The back and forth between the candidates, the fights over pastors and passports, is feeling less and less relevant and important. Especially for those of us here in California, where nearly 20,000 teachers got a layoff notice. Arnold Schwarzenegger and legislative Republicans want to balance the budget on these teachers' backs, and refuse to even consider any tax increase to help close our structural revenue shortfall.

As despicable as that is, perhaps the worst and most telling moment came last month when Republicans voted against closing a loophole favoring wealthy yacht owners. But with your help, we can turn this into the political breakthrough we need to finally turn this state around and beat back far-right ideology.

Courage Campaign has produced a new video that uses the yacht tax to frame the Republicans as the Yacht Party. And with your help we can get this video onto the airwaves, on MSNBC, CNN, The Daily Show and the Colbert Report.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AISA-Rj2mzc

This is a netroots product. David Dayen produced the first Yacht Party video a few weeks back, and Courage Campaign, itself a netroots, people-powered organization, was inspired by that to create this particular video.

Our goal is to make Californians understand what the political choices are this year - either we make the necessary investment in our public services, or we fire teachers to protect yacht owners.

To get this video on the air, we need $10,000 by Tuesday. Courage Campaign survives on your donations and your activism - so won't you visit our ActBlue page and help us fight back? $25, $50, $100 - whatever you can contribute will help.

And spread the word. *Especially* if you live in California. These cuts will destroy public education if they're allowed to happen. And the only way we can break the Republicans' resistance to new taxes is to show the public who the Yacht Party is really working for. As Assemblymember Mark Leno explained at Calitics on Monday:

"In February, the legislature considered closing the loophole that gives the wealthiest in the state a tax exemption for their extravagant toys. The proposal was simply to adjust this loophole in the tax law and increase the waiting period to a year--an action that is estimated would have netted the state $26 million. No-brainer, right? Well, not to the Republicans in the legislature.

Because Republicans in both houses voted against the bill, it failed to garner the two-thirds majority needed for passage. Republicans in the legislature have taken a pledge to never, under any circumstances, consider tax increases, even during budget deficits like the $16 billion one we currently face...

... (Governor Schwarzenegger) is now proposing that we cut more than $4.5 billion from K-12 education; decimate our AIDS Drug Assistance Program; further reduce reimbursement rates for health care providers; put the children of mothers on state assistance at risk of homelessness; deny the blind, the elderly, and the disabled even a minimal cost-of-living adjustment; slash funding for our court system; virtually close down our state parks system; and continue to under-fund our higher education systems."

This effort has already begun to gather serious attention. The Sacramento Bee wrote about it today, and at Firedoglake Eli juxtaposes the Yacht Party with the Bushvilles growing up in the parts of California hardest hit by the housing collapse. It's a stark choice - either we fire teachers and tolerate mass homelessness, or we close the loopholes and show Californians that Republican answers are no longer acceptable.

The Democratic primary is not likely to be settled anytime soon. But until it is, you can help fight the Republicans here in California, and strike a major blow for progressive politics. Donate now and get this ad on the air. It's the least we can do to help put this state right.