In addition to executing the normal functions of the California attorney general, Rob Bonta has earned a place in my heart for bringing the hammer on reactionary cities that don’t want to comply with state housing laws, such as the efficiently run “city” of Huntington Beach and the checks notes cougar habitat known as Woodside. Four more years.

Shirley Weber is the incumbent; she’s done her job and ensured we actually get to vote, and she’s by-the-book enough that she told Gavin Newsom to kick rocks when he screwed up his election paperwork and tried to correct it after a deadline. Two big points in her favor, here’s to four more years.

Insurance is a slow-burning disaster in California. The core of the problem is 1) climate change increasing the rate of significant property damage 2) homeowners in fire-prone areas lobbying for rules that prevent insurance companies from accurately pricing climate risk 3) insurance companies responding to this rationally by refusing to issue new policies. As the Palisades wildfires showed, disasters cause large, concentrated losses, with large numbers of people on the state’s special high-risk insurance plan because they could not buy conventional insurance. The plan is funded by a tax on all insurance companies operating in the state, and as such is effectively a subsidy for people living in risky areas – what my favorite socialist writer calls “ bad climate socialism.” This is also what would happen if the state took over the entire home insurance market (as one candidate is proposing) without managing retreat from climate risks. A better insurance market in California probably requires people to leave risky places to live and for insurance prices there to reflect the actual likelihood of disaster. Ben Allen has the most credible plan for encouraging this, including a willingness to let insurers accurately price risk, which allows them to come back to the state. This is unpopular in disaster-prone areas but ought to be popular for the rest of us. I want to have renters’ insurance again.

Asm. Stefani has plausible Republican opposition, and does not have any sports-related scandals. You can toss her a vote.

Let’s end on a high note. The California Board of Equalization is a unique government agency in America, being the only elected tax appeals board – that is, a government agency that you can appeal your tax bill to, run by people who have to run for reelection. This is so obvious a corruption opportunity that the board was nearly dissolved in 2017. There remain 4 elected seats on the board; almost all of coastal California is in District 2. The incumbent claims to have the longest surviving marriage to have come out of Burning Man; her progressive challenger is interested in closing loopholes in state tax policy so that there is more money available to spend on progressive policy. In his last statewide role he abolished a police agency; in his current role in Menlo Park, he worked to abolish a parking lot (and turn it into subsidized affordable housing); and if he wins election to this seat, he claims he will try to abolish his own job. He has my vote.