Voters

In 1986, lawmakers decided the problem of illegal immigration had to be dealt with. More than 3 million people were living in the United States after crossing the border illegally or overstaying their visas. A new law signed by President Ronald Reagan gave legal status and a path to citizenship to most of those unauthorized residents - helping many secure a slice of the American dream but also giving fuel to critics who sought to turn "amnesty" into a pejorative. Less than 30 years later, the number of immigrants living in the country illegally is thought to have nearly quadrupled, and the freighted baggage of amnesty looms over new efforts to reform the nation's immigration laws.

Tuesday's elections will sweep in new leadership for Los Angeles' 3.8 million residents, but the races are likely to be decided by an older, whiter and more educated fraction of the city's population. Latinos, the city's dominant ethnic group and a key voting bloc, make up 44% of the city's population, U.S. Census figures show. But a USC Price/Los Angeles Times poll of likely voters last week suggests Latinos will make up 24% of those who cast ballots Tuesday, in part because many are immigrants who are ineligible to vote.

Trial judges are, on the books, elected officials, and even the vast majority of those whose names never appear on a ballot are subject to election challenge every six years. Should voters not call them to account for their performance, as they do with any other politician, on election day? Should they not encourage opponents to challenge incumbent judges? Or are judges different from members of Congress or city councils? Judges are most definitely different. The last thing we want or need in California is trial judges who sit on the bench with one eye on justice and the other on how any particular ruling is going to play with the public.

It's a small swath of Los Angeles, near the city's heart, that hasn't received much attention from the mayoral candidates. But a Times analysis shows that a 2.8-square-mile, Mid-Wilshire neighborhood has had an unmatched record of picking mayors in both primary and runoff elections since 2001. And interviews suggest it could again be a bellwether of the concerns, apathy and ambivalence voters take to the polls Tuesday as they choose the city's new chief executive. Both Wendy Greuel and Eric Garcetti have supporters here, though most voters approached on a recent day voiced the sort of indifference that could keep turnout near record lows.

The most powerful labor organization in Los Angeles refused Friday to back away from a campaign mailer in which it urges voters to support Wendy Greuel for mayor because she "will raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour. " Even though Greuel has said she supports the higher "living wage" only for workers at large hotels, Los Angeles County Federation of Labor chief Maria Elena Durazo accused the media of "nitpicking" when she was questioned about the accuracy of the mailer, which went to Latino voters.

A political system in gridlock, conservatives and progressives at each others' throats, military threats looming in the Middle East: Welcome to the last days of the Roman Republic. In 64 BC, Marcus Cicero, an idealistic outsider and the greatest orator ancient Rome produced, was running for consul - the highest office in the land - in a desperate bid to restore sanity to a corrupt and broken political system. It was a bitter contest to lead the most powerful government on earth, with accusations of incompetence, inconsistency and sexual misdeeds filling the air. Marcus wanted more than anything to save the republic from ruin, but he was hampered by his lowly birth and political naivete.

City Councilman Dennis Zine holds a significant lead among likely voters in his race against Ron Galperin for the city controller's seat in the May 21 runoff election, a USC Price/Los Angeles Times poll shows. Zine, a three-term councilman, is the choice of 34% of respondents, according to the bipartisan survey of 500 likely voters conducted over three days last week. That compares with 22% who said they would probably vote for Galperin, a city commissioner and attorney. Poll director Dan Schnur, of USC, said the findings indicate that Zine has the advantage at this point in what has largely been a low-profile campaign.

WASHINGTON -- In the nearly four and a half years since California voters approved Proposition 8, banning same-sex marriages in the state, public attitudes on the subject have gone through a remarkably rapid transformation. Nationally, 1 in 7 American adults said in a recent Pew Research Center survey that they had changed their minds about same-sex marriage. Nearly all had gone from opposing legal marriage for same-sex couples to supporting it. Having a friend or family member who is gay was the most common reason for having switched positions, the poll found.

Polls will be open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. Tuesday as voters choose the nation's president, members of Congress and the state Legislature and decide a slew of statewide and local ballot measures. Voters who encounter difficulties can contact their county's elections offices for help: Los Angeles: lavote.net or 1-800-815-2666 Orange: ocvote.net or 714-567-7600 Riverside: voteinfo.net or 951-486-7200 San Bernardino: sbcountyelections.com or 1-800-881-VOTE or 909-387-8300 Ventura: venturavote.org or 805-654-2700.

Re “ The people and the props ,” Editorial, Nov. 11 If the lack of appeal to intellect and reason in political ads that proliferated before the election is any indication, The Times' ideal of the “citizen voter” rarely appears in our electorate. It's tempting to ponder the use of a qualifying I.Q. test, however legally dubious, to screen out unworthy voters. Perhaps election boards could pass constitutional muster by disqualifying any voter who spends less time reading high-quality periodicals and books than he or she does riveted to such cultural gems as “American Idol” and reality TV shows.

A two-year campaign that has drawn record spending will see either the first woman or the first Jew elected as Los Angeles mayor. But despite those milestones, candidates Wendy Greuel and Eric Garcetti sped around the city Sunday trying to avoid another distinction: drawing the lowest turnout for an open mayoral seat in modern history. The two candidates reached out to voters in churches, at a pizza parlor and in a bowling alley on a long day of campaigning - their last extended opportunity to connect directly to voters before Tuesday's election.

PORTLAND, Ore. - Proponents of fluoridating Portland's water supply had no trouble getting the local Urban League on board. Here in the biggest city in the country that still doesn't treat its water to prevent tooth decay, studies show that low-income children and kids of color have been hit hardest by untreated cavities. "Do we really want our children to be suffering from something we could prevent? Why would we not want to be involved?" said Jerome Brooks, an Urban League advocacy contractor who has helped marshal the civil rights group behind a fluoridation measure on Tuesday's municipal ballot.

The most powerful labor organization in Los Angeles refused Friday to back away from a campaign mailer in which it urges voters to support Wendy Greuel for mayor because she "will raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour. " Even though Greuel has said she supports the higher "living wage" only for workers at large hotels, Los Angeles County Federation of Labor chief Maria Elena Durazo accused the media of "nitpicking" when she was questioned about the accuracy of the mailer, which went to Latino voters.

Eric Garcetti's lead in the Los Angeles mayor's race has narrowed to seven percentage points, but his strength among conservatives has blocked rival Wendy Greuel from securing a San Fernando Valley base that is vital to her chances, according to a new USC Price/Los Angeles Times poll. As the candidates and their partisans swarmed across the city in advance of Tuesday's runoff election, Garcetti, a city councilman from Silver Lake, held a 48% to 41% lead, the survey found. Voters in the Valley and every other key region of Los Angeles favored him over Greuel, the city controller.

Los Angeles voters rejected a plan to hike the city's sales tax two months ago, but the battle over that measure lives on in a hotly contested City Council race. In multiple mailers sent to voters in the 13th council district, candidate John Choi and his backers in organized labor contend that Choi's rival, Mitch O'Farrell, supported the layoffs of 500 police officers. In one mailer, a downcast O'Farrell is pictured next to a crime scene and the words: "Votes to cut 500 cops. " Choi and his backers base the claim on O'Farrell's opposition to Proposition A, the March 5 ballot measure that was promoted by city leaders and others as a way to avoid reductions in police staffing.

Former lawmaker Mike Feuer and City Councilman Dennis Zine continue to hold leads in their races for citywide Los Angeles offices, new polling released Monday showed. In polling conducted April 29 through May 7 by the Edmund G. "Pat" Brown Institute of Public Affairs at Cal State L.A., Feuer, a former member of the state Assembly and L.A. City Council, led City Atty. Carmen Trutanich, who is seeking reelection in next week's balloting, 35 to 24%, with 41% of voters still undecided.

It is not surprising but it is confirmed: Money and frustration are driving California's elections this year. A Field Poll released last week demonstrated the dramatic edge that Republican Meg Whitman has given her campaign for governor by spending millions on a prodigious number of television ads: She was pummeling her Republican primary opponent, Steve Poizner, and was newly in a statistical tie with presumptive Democratic nominee Jerry Brown....

The cartoon on the Nov. 6 Op-Ed page asks, "Which is the most powerful place in America?," and selects the voting booth from among four choices, including Capitol Hill, the Pentagon and the White House. The cartoon reflects a quaint, naive view of contemporary American politics. A truer view is reflected in the diagram elsewhere in the same paper that shows the flow of money into the campaigns for California's ballot initiatives. The "most powerful places" are now corporate boardrooms or the offices of the Koch brothers, who pour tens of millions of dollars into races to get results that increase their profits.

SACRAMENTO - In the last century, Californians have said yes to every request for money to help veterans buy homes. Since 2000, they have signed off on $1.4 billion in bonds for that purpose. But most of that money remains untapped. In fact, the state's home loan program for veterans, run by the agency known as Cal-Vet, is doing less and less each year to help servicemen and women returning from Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere. Yet there's more money available for the program than in the agency's annual operating budget.

A new mailer sent out by Los Angeles mayoral candidate Wendy Greuel's allies to Latino voters that strongly suggests voting for her will result in an increase in the minimum wage to $15 per hour drew sharp criticism from her rival Monday. In addition to the mailer, labor members supporting Greuel drove through Latino neighborhoods over the weekend broadcasting a song, "La Wendy," with the same message. Greuel's opponent, Councilman Eric Garcetti, called the efforts a "cynical attempt to buy votes" and "give false hope to people who are struggling to make ends meet.