– Real pension reform cannot take place this Fall because there will be no time to put reforms on the ballot for the voters to lock into place. After all, who would trust this legislature not to reverse any reforms, retroactively, as soon as there is an upswing in the economy?

– Attempts by the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors and the City Councils in Fontana and Ontario are advancing an absurd expansion of eminent domain that you really couldn’t make up if you tried. They would use the power to seize mortgages — seriously. Just take them from the lenders as if they were the equivalent as a parcel of land impeding a highway expansion. All in the name of a non-existent responsibility of government to mettle in people’s personal finances. This goes nowhere.

– I still maintain that the efforts by Senators Mimi Walters, Joel Anderson, CRP Chairman Tom Del Beccaro and others to qualify a referendum on the new Commission-drawn State Senate lines were appropriate. As drawn, it is overwhelmingly likely that the GOP will lose enough seats to lose the ability to stop 2/3 vote bills. The judges opted out of drawing any new lines when the referendum qualified, saying they would draw new ones if voters rejected the referendum. While proponents have “given up” on the measure (saying so in their ballot statement) I wouldn’t be surprised, with it’s obscure placement at the bottom of a long ballot, if it fails anyway, and we get new Senate lines…

– Apparently State Treasurer Bill Lockyer has announced that he is divorcing his wife, Nadia. she recently resigned from the Alameda County Board of Supervisors after a large amount of negative publicity surrounding her drug abuse. My prayers go out to the Lockyers and their young son. What a tragic situation, and a difficult one — made that much more so by being figures in the public spotlight.

– Everyone is waiting in anticipation of Mitt Romney’s selection of a running mate. For a cope of days last week, Condie Rice’s name was floating around. The reaction from conservatives everywhere was swift and negative. The key for moderate Romney is to tap an accepted, proven conservative for the VP slot. All of the talk about Rob Portman and Tim Pawlenty is enough to make a conservative cringe. The outrageous Obamacare decision by the Supreme Court has fired up conservatives very much. The wrong VP pick would be one way to dampen he spirit of conservatives, on whom Romney is counting.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 17th, 2012 at 1:27 am and is filed under Blog Posts.