The pipe dream lives on.

Nov. 2 voters rejected legalizing pot for recreational use, but there are indications that Californians are increasingly inclined to favor legal marijuana and a key backer has vowed to return a measure to the ballot in 2012.

Voters rejected Proposition 19, with 54 percent voting against it. But a post-election poll by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner – commissioned by a Prop. 19 proponent Peter B. Lewis – found that 50 percent of California voters favor legalizing pot. Low turnout by young voters, who overwhelmingly favor legalization, and vague ballot language were key to Prop. 19’s demise.

Opponents had argued that even if you favored legalization, Prop. 19 was a poor way to go about it. Among other things, the measure was criticized for banning employers from firing workers for testing positive for marijuana. While the provision was intended to protect workers who got high on their own time, it prompted the California Chamber of Commerce and other business interests to spend money against the measure. The chamber complained Prop. 19 would protect workers who came to work stoned.

Many voters “just didn’t like the details” of the measure, Prop. 19 backer Richard Lee told the Sacramento Bee. Lee, who’s made millions growing and supplying pot for his Oakland medical pot dispensaries, put $1.5 million into the campaign and promised another version of the measure for the 2012 ballot.

A sign of voter acceptance of pot – especially when it can generate tax revenue – was that voters in nine cities approved measures Nov. 2 to tax marijuana shops. And voters in Santa Barbara and Morro Bay rejected measures to ban medical pot dispensaries.

Prop. 19 would have allowed adults to grow and possess marijuana for their own recreational use, and allowed cities and counties to regulate and tax the cultivation and sales of marijuana.

While the measure was easily defeated It won the highest “yes” percentage of six state measures on the matter put before voters since 2000. The five previous measures were decided by voters in Alaska (twice), Nevada (twice) and Colorado. More voters wanted legal pot in California than wanted Meg Whitman to be governor or Carly Fiorina to be senator.

Bashing Bush

George W. Bush is getting attention again, thanks to his new book and book tour – but his absence since 2008 hasn’t made Rep. Dana Rohrabacher‘s heart grow fonder.

The Costa Mesa Republican laid into the former president on Twitter.com Thursday:

@MarkRMatthews Bush not class act, destroyed GOP, jailed Ramos & Compean, left us bailouts, gave more power to fed gov & China.

Rohrabacher was responding to a post by Mark R. Matthews, a conservative law professor who complimented Bush for not criticizing Barack Obama during an appearance on the “Oprah” show.

Border Patrol agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean were convicted of shooting a Mexican drug dealer. Anti-illegal immigration activists repeatedly called on Bush to commute their sentence, which he finally did on his last day in office.

Contact the writer: 714-796-6753 or mwisckol@ocregister.com