Term Limits, on balance, have been good for California. Term limits have been around long enough now that there are actually a lot of people involved in politics who really don’t remember what it was like before they were voted into place by the California electorate back in 1990. What we had before term limits was the era of the career politician. You know how your local Congressman has been in office for what seems like a lifetime? Well, that is how it used to be for members of the Senate and the Assembly. In many cases, members of the legislature never had any other career before leaping into state house. Once they got there, legislators would serve in office for decades (or even longer). This created a system where the personal relationships became the dominant factor in the Capitol — which ended up primarily serving the ends of crafty politicians like uber-Speaker Willie Brown. Now there is a healthy turn-over of legislators that insures that those who are elected do not lose touch with those that put them in office. Unfortunately, because of the grossly unbalanced legislative districts crafted by a politician-drafting redistricting… Read More

Term Limits, on balance, have been good for California. Term limits have been around long enough now that there are actually a lot of people involved in politics who really don’t remember what it was like before they were voted into place by the California electorate back in 1990. What we had before term limits was the era of the career politician. You know how your local Congressman has been in office for what seems like a lifetime? Well, that is how it used to be for members of the Senate and the Assembly. In many cases, members of the legislature never had any other career before leaping into state house. Once they got there, legislators would serve in office for decades (or even longer). This created a system where the personal relationships became the dominant factor in the Capitol — which ended up primarily serving the ends of crafty politicians like uber-Speaker Willie Brown. Now there is a healthy turn-over of legislators that insures that those who are elected do not lose touch with those that put them in office. Unfortunately, because of the grossly unbalanced legislative districts crafted by a politician-drafting redistricting… Read More

If you take an Internet stroll to the Democratic Party of Orange County’s web site you find the typical party RA-RA and fund raising appeals and smartly a big pitch for Dem endorsed supervisorial candidate Tom Umberg.

Down at the bottom of the page is one of those rolling straw polls for the Democratic Nominee for President. It’s been operational since Nov. 28, 2006 and over 1200 people have responded to the on-line poll.

I thought it would be fun to put in a vote for Kucinich in the straw poll. I assumed it would be one of only a handful for the guy. Surely Hillary or Obama would lead the pack. I thought maybe Bill Richardson would be high on the list, after all Orange County is a conservative place, maybe our Democrats would prefer a more moderate Dem.

I was embarrassed for my local rival party when I saw that my shill vote for Kucinich was joined with hundreds of others.

No political professional considers Kucinich to be a real candidate for anything other than perhaps re-election and certainly a good shampoo and hair cut. Yet it seems that the Dems in OC are excited about his… Read More

In 1994, a comprehesive study from top to bottom of Cal Trans was performed. There is no proof that it was commissionedin response to jokes like the one below, prevalent in the 80’s and 90’s, but it might have been:

Question: What’s orange, has wheels and sleeps 5? Answer: A CalTrans truck on the side of the freeway. Among the findings were issues with project delivery, meaning, projects were languishing within the bureaucratic process of the agency. Go visit your local Cal Trans office some day if you want to see and feel the maze and labyrinthic smothering atmosphere of a government institution that has outgrown its ability to function. Will Kempton, the current Director, had hisname surface for a brief moment as acandidate for CA’s Secretary of Business, Transportation & Housing, but was immediately pulled back downbecause he is the first of recent Cal Trans directors who has been able tomove the behemouth agency off of its posterior.

Did the study lead to meaningful reforms? Sure. Grab Toto, click your red heels together and come with me.

There is currently a… Read More

You like Redwood decking, hot tubs, etc? You’ll be pleased that soon virtually all redwood for such products will be imported if the regulators have their way. You may have seen articles here on the FR concerning the bankruptcy filing by Pacific Lumber Co. [PALCO] of Scotia on the North Coast, near Eureka. They’ve beenjammed into that position by the ever-changing regulatory positions of it’s partner, the State of California

Several years ago, PALCO, in an arrangement negotiated with the state, sold to California thousands of acres of old growth forest redwoods, The Headwaters Forest, for us taxpayers to sit on into perpetuity. [Only 3% of all old growth in CA is in private hands, the rest State or Fed owned and I suppose, "protected"] In return, PALCO would have some predictability, they thought, for some years to come to operate on their 200,000 acres of lands they still own. In doing so, they implement a Habitat Conservation Plan for endangered critters, as well as complying with Timber Harvest Plan regs.These THP’s are developed as you go and last about 3 years until they must be updated for a given harvest zone.… Read More

The Senate Republican Caucus is blessed to have some very talented and committed professionals working with us as staffers. They regularly write very compelling and dead-on policy commentary.

Here is an example of their great work.

I’d love to claim credit for the words below, but it’s only right to give credit where it is deserved. WelfareNeeds ToBeA Safety Net, Not A Hammock

A little more than 10 years ago, California and the nation embarked on an ambitious effort to enact real welfare reform, turning away from an entitlement culture that promoted irresponsibility and indolence to a system designed to transition welfare recipients into the workforce.

The undertaking was roundly criticized by liberals, often with apocalyptic scenarios about children by the millions being pushed into poverty. What actually resulted was extraordinary. Since 1996, welfare caseloads have dropped 56 percent. As recipients left the bread line to become breadwinners, the child poverty rate decreased as well – from 20.8 percent in 1995 to 17.8 percent in 2004. Within six… Read More

Well, he may no longer be chair of the House Committee on Rules (due to the GOP’s majority defeat) but Congressman David Dreier can take great comfort in the fact that he is one of the few Republican members of the House of Representatives to see his winning margin and his net percentage actually increase over his Democratic opponent in 2006 over the result of 2004. While this may seem like political trivia (Hey, maybe you can impress your friends), it’s hardly trivia info, given the fierce fight that seemed to loom on the horizon for Congressman Dreier just one year ago today.

In campaign 2004, Congressman Dreier was on the receiving end of a significant negative attack campaign waged against him from the political left and right. In a bizarre marriage of political convenience, Dreier’s 2004 Democrat opponent joined forces with conservative talk radio icons Ken and John of Los Angeles-based station KFI. The John and Ken show is among the most popular… Read More

Well, he may no longer be chair of the House Committee on Rules (due to the GOP’s majority defeat) but Congressman David Dreier can take great comfort in the fact that he is one of the few Republican members of the House of Representatives to see his winning margin and his net percentage actually increase over his Democratic opponent in 2006 over the result of 2004. While this may seem like political trivia (Hey, maybe you can impress your friends), it’s hardly trivia info, given the fierce fight that seemed to loom on the horizon for Congressman Dreier just one year ago today.

In campaign 2004, Congressman Dreier was on the receiving end of a significant negative attack campaign waged against him from the political left and right. In a bizarre marriage of political convenience, Dreier’s 2004 Democrat opponent joined forces with conservative talk radio icons Ken and John of Los Angeles-based station KFI. The John and Ken show is among the most popular… Read More