I would carefully rephrase that to
when in doubt vote against everything only because of the shenanigans that politicians keep using to try to put one over on the unsuspecting voters, where NO means YES and vice-versa.
For example Prop. 40, where voting NO means you don't agree with the Redstricting Commission (
e.g. we draw the lines) and you want the redistricting done some other (as yet unknown) way. What would probably happen, since who and how are not provided for by Prop. 40, is that the courts would need to get involved.
For some background on why there is currently no organized
No on 40 support for Prop. 40, and why NO means YES (because it's a referendum) there is a writeup in LA Times editorial section
here. Warning: you may get a headache following all the twists and turns.
My new M.O. for the last several elections has been generally:
NO if it involves any new tax or fee; and vote for the
non-incumbent candidate, even if from the same party as the incumbent, especially so if the incumbent has had the job for more than one term already, because IMO none of them has done a very good job, and sitting in one place too long causes entrenchment and stagnation.
This new run-off election system we voted for ourselves in CA is making for some interesting candidate pairings in this November run-off. It's fun, although not especially instructive or useful, to see two candidates from the same party at each other's throats. Also my mailbox is inundated with political advertising
It's an especially long ballot this time around, at least for us in LA, and I think short attention span/sound bite mentallity plus voter burn-out means sadly more voters will take their recommendations from a pamphlet that arrives in their mailbox or an ad on the tube instead of doing some reading and thinking.
PS: Steve doens't seem to have put an analysis together for the November election, or at least it's not on his website.