Yesterday morning, in the State Capitol, Speaker Fabian Nunez (pictured) approached Assemblyman Todd Spitzer, furiously waving a printout of the Assemblyman column which was featured yesterday in the FlashReport…he uttered profanities at Spitzer, telling him he had gone to far.  The issue brought to the fore in Spitzer’s column was that the Democratic majority on the Assembly Public Safety Committee, hand picked by Speaker Nunez, is "pro-criminal" – regularly voting down common-sense tough-on-crime measures on a party-line vote.  Of course, the Speaker has stacked this committee with some of the most left-wing members of his caucus!
 
This confrontation was a precurser to the Assembly floor session later where the lower house of the legislature was debating the passage of a crime bill package (Assembly Bill 50) that represented a significant watering down of the tough-on-crime elements introduced as Jessica’s Law by Sharon Runner in the Assembly, and George Runner in the State Senate.  Before the session, Republicans came together and agree that where being tough on child predators was concerned, there would be no compromise.  Republicans were unified:  pass the original Jessica’s Law legislation, and let’s get serious about protecting children.
 
Adding to the tension of today’s floor session was the debacle of last week, where despite arguments by Republicans that possession of a single piece of child pornography, in some case, could be charged as a felony — Democrats led by liberal San Francisco Assemblyman Mark Leno, Chairman of the Public Safety Committee, opposed this stiff law. 
 
Well, word of this quickly went out to grassroots voters (and to the press) — we did our part featuring a column last Friday from Karen Hanretty — and the furor rose.  Enough so that when we followed up by printing the hard-hitting piece from Spitzer on Monday, it finally brought things to a boil.  For maybe the first time, the ultra-liberals lost out as Democrats were shamed into amending their bill to say that the possession of just a single piece of kidde-porn may, in some cases, be charged as a felony.  In just a short period of time – we went from Democrats wanting the felony to require 100 ITEMS (which can each be a CD-Rom LOADED with thousands of photos) of child pornography down to just ONE ITEM. 
 
The tragedy was that even though Democrats caved on this one aspect of the Jessica’s Law package, they were unmoving on so many more of the key protections for children in the Runners’ legislation.  Republicans showed a uniform opposition to compromise, as they had agreed, and ‘layed off’ the bill (didn’t give it any "AYE" votes) – except for Rep. Shirley Horton who voted for it.
 
When will Assembly Democrats and their Speaker decide that it is long overdue for them to get tough on crime?
 
As Spitzer pointed out on the floor — Speaker Nunez deserves all of the blame here, as he not only placed these left-wing Democrats on the Committee — but he has systematically removed any Democrat from the committee that has shown any real anti-criminal sentiment (Rudy Bermudez would be a great example).
 
Congratulations Assemblyman Spitzer for being hard-core and taking it to the Democrats — and congrats to all Assembly Republicans for sticking together.  Kudos to John and Ken, and all of the other talk radio hosts who made a stink about Mark Leno’s leftist lunacy.  And finally, thanks to the readers of the FR, many of whom engaged and made a difference.
 
We must keep up the pressure, and insist that the Assembly pass the real Jessica’s Law.  Democrats have a last chance to show they are not "pro-criminal" but their window is quickly closing.
 
Two Featured Columns – Zaramberg and Hanretty
Today we are featuring two pieces in the FlashReport.  The first is a column written for our site by Allan Zaremberg, who is the President of the California Chamber of Commerce.  As I have taken so many opportunities to share some of my strong concerns about the Governor’s BIG BONDS package, I reached out to Allan, as a big booster of the plan, and asked him if he would share with FR readers his perspective on why this proposal was a good one, and the borrowing necessary.  So a big FR THANK YOU to Allan for his piece, which you can read here.
 
  The other featured column is from our frequent contributor Karen Hanretty.  Hanretty, who has actually been MORE outspoken since leaving her posts as spokesperson for the State GOP, once again is writing about the ultra-liberal Mark Leno, who is rumored to be getting a ‘promotion’ to become Chairman of the Assembly Appropriations Committee.  Say it ain’t so!  Read it here.
 
Have a great day!
 
Jon

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 1st, 2006 at 12:00 am and is filed under Blog Posts.