Pardon me for perhaps being the last observer of California politics to comment on a incident that occurred last week, but it’s been a busy time for me, yet I could not let this one pass buy without commentary.

So last Tuesday Governor Brown comes and meets with the Senate Republican Caucus to discuss his budget plans.  After the meeting is over, one Senate Republican, Tom Berryhill of Modesto, apparently told reporters that, “no one person in there is ready to support extra taxes.”

Senator Berryhill (pictured) went on to say that the budget is, “really not our problem.  The Democrats own this.”

Apparently these sentiments did not go over well with Democrat Senate President Darrell Steinberg who used Berryhill’s comments to strip him of the Chairmanship of the Senate Agriculture Committee (handing that “prize” instead to Republican Anthony Canella instead) and also to send Berryhill what I will call a motherly letter, telling his colleague how he is supposed to act and what he can and cannot say.

I guess I want to address a few issues here – Senator Berryhill’s comments, Senator Steinberg’s actions, and finally the issue of Republicans serving as Chairmen of committees.

First and foremost – Senator Berryhill’s comments, taken in context, are totally acceptable and a fair exercise of political speech.  From a technical point of view, with the Passage of Prop. 25 by the voters last November, lowing the vote threshold to pass a budget from two-thirds to a majority vote, literally does mean that passing a budget does not require a single Republican vote. 

But more importantly, when we talk about how screwed up our state budget is, fault does lie at the feet of Democrats.   That is because it is impossible to look at the state’s budget crisis in a vacuum, without considering the very real and serious negative impact of literally thousands and thousands of onerous laws and regulations passed by Democrats that have grown the size and scope of state government.  Literally no area of the lives of California business owners or individuals has been spared as the Nanny State mentality of the liberal majority has encroached on liberty and freedom, and has created a choke-hold on entrepreneurialism and job creation in this state.

So if you hear frustration coming from a common sense businessman-turned-legislator like Tom Berryhill, it’s no wonder.  Frankly, I think it is refreshing to hear someone publicly telling the way that it is – and I applaud Berryhill for doing so, and I encourage other Republicans to do the same.  It is important and critical for the public to understand who created this mess – because voters continue to empower Democrats, and if we are going to see a different approach to creating public policy in California, the “reform” that it will take is electing a Republican majority.

As for Senator Steinberg – grow up, man.  “Firing” a well-respected Senator like Tom Berryhill as Chairman of the Agriculture Committee because you didn’t approve of his rhetoric is the action of a very small man, who was in the front of the line when hubris was being handed out.  It would appear that Steinberg’s expectations are not only that Republicans should act like Democrats, voting for schemes to try to raise taxes — but apparently Republicans must also sound like Democrats.  That is totally outrageous.  You can be sure that if a Republican Senate President had axed a liberal Democrat for making similar comments that the lefty “free speech caucus” would have been on fire, condemning the use of political pressure to curtail one’s right to speak their mind.   Of course, the silence from Democrats on this issue has been noticeable.

Finally, a few words on Republicans being given Chairmanships of a handful of political committees in the Senate and the Assembly.  It is important to note that Democrats control both Chambers, and since I believe in high-stakes politics (elections matter), the Democrats have the right to have majorities on and possess the Chairmanships of every committee.  Of course, if the majority party wants to exercise charity, and tap some minority party members to head up committees, that’s not a problem per say.  After all, Democrat still appoint solid majorities of their own members to those committees, so they still control outcomes.   But it is a big problem if Republican Committee Chairmen are now having strings put on them, or if these appointments are being used to try and manipulate the minority party, and undercut and go-around the Republican leaders. 

If I were a Republican who was tapped in either Chamber to head a committee, such as (now) Senator Canella, Senator Walters, Assemblyman Paul Cook or Assemblyman Cameron Smyth (there may be others but there are too many committees to check them all) – I think now would be a good time to hold a press conference, and dare to publicly opine about the budget, much the same as how Senator Berryhill did last week.  It would be interesting if it would one cost one or all of all of them their Chairmanships.  If it did, then I would submit to you that the price tag for those positions is way too high.

After all, it is the Democrats who get the last laugh if they successfully take away the most important of the few weapons in the arsenal of the minority party, the ability to communicate that if you want something done differently – change parties – and to make it clear that our state’s problems today lie largely with their failed leadership.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 19th, 2011 at 12:00 am and is filed under Blog Posts.