women died.
Mar 05, 2026
Chinatown Stabbing Victim Got No Press Conference
Mar 06, 2026
Yes, Fare Gates Actually Reduce Crime
Mar 13, 2026
He Killed Grandpa Vicha. Tomorrow, He Walks Free
Mar 24, 2026
Grandpa Vicha's Killer Was Just Released on Probation
Mar 26, 2026
Richmond Just Voted to Reinstate Their Flock Cameras After Crime Spiked
Mar 28, 2026
SF Courts Won't Show Their Work
Apr 08, 2026
The Easiest Way to Sell Wine in San Francisco Is Illegally
Apr 01, 2026
A Tropical Disease Hit a Berkeley Homeless Encampment. Courts Blocked Cleanup.
Apr 12, 2026
Oakland Has a Gang Problem Disguised as a Gun Problem
Apr 08, 2026
From AI Doomerism to Molotov Cocktail
Apr 20, 2026
State Politicians
California lawmakers killed two bipartisan transparency bills that would have posted lobbyist influence letters online in real time — while the state's own analysts confirm a structural deficit of $20–$30 billion per year driven by spending that outpaced revenue growth by 10 points. Meanwhile, legislation is moving through the Assembly that critics say could expose journalists covering government-funded immigration nonprofits to $4,000-per-violation fines, even as Sacramento faces scrutiny over billions lost to pandemic-era fraud that auditors flagged and officials ignored.
Matt Mahan Must Be California's Next Governor
Jan 30, 2026
Mahan wants to fix the waste. Steyer just wants to raise taxes.
Feb 19, 2026
Steyer's $20 Billion "Trump Tax Loophole" Is a Lie
Feb 25, 2026
The Builder Class vs The Luxury Beliefs Class
Feb 27, 2026
The BASED Act Comes for Big Tech
Apr 02, 2026
California Auditors Confirmed Billions in Fraud. The State Ignored Them.
Apr 03, 2026
Exposing Nonprofit Fraud Could Come With a Price Tag
May 01, 2026
The Deficit California Can't Tax Away
May 07, 2026
Half a Billion in Lobbying, Zero Transparency
May 22, 2026
Merit & Excellence
Paul Graham is pushing back on AOC's claim that billionaires can't earn their wealth, arguing from two decades of evaluating founders that exploitation isn't what makes billionaires — value creation is. Meanwhile, California's education system is under fire on multiple fronts: SFUSD just rubber-stamped a new ethnic studies curriculum through a rigged review process, drawing an immediate legal challenge, while federal data projects the state will lose nearly one million public school students by 2031 — three times the national rate of decline. Sacramento is also moving ACA-7 forward, a constitutional amendment that would strip Prop 209's equal-protection guarantees from K-12 schools and reopen the door to race-based admissions in gifted programs — a policy California voters have rejected twice.
UC Regents Knew SAT Ban Was Wrong—Voted for It Anyway
Jan 23, 2026
Blanket Visa Bans Punish America's Best Immigrants
Jan 28, 2026
Stanford's Fake Disability Crisis Is America's Future
Feb 03, 2026
Noam Chomsky Denied a Genocide, Advised Epstein, and Paid No Price.
Mar 05, 2026
California Will Lose a Million Students
Apr 23, 2026
After a Rigged Review Process, SFUSD Just Approved Its New Ethnic Studies Curriculum
Apr 28, 2026
Yes, You Can Earn a Billion Dollars
May 08, 2026
Techno-Optimism
AI is now writing 95% of code at a quarter of YC startups, compressing two-day engineering tasks to 15 minutes and enabling teams of under 10 to hit $10M in revenue—a shift that's moving the scarce resource from technical skill to taste and judgment. The infrastructure race is on: open-source projects are battling to solve AI's memory problem, while data centers sprint toward consuming 10% of US power by 2028, forcing YC and major tech giants to bet heavily on nuclear and energy startups. Germany's cautionary tale—a chancellor admitting his country's nuclear phase-out was a catastrophic mistake while declaring it irreversible—frames what's at stake when policy can't keep pace with technological reality.
SF Is Winning the AI Race. Politicians Want to Kill It.
Feb 13, 2026
Anthropic's War on Its Own Power Users
Feb 25, 2026
Brain Computer Interfaces Are Now Giving Sight Back to the Blind
Mar 06, 2026
The Compute Is Ready. The Grid Isn't.
Apr 30, 2026
Personal AI Is in Its Homebrew Computer Club Phase
May 02, 2026
The Seeker and the Builder Are the Same Person
May 07, 2026
Your AI Forgets Everything. GBrain and MemPalace Don't.
May 06, 2026
Asset Seizure Taxes
AOC's claim that "you can't earn a billion dollars" ignited a direct rebuttal from Y Combinator's Paul Graham, who argues his two decades of evaluating founders proves billionaires create wealth rather than steal it. The debate lands as California confronts a structural deficit of $20–35 billion annually — the result of spending growing 10 points faster than revenue under Newsom — with Democrats split between raising taxes further and fixing the underlying spending problem. Proposals like the Sanders-Khanna 5% wealth tax on unrealized gains face a damning track record: Europe already ran this experiment, lost trillions in fleeing capital, and produced zero of the world's ten largest tech companies.
The NIMBY Millionaire Behind California's Asset Seizure
Jan 27, 2026
The Wealth Exodus Is Live: Watch California Die
Feb 11, 2026
Washington's Tax Blitz Could Kill the Sonics—And the Startup Economy
Feb 19, 2026
Mahan wants to fix the waste. Steyer just wants to raise taxes.
Feb 19, 2026
Bernie Sanders Can't Explain American Innovation
Feb 21, 2026
Asset Seizure: A One-Act Play
Mar 03, 2026
The Deficit California Can't Tax Away
May 07, 2026
Yes, You Can Earn a Billion Dollars
May 08, 2026
Criminal Justice
San Francisco's criminal justice system is under mounting scrutiny: a judge just released the killer of 84-year-old Vicha Ratanapakdee on probation after pretrial credit math made additional prison time impossible, while SF courts have gone five years without reporting case data to the state and resolve only 32% of filed cases — dead last among comparable California counties. Meanwhile, new research confirms that Oakland's gun violence is driven by fewer than 2,000 people, reinforcing a broader pattern across California cities where a tiny fraction of the population accounts for the majority of violent crime.
Sacramento Sabotages Prop 36 After Voters Spoke
Jan 20, 2026
A parole officer sent an email: "Agents must not search for violations." Then two women died.
Mar 05, 2026
Chinatown Stabbing Victim Got No Press Conference
Mar 06, 2026
He Killed Grandpa Vicha. Tomorrow, He Walks Free
Mar 24, 2026
Grandpa Vicha's Killer Was Just Released on Probation
Mar 26, 2026
SF Courts Won't Show Their Work
Apr 08, 2026
Oakland Has a Gang Problem Disguised as a Gun Problem
Apr 08, 2026
Housing & YIMBY
California is projected to lose nearly one million public school students by 2031—a 15.7% collapse driven by soaring housing costs pushing families to Idaho, Florida, and beyond. In San Francisco, broken housing promises are playing out in real time: SFMTA quietly gutted 365 affordable units from a major transit project after admitting the funding never existed, while a Chinatown nonprofit controlling 29 LLCs and $163 million in assets faces scrutiny over undisclosed conflicts and ballot harvesting. Underneath both stories is the same dysfunction—a California housing system that routinely overpromises, underbuilds, and drives out the families it claims to serve.
The NIMBY Millionaire Behind California's Asset Seizure
Jan 27, 2026
$215 Billion New City Gets Historic Labor Deal
Jan 28, 2026
Matt Mahan Must Be California's Next Governor
Jan 30, 2026
California Taxes Affordable Housing Into Oblivion
Feb 10, 2026
NYC's Socialist Mayor Raids the Piggy Bank
Feb 18, 2026
The Builder Class vs The Luxury Beliefs Class
Feb 27, 2026
The San Francisco Chinatown Grift: 29 LLCs, Political Power, and Too Few New Homes
Mar 01, 2026
The Left's Housing Math Doesn't Add Up
Mar 07, 2026
SFMTA Promised 465 Affordable Units. There Was Never a Plan to Pay for Them.
Apr 17, 2026
California Will Lose a Million Students
Apr 23, 2026
Budgets & Fiscal Policy
California's nonpartisan Legislative Analyst's Office just confirmed what critics have argued for years: state spending grew 10 points faster than revenue since the pandemic, producing structural deficits of $20–30 billion annually that more taxation alone won't fix. The same period saw $20 billion in EDD fraud, an unpaid $21 billion federal pandemic loan, and a projected loss of one million public school students by 2031. From Sacramento's budget math to BART's missing consultant invoices to SF's $1.7 million toilet, the throughline is the same: California's fiscal dysfunction isn't incidental—it's baked into the system.
California Is Killing the Golden Goose
Feb 06, 2026
California Taxes Affordable Housing Into Oblivion
Feb 10, 2026
The Wealth Exodus Is Live: Watch California Die
Feb 11, 2026
NYC's Socialist Mayor Raids the Piggy Bank
Feb 18, 2026
Mahan wants to fix the waste. Steyer just wants to raise taxes.
Feb 19, 2026
Lurie's Charter Reset Is a Masterclass
Mar 05, 2026
BART Paid Consultants to Say Fare Evasion Didn't Matter — Then Lost the Receipt
Mar 26, 2026
California Auditors Confirmed Billions in Fraud. The State Ignored Them.
Apr 03, 2026
California Will Lose a Million Students
Apr 23, 2026
The Deficit California Can't Tax Away
May 07, 2026
Homelessness & Drug Crisis
A tropical disease common in the developing world is now spreading through Berkeley homeless encampments while courts block cleanup, and a federal judge kept the infected site open for three months after rats tested positive for leptospirosis. Across California, the dysfunction compounds: Los Angeles spent $20 million converting a functioning homeless hotel into 32 units that remain empty four years later, a BART encampment fire shut down the Transbay Tube for 12 hours despite officials knowing about the hazard in advance, and San Francisco's leading homeless housing provider has recorded 162 overdose deaths since 2020 while running programs that teach residents how to use drugs. The pattern connecting these stories is the same: policies designed to help people experiencing homelessness are instead trapping them in dangerous conditions, with little accountability for the results.
Housing Won't Fix This. It's the Drugs.
Jan 15, 2026
Matt Mahan Must Be California's Next Governor
Jan 30, 2026
Chan and Fielder Vote to Keep People Dying on Sidewalks
Feb 11, 2026
BART's 'Leave Them Be' Order Burned the Transbay Tube
Feb 25, 2026
While SF stopped Prosecuting Drug Dealers, 3,700 People Overdosed
Feb 24, 2026
Why Is Los Angeles Spending $20M on 32 Empty Housing Units?
Mar 26, 2026
A Tropical Disease Hit a Berkeley Homeless Encampment. Courts Blocked Cleanup.
Apr 12, 2026
Media & Narrative
Garry's List is launching its inaugural Civic Impact Awards to spotlight the newsletters, reporters, and creators making California politics legible — nominations are open now ahead of the June 2 primary. Meanwhile, a bill moving through Sacramento (AB 2624) could expose journalists investigating government-funded immigration nonprofits to $4,000-per-violation fines with no press exemption, raising urgent questions about who gets to hold power accountable.
The NIMBY Millionaire Behind California's Asset Seizure
Jan 27, 2026
Noam Chomsky Denied a Genocide, Advised Epstein, and Paid No Price.
Mar 05, 2026
Most Democrats Want Normal. Nationally It's Going Bad. In San Francisco, There's Hope.
Mar 07, 2026
From AI Doomerism to Molotov Cocktail
Apr 20, 2026
Exposing Nonprofit Fraud Could Come With a Price Tag
May 01, 2026
Introducing the Garry's List Civic Impact Awards
May 11, 2026
Asian American Issues
Antoine Watson, the man who slammed into 84-year-old Vicha Ratanapakdee and left him dying on a San Francisco sidewalk, walked free this week after a judge suspended his sentence — the mathematically inevitable result of California's 2-for-1 pretrial credit rules colliding with a four-year manslaughter cap. The case has reignited long-running anger over how the criminal justice system handles violence against Asian elders, from the uninvestigated Chinatown stabbing two days before Lunar New Year to a civil lawsuit alleging state parole officials told agents to stop looking for violations before a parolee with 91 felonies killed two women on New Year's Eve. Meanwhile, Sacramento is moving ACA-7 forward — a constitutional amendment that would strip Prop. 209's equal-protection guarantees from K-12 schools, a change with direct consequences for Asian American students in gifted programs across the state.
The San Francisco Chinatown Grift: 29 LLCs, Political Power, and Too Few New Homes
Mar 01, 2026
A parole officer sent an email: "Agents must not search for violations." Then two women died.
Mar 05, 2026
Chinatown Stabbing Victim Got No Press Conference
Mar 06, 2026
He Killed Grandpa Vicha. Tomorrow, He Walks Free
Mar 24, 2026
Grandpa Vicha's Killer Was Just Released on Probation
Mar 26, 2026
SF Politicians
SFMTA just voted to eliminate 365 of 465 promised affordable housing units above the Potrero Yard bus facility — after eight years of community planning — because the city never actually secured funding to build them. Meanwhile, Mayor Lurie is pushing SF's first comprehensive charter reform in 30 years while clashing with progressive supervisors like Chan and Fielder, who were the only two votes against his RESET Center for open-air drug users. These fights are connected: a city charter engineered for dysfunction, a housing pipeline with no money behind it, and elected officials blocking the interventions that might actually work.
CA Ballot Measures
Tom Steyer is pushing a ballot measure he calls the "Trump Tax Loophole" fix, claiming it would unlock $20 billion annually—but critics say he renamed a 1978 Democratic law and inflated the revenue figure by up to 150% compared to the state's own fiscal estimates. Meanwhile, a separate SEIU-UHW "billionaire tax" initiative has already triggered a reported $16.4 billion per year in lost revenue as dozens of high-wealth residents depart, with Google's founders and Mark Zuckerberg among those who have left. Both fights are playing out against a backdrop of an $18 billion state deficit, making the stakes of California's ballot measure battles unusually high.
Elections & Voting Integrity
California lawmakers killed two bipartisan bills that would have required lobbyist position letters to be posted online in real time — blocking a reform already standard in at least ten other states. With half a billion dollars flowing through Sacramento's lobbying machine and records arriving months after key votes, transparency advocates are asking what exactly the Legislature is protecting. Upstream, the governor's race is taking shape around the same dynamics: public sector unions collecting nearly $1 billion in annual dues are already lining up behind Porter, Swalwell, and Steyer.
This Citizen's Union Is Throwing a Party March 4 in Mountain View, California
Feb 11, 2026
The Builder Class vs The Luxury Beliefs Class
Feb 27, 2026
Most Democrats Want Normal. Nationally It's Going Bad. In San Francisco, There's Hope.
Mar 07, 2026
Introducing the Garry's List Civic Impact Awards
May 11, 2026
Half a Billion in Lobbying, Zero Transparency
May 22, 2026
Business Taxes
San Francisco's Proposition D — the so-called "Overpaid CEO Tax" on the June 2026 ballot — would raise gross receipts tax rates by roughly 800% on grocery stores, pharmacies, and coffee shops while exempting major tech companies entirely. The tax doesn't touch CEO paychecks; businesses pay it on total revenue, and economists say the cost gets passed directly to consumers. Meanwhile, as downtown SF vacancy rates hover near one-third, critics argue the measure would accelerate the exodus of companies that has already cost the city names like Stripe, Schwab, and McKesson.
The 'CEO Tax' Scam That Will Crush Your Grocery Bill
Jan 24, 2026
Art Won't Save Downtown From an 800% Tax Hike
Jan 25, 2026
The "CEO Tax" Doesn't Tax CEOs. It Kills SF.
Jan 21, 2026
SF Is Winning the AI Race. Politicians Want to Kill It.
Feb 13, 2026
Steyer's $20 Billion "Trump Tax Loophole" Is a Lie
Feb 25, 2026
SF's "Overpaid CEO Tax" Will Hammer Grocery Stores and Coffee Shops
May 14, 2026
Federal Politicians
AOC's claim that "you can't earn a billion dollars" drew a sharp rebuttal from Y Combinator's Paul Graham, who spent two decades professionally evaluating founders and says exploitation isn't what creates billionaires—value creation is. The debate tracks a broader pattern in this channel: Sanders and Khanna's proposed 5% wealth tax on unrealized gains, Bernie's evasion on why Europe produces zero frontier tech giants, and Saikat Chakrabarti burning $1.47M of his own money on a congressional bid while receiving zero votes from local Democrats. These aren't isolated stories—they're a running argument about whether the left's economic worldview can survive contact with how wealth actually gets built.
Small Business & Regulation
San Francisco restaurant owners face six months of waiting and fees across four agencies just to serve wine legally—while stolen bottles sell openly two blocks away. Richmond's City Council voted in March to restore the Flock camera network it killed last fall, after car thefts jumped 33% and the immigrant shopkeepers the cameras were disabled to "protect" showed up to city hall demanding them back. From graffiti fines hitting victims instead of vandals to a $215 billion new city breaking ground in Solano County, California's small business climate is defined right now by a stark choice: maximum friction for those who play by the rules, or build something new from scratch.
Transit & Safety
SFO is forcing Waymo to the Rental Car Center while Uber and Lyft keep 800,000 monthly trips from the main terminal garage — the latest example of incumbents using policy to slow autonomous vehicles that are already proven 10x safer than human drivers. Meanwhile, BART can't account for money it spent on a consultant report arguing fare enforcement doesn't work, even as its own 2025 crime data shows the opposite — and two encampment fires in one week shut down the Transbay Tube after BART admitted it knew about the hazard and failed to act.
SF Ballot Measures
San Francisco's Prop D — the so-called "Overpaid CEO Tax" — is on the June 2026 ballot, and critics say it's a bait-and-switch: the measure exempts tech giants like Google while hitting grocery stores, pharmacies, and coffee chains with an 800% gross receipts tax hike. The tax doesn't touch CEO paychecks — it's levied on business revenue, meaning consumers bear the cost. With a third of downtown office space already empty and companies worth $400 billion having already fled SF's tax burden, opponents argue the measure would deepen the city's economic hole while delivering nothing to workers.
Tech & Startup Regulation
New York's S7263 — which would ban AI from answering medical, legal, and other licensed-profession questions — reached the Senate floor in February and faces an imminent full chamber vote, even as studies show AI outperforming doctors on diagnostic tests. Meanwhile, Anthropic and Google have moved to lock paying subscribers out of third-party tools, and a federal lawsuit is challenging San Francisco's Flock license plate cameras despite the technology's role in solving crimes — including a hit-and-run that injured site founder Garry Tan's wife.
Skilled Immigration
Blanket visa bans targeting entire nationalities are now blocking even model legal immigrants from basic family visits — a San Francisco couple known for personally detaining criminals and saving overdose victims can't get the wife's mother a visitor visa to meet their newborn. The case highlights a growing tension between broad immigration enforcement and the skilled, civically engaged immigrants that have long been central to American competitiveness. Critics argue blunt nationality-based bans punish exactly the wrong people while doing little to address actual security concerns.
Tech Antitrust & M&A
California is moving to do what Congress couldn't: a new state bill called the BASED Act (SB 1074) would ban Apple, Amazon, Google, Meta, and Microsoft from self-preferencing their own products, mining competitor data, and tying marketplace access to other purchases. Introduced last week by State Senator Scott Wiener with backing from Y Combinator's Garry Tan, the bill targets any company with over $1 trillion in market cap and 100 million monthly US users. With enforcement open to consumers, businesses, and the state AG, this is the most aggressive platform antitrust push in the country — and it's happening in Big Tech's own backyard.
CA Prop 36 (2024)
California voters passed Prop 36 by a wide margin in November 2024, but Sacramento is refusing to fund its implementation—effectively vetoing the will of the electorate. San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan, now running for governor, is leading the charge against the Legislature's defiance, arguing that starving voter-approved measures of funding is a betrayal of democratic accountability. The standoff has turned Prop 36 into a flashpoint for the 2026 governor's race and a test of whether California's political class will answer to voters or ignore them.
CA Prop 47 (2014)
A viral post highlighting open-air stolen wine sales at 7th and Market — steps from where restaurants wait six months and pay thousands in fees to serve wine legally — has renewed debate over Prop 47's role in making petty theft effectively consequence-free. The contrast sharpens a longstanding criticism: California's 2014 ballot measure, which raised the felony theft threshold to $950, created a system where law-abiding businesses face maximum regulatory friction while shoplifters and fencers face minimum risk. With SF's Prop M having recently eliminated some local licensing fees, the burden on legitimate operators has eased slightly — but enforcement gaps remain the central complaint.
SF Prop M (2024)
San Francisco's business tax overhaul, passed as Prop M in November 2024, is now at the center of a heated fight over the city's economic future. Supporters of a new "CEO Tax" proposal want to layer additional gross receipts taxes on top of Prop M's reforms, but critics—including YC's Garry Tan—argue it amounts to an 800% tax hike that would undermine SF's position as the only major U.S. tech hub still growing startup formation. With SF capturing 40% of early-stage venture capital and leading the AI boom, the stakes for getting the tax policy right couldn't be higher.
San Francisco
San Francisco's June 2026 ballot features Prop D, an "Overpaid CEO Tax" that critics say would exempt major tech companies while hitting grocery stores and pharmacies with an 800% rate hike. Meanwhile, SFUSD just voted 6-1 to adopt a contested ethnic studies curriculum through a review process that set no passing threshold — and a legal challenge was filed the same night. Across both stories, a pattern: policies sold one way, structured another.
The 'CEO Tax' Scam That Will Crush Your Grocery Bill
Jan 24, 2026
Art Won't Save Downtown From an 800% Tax Hike
Jan 25, 2026
The "CEO Tax" Doesn't Tax CEOs. It Kills SF.
Jan 21, 2026
Housing Won't Fix This. It's the Drugs.
Jan 15, 2026
Lawsuit Wants to Ban the Tech That Caught My Wife's Hit-and-Run Driver
Jan 31, 2026
Chan and Fielder Vote to Keep People Dying on Sidewalks
Feb 11, 2026
SF Is Winning the AI Race. Politicians Want to Kill It.
Feb 13, 2026
While SF stopped Prosecuting Drug Dealers, 3,700 People Overdosed
Feb 24, 2026
The San Francisco Chinatown Grift: 29 LLCs, Political Power, and Too Few New Homes
Mar 01, 2026
A parole officer sent an email: "Agents must not search for violations." Then two women died.
Mar 05, 2026
Lurie's Charter Reset Is a Masterclass
Mar 05, 2026
Chinatown Stabbing Victim Got No Press Conference
Mar 06, 2026
Most Democrats Want Normal. Nationally It's Going Bad. In San Francisco, There's Hope.
Mar 07, 2026
Yes, Fare Gates Actually Reduce Crime
Mar 13, 2026
The BASED Act Comes for Big Tech
Apr 02, 2026
He Killed Grandpa Vicha. Tomorrow, He Walks Free
Mar 24, 2026
Grandpa Vicha's Killer Was Just Released on Probation
Mar 26, 2026
SF Courts Won't Show Their Work
Apr 08, 2026
The Easiest Way to Sell Wine in San Francisco Is Illegally
Apr 01, 2026
SFO Is Trying to Bury Waymo
Apr 07, 2026
SFMTA Promised 465 Affordable Units. There Was Never a Plan to Pay for Them.
Apr 17, 2026
From AI Doomerism to Molotov Cocktail
Apr 20, 2026
California Will Lose a Million Students
Apr 23, 2026
After a Rigged Review Process, SFUSD Just Approved Its New Ethnic Studies Curriculum
Apr 28, 2026
SF's "Overpaid CEO Tax" Will Hammer Grocery Stores and Coffee Shops
May 14, 2026
SF Bay Area
Garry's List is accepting nominations for its inaugural Civic Impact Awards, recognizing the creators, newsletters, and reporters helping Californians make sense of the June 2 primary. Meanwhile, BART is under scrutiny on two fronts: a public records request revealed the agency can't produce the invoice for a consultant report it commissioned arguing fare enforcement was pointless — even as it pursues a new tax measure — and an investigation showed BART knew about the West Oakland RV encampment that burned and knocked out Transbay Tube service for 12 hours, but failed to act in time.
UC Regents Knew SAT Ban Was Wrong—Voted for It Anyway
Jan 23, 2026
The Wealth Exodus Is Live: Watch California Die
Feb 11, 2026
BART's 'Leave Them Be' Order Burned the Transbay Tube
Feb 25, 2026
Steyer's $20 Billion "Trump Tax Loophole" Is a Lie
Feb 25, 2026
Brain Computer Interfaces Are Now Giving Sight Back to the Blind
Mar 06, 2026
Why Is Los Angeles Spending $20M on 32 Empty Housing Units?
Mar 26, 2026
BART Paid Consultants to Say Fare Evasion Didn't Matter — Then Lost the Receipt
Mar 26, 2026
Introducing the Garry's List Civic Impact Awards
May 11, 2026
South Bay
Ro Khanna is co-sponsoring a federal billionaire wealth tax that would hit the very Silicon Valley founders and companies that make up his CA-17 district — and the backlash is sharp. Meanwhile, San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan has emerged as the South Bay's most consequential policy story: his fee cuts turned a literal zero market-rate homes built in 2024 into 2,000 under construction in 2025, and he's now running for governor on a platform of fiscal accountability against Tom Steyer's $27 million ad campaign.
Sacramento
Sacramento's transparency problem is on full display: bipartisan bills that would have posted lobbyist influence letters online were quietly killed by the Assembly Rules chair, while a separate bill moving toward the floor could let government-funded immigration nonprofits sue journalists who report on them. Meanwhile, the Legislature is staring down structural deficits of $20–30 billion annually—a spending crisis the state's own nonpartisan analysts say is simply not sustainable.
Sacramento Sabotages Prop 36 After Voters Spoke
Jan 20, 2026
$215 Billion New City Gets Historic Labor Deal
Jan 28, 2026
Matt Mahan Must Be California's Next Governor
Jan 30, 2026
California Is Killing the Golden Goose
Feb 06, 2026
Exposing Nonprofit Fraud Could Come With a Price Tag
May 01, 2026
The Deficit California Can't Tax Away
May 07, 2026
Half a Billion in Lobbying, Zero Transparency
May 22, 2026
New York City
New York State's S7263, which would ban AI chatbots from answering medical, legal, and other licensed-profession questions, is headed for a full Senate floor vote after clearing committee 6-0 — this as studies show AI outperforming doctors on diagnostic tests, making the stakes especially high for people who can't afford professional consultations. Meanwhile, Mayor Zohran Mamdani is pushing rent freezes, eliminating gifted school programs, and raiding NYC's rainy day fund to plug budget gaps — policies that economists widely pan and that mirror the fiscal spiral that left San Francisco broke.
Oakland
Oakland's gun violence is driven by fewer than 2,000 people — less than 0.5% of the city — and new analysis shows targeted intervention programs like Ceasefire cut shootings in half, while broad approaches wasted $80 million. Meanwhile, the city is grappling with cascading failures: a homeless encampment fire shut down the Transbay Tube for 12 hours despite BART warnings, the Coliseum sale is collapsing with no buyer in sight, and OPD's 509 officers are solving just 0.5% of property crimes — one-fourteenth the peer city average.
Berkeley
A leptospirosis outbreak at Berkeley's Harrison Street encampment—a tropical disease rarely seen in the U.S.—finally prompted a court-approved cleanup in April 2026 after sixteen months of injunctions blocked the city from clearing the site. The case has become a flashpoint in the broader debate over how California balances homeless rights litigation against urgent public health threats. Meanwhile, Berkeley figures are shaping statewide battles over wealth taxes and university admissions, with UC professor Robert Reich fronting a proposed unrealized gains tax and newly surfaced footage revealing UC Regents knowingly voted against faculty data when they dropped the SAT in 2020.
East Bay
Berkeley courts finally allowed cleanup of a disease-ridden homeless encampment after a 16-month legal blockade—but only after leptospirosis, a tropical bacterial disease, spread through rats at the Harrison Street site. Meanwhile, Richmond voted to reinstate its Flock Safety license plate cameras after shutting them off over an ICE data concern that had already been resolved, a decision that cost the city a 33% spike in vehicle thefts. Both stories point to the same tension: local governments paralyzed by ideological commitments while residents bear the consequences.
Los Angeles
Los Angeles is under intensifying scrutiny over its homeless housing spending after a $20 million conversion project left 32 units sitting empty for four years at $625,000 per unit — while the people originally housed in the building were displaced with no public accounting. The debacle is fueling broader questions about the city's housing strategy as mayoral candidate Nithya Raman pushes a platform combining rent freezes with new construction — a combination developers and economists say is financially self-defeating. With the 2026 mayor's race taking shape, how LA taxes, builds, and manages housing for its poorest residents is becoming the defining political issue in the region.
Seattle
Washington State's proposed 9.9% millionaire's tax is rattling more than just wealthy individuals — NBA Commissioner Adam Silver has flagged it as a threat to Seattle's chances of landing a new SuperSonics franchise, and tech founders are reportedly planning exits to Florida. Meanwhile, street outreach workers in Seattle and San Francisco are pushing back against the city's housing-first orthodoxy, with on-the-ground evidence that many people living on the streets already have taxpayer-funded apartments — pointing to addiction, not shelter shortages, as the real crisis.
Peninsula
A viral debate over Stanford's disability accommodation system is gaining traction on the Peninsula, after data showing 38% of Stanford undergraduates claim disability status—compared to 3-4% at community colleges—sparked accusations of widespread gaming of the system. Critics argue wealthy, high-achieving students are exploiting a low-scrutiny process to secure single dorm rooms, extended test time, and other perks. The controversy touches a broader national conversation about institutional integrity at elite universities.