Whenever you start an entirely new state bureaucracy like this initiative proposes, the costs always exceed initial estimates. When that happens, parents of preschool children could be charged a fee or the legislature could raise taxes on all Californians to keep the new bureaucracy going.

This is, I say, the time for all good men not to go to the aid of their party, but to come to the aid of their country.

Bureaucracy, the rule of no one, has become the modern form of despotism

Rather than focus resources on the state's most pressing needs or helping parents of low-income families who need the most help sending their kids to preschool, this flawed measure creates a subsidy for rich and middle-income families that already send their kids to preschool.

Basically, taxpayers would pay $2.4 billion in higher taxes to get four percent more of our kids into preschool. That just doesn't seem like a very good bang for the buck. Rather than focus resources on the state's most pressing needs or helping parents of low-income families who need the most help sending their kids to preschool, this flawed measure creates a subsidy for rich and middle-income families that already send their kids to preschool.

It is premature. We're a vast state with critical needs. If investment is put together in a fragmented way with initiatives by special interest groups, it is going to be haphazard.