Charles T. Munger, Jr., through his PAC, spent more heavily in California’s November 2014 State Senate election than in any other general election contest this year. During the year he spent $663,000 to elect former Assemblymember Bonnie Garcia, a Republican, to the open State Senate seat, district 28, in Riverside County. She was running against another Republican, County Supervisor Jeff Stone.

Stone defeated Garcia, even though Stone was badly outspent and even though former Republican Governor Pete Wilson endorsed Garcia. Stone is clearly more conservative than Garcia, and during a debate, Stone said he admires Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s methods for dealing with inmates.

A PAC controlled mostly by John Arnold, a Texas billionaire, spent $800,000 to defeat California Congressman Mike Honda, a Democrat who was running against another Democrat, Ro Khanna. This Santa Clara County district, the 17th, nevertheless re-elected Honda, who is considered more liberal than Khanna.

Louisiana has a mandatory retirement age for state judges; they can’t serve after they attain age 70. Voters defeated a measure to repeal that law on November 4. At the same time, voters in Orleans Parish re-elected Criminal Court Judge Frank Marullo, who is age 74. See this story.

State measure five, which would have repealed the retirement age, lost 42%-58%.

The Los Angeles Times has this op-ed by Matt Parker, who is originally from Australia and who is now a stand-up comedian in London, and a lecturer at the University of London on mathematics, and author of “Things to Make and Do in the Fourth Dimension.” Here is his web page. Thanks to Rob Richie for the link.