Vox Sentences: California starts water rationing

1. The West can be a desperate place

California Governor Jerry Brown, right, looks on as Frank Gehrke, chief of snow surveys for the California Department of Water Resources, as he gestures to the average level recorded during snow surveys on April 1, 2015 in Phillips, California. The level is zero, the lowest in recorded history for California. (Max Whittaker/Getty Images)

• California Governor Jerry Brown (D) has announced the state's first ever mandatory water restrictions.

  [Vox / Brad Plumer]

• Brown's executive order instructs the State Water Resources Control Board to force cities and towns to reduce water consumption by 25 percent in the next year.

  [Jerry Brown]

• State officials say they'll use punitive measures like fines if necessary, though they hope the reduction will come voluntarily.

  [NYT / Adam Nagourney]

• But the mandatory rationing does not apply to agriculture, which uses four times as much water as urban areas do.

  [Vox / Brad Plumer]

• California's drought is reaching crisis level; its snowpack — a key water source — is just 5 percent the size it normally is.

  [Washington Post / Jason Samenow]

• One study found that this is California's worst drought in 1,200 years.

  [Bloomberg / Tom Randall]

• While it's hard to know how much climate change contributed to this particular drought, as the planet warms, droughts are likely to become both more common and longer.

  [NASA]

• So far farmers have made due with groundwater — but groundwater is depleting rapidly as a consequence, and regulations to limit pumping won't take effect for years.

  [Vox / Brad Plumer]

• In past droughts, cities considered legislation that would have made water-wasters eligible for jail time; so far there hasn't been much appetite for that this time around.

  [LA Times / Matt Stevens]

• More sensibly, the state could consider creating water markets as a way to manage the scarcity.

  [Vox / Brad Plumer]

2. Fear and Loathing in Paramus, New Jersey

A law enforcement agent at the medical-office complex of Dr. Salomon Melgen on January 30, 2013, in West Palm Beach, Florida. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

• Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) has been indicted on 14 federal corruption charges, including eight counts of bribery.

  [Vox / Andrew Prokop]

• You can read the full indictment here.

  [US District Court, District of New Jersey]

• The charges concern Menendez's relationship with Salomon Melgen, a Florida eye doctor and major campaign donor.

  [Vox / Andrew Prokop]

• Melgen's clinic was accused of overcharging Medicare to the tune of $8.9 million.

  [CNN / Susan Candiotti and Greg Botelho]

• Menendez met with Medicare officials about Melgen's reimbursements, though the senator's office insists he did not interfere with an actual investigation into Melgen.

  [Washington Post / Carol Leonnig and Jerry Markon]

• Menendez also allegedly talked to then–Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius about the matter in 2012.

  [NJ.com / Matt Friedman]

• In 2010, Menendez took two trips to Melgen's mansion in the Dominican Republic on his private jet without properly disclosing them. He eventually paid back the $58,500 cost of the flights.

  [Washington Post / Carol Leonnig and Jerry Markon]

• He was once accused of sleeping with underage prostitutes at Melgen's vacation house, but despite the story being pushed by right-wing media, it appears to have been a hoax invented as part of a Cuban intelligence plot.

  [Washington Post / Carol Leonnig and Manuel Roig-Franzia]

• Menendez has reportedly told the Senate Democratic leadership that he will temporarily step aside as ranking member on the Foreign Relations committee, where he's been a leading hawk on Iran and Cuba.

  [NYT / Matt Apuzzo]

• The next most senior Democratic member on Foreign Relations is Barbara Boxer, who is markedly less hawkish on Iran; if she doesn't get it, Ben Cardin is next in line and appears to be in line with Menendez on the issue.

  [The Hill / Kristina Wong]

• Menendez is the first sitting senator to be indicted since then–Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) in 2008.

  [Vox / Andrew Prokop]

3. This new law won't affect this other law we don't have

Robert Lloyd of Conway, Arkansas, stands with demonstrators during a press conference on the steps of the Arkansas State Capital in Little Rock following Gov. Asa Hutchinson's comments on House Bill 1228. (Andrea Morales/Getty Images)

• Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson (R) has asked state legislators to either recall or alter the Religious Freedom Restoration Act they passed this week, which critics have attacked for allegedly enabling anti-LGBT discrimination.

  [Politico / Nick Gass]

• Hutchinson says he wants the bill to more closely reflect the federal RFRA and to make it clear it isn't meant to allow discrimination.

  [WSJ / Ana Campoy]

• The leaders of the state Senate and House both said they wanted to change the bill, but could not guarantee an amended version could pass.

  [NYT / Campbell Robertson and Timothy Williams]

• But it's already legal in Arkansas to discriminate against LGBT people in employment, housing, and public accommodations; in fact, it's illegal for cities and towns to pass anti-discrimination laws.

  [Vox / German Lopez]

• So business owners who want to discriminate don't need a RFRA as a defense; they can do it freely anyway.

• And if they couldn't do it legally, a RFRA probably wouldn't be much help to them anyway.

  [Vox / German Lopez]

• Hutchinson said he became skeptical of the RFRA proposal in part because his left-leaning son Seth opposed it.

  [NYT / Alan Blinder]

4. Misc.

• One benefit of releasing TV seasons en masse, like Netflix does: it prevents the writers from zigging and zagging in response to criticism as the season progresses.

  [Slate / Aisha Harris]

• Poverty expert Christopher Jencks argues that — if you're counting correctly — poverty has fallen to as little as a quarter of what it was in 1964.

  [New York Review of Books / Christopher Jencks]

• Pras: member of the Fugees. Man behind "Ghetto Supastar." Super-PAC mega-donor.

  [Slate / Michael Beckel]

• Alex Abad-Santos's "50 Comic Books that Explain Comic Books Today" is maybe my favorite big maps post we've ever done.

  [Vox / Alex Abad-Santos]

• Gov. Nathan Deal (R-GA) is a down-the-line conservative. He's also extremely effective at reducing the size of prisons.

  [New Republic / Naomi Shavin]

• For years, many believed that lottery winners wound up no happier, or even worse off, compared with non-winners. More recent research suggests that's all wrong: winning the lottery really is good for you.

  [NYT / John Tierney]

5. Verbatim

• "New York, the most densely populated area of the nation, got 212—2-1-2 containing the lowest number of clicks possible on the rotary phone."

  [The Atlantic / Megan Garber]

• "'Let’s go back to Brideshead,' she said. 'Oh, what a good idea.' It really was a good idea. They had a wonderful time revisiting Brideshead. – Brideshead Revisited"

  [The Toast / Mallory Ortberg]

• "There are rumours in the scientific community that the first studies involving the genetic modification of a human embryo are about to be published."

  [Practical Ethics / Chris Gyngell, Tom Douglas, and Julian Savulescu]

• "He is recommending big changes in American culture and society, based on his off-the-cuff sociological explanation for SOMETHING THAT ISN'T EVEN HAPPENING."

  [Noah Smith]

• "The image of the little old lady living hand to mouth off the interest on her bank account is basically a fiction."

  [NYT / Paul Krugman]

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