Good-government types promised their reforms — redistricting
and a top-two primary system — would fix things. They were wrong.   

Hollywood produced “Ishtar” and, more recently,
Disney’s “John Carter.” But it has never made a bomb quite like
Tuesday’s California elections.

Expectations were high. California’s political reformers
told us that this would be the year everything changed. After a decade and a
half of reform efforts, a new system of less partisan elections was finally in
place, and fairly drawn legislative districts and a new top-two primary system
would usher in a new era of democracy. Voters would be engaged, competition
would be spurred, independents would get a boost and California would see the
kind of big policy debates necessary to find solutions to the state’s
persistent governance crisis.

Oh, well.

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