"Lifted" from State Senator Tom Harman’s latest e-newsletter:

A Loophole by any other name is still the same After years of reckless spending and special-interest pandering, the liberal majority must now face their comeuppance in the form of a massive budget deficit. So they turn their focus to closing "loopholes." But there’s just one problem: The folks up in Sacramento have a very different notion of what constitutes a "loophole" than do the rest of us. The biggest "loophole" in California, according to state Legislative… Read More

AD 80 on again – off again candidate, Lupe Ramos Watson, is out.

Tomorrow, Gary Jeandron will become the unopposed Republican nominee for Assembly.

Now, for the next three months Gary will be able to fundraise and campaign while the Democrat candidates tear each other apart. And from what I’m hearing, it’s going to be a Democrat Battle Royale.

Since the day he announced Gary has been a juggernaut. He’s a well respected former police chief of Palm Springs, current school board member and even a marriage and family counselor (what a guy).

HIs fundraising is better than all the Democrats combined and his work ethic is second to none.

Jeandron is on a roll – and clearing the Primary is just another sign of his strength.

Anyone who knows me, knows my obsession with AD 80 (my old district). I’m very comfortable Gary… Read More

The Democrat secret plan to solve the budget crisis has finally been revealed.

Yesterday, Senate Democrat Leader Don Perata spoke plainly when he was asked how they proposed to to make up the deficit when he said,"Raise taxes. That clear enough? Raise taxes." What a shocker….. the Democrats want to raise our taxes – I just can’t believe it.

Senator Perata also promised to hold us here all summer apparently until the Republican resolve not to raise taxesis broken. And I’m sure he means it. Remember our Senatesleep-over lastyear? (no worries – – we eventually were set free).

If last year’s Democrat rage at the Senate Republicans refusing to vote for a budgetuntil spending was reduced by just… Read More

Deep down everyone involved in politics knows that “campaign reform” has been a failure. More and More money comes in, but all these laws make it harder to find who is really giving to whom. At the state level, you can go to the Secretary of State Website and check out donors at the state level to the real big campaigns.

Local campaigns are a completely different story. It is hard to know about campaign donations without going to City Hall. Hard except in Pasadena , where The Foothill Cities Blog that covers the Foothill Cities in LA County. (Hence the clever name) has taken on campaign finance at the local level. In Pasadena the most prominent of the cities it covers … Read More

Having been rolled by the Governor for the past five years (a little less rolled in 2007 than in years past) the GOP minority in the State SenateandAssembly must now, finally, draw a line in the sand on State spending, which has exploded under this Governor and with a few Republican votes every year.

At risk here are losing the arguments on two key principles, the premise that we have a spending problem rather than a revenue problem, the historical fact that tax increases do not now, nor ever have, increased tax revenues.

There is also the issue that nobody in elected office, nor any candidate wants to touch – education spending. Somebody explain to me why a 100% run up in education spending over 10 years with less than 15% change in enrollment can’t be reduced in a fiscal crisis? Are there no intellectuals out there to make the argument.

This is a seminal time for the GOP. A depressed nationwide base looks at a feckless Congress, a lame duck President and a Governor who has place our State at great risk while flying the GOP flag. Its not a good situation, and taking a stand on the issue of taxes would be a great help.… Read More

For the past few months I’ve been worried that the Democrats would wake up. They didn’t. Now that their Presidential nomination will continue to be up in the air for months I’m ready to thank them for giving Republicans a chance to keep the White House for four more years. It also means a chance at another Supreme Court Justice.

This should be a bad year for a Republican to be at the top of the ticket. Republicans did a smart thing by nominating the best candidate in the field to be able to win in November. Senator McCain brings independent voters to the table and should be able to hold the Republican base with a little work.

As for the Democrats they needed to nominate anyone but Senator Clinton or Senator Obama. They didn’t do that.

I believe that if Senator John Edwards was the nominee of the Democratic Party he would get 53% of the vote or greater and would walk into the White House. He would also have a good chance of putting North Carolina in his column.

Governor Bill Richardson would have been the darling of the media. They would have praised him to high heaven in editorials all over the country and he… Read More

With his strong wins in Texas and Ohio, Rhode Island and Vermont, Senator McCain has earned the delegates to be our Republican standard bearer for President. Right now he is receiving the endorsement of President Bush, a true showing of Republican unity that will be critical this November. President Bush is in a jovial mood, talking about how they’ve campaigned against each other and with each other over the years and that he will be back in Crawford with his feet up, while John is inside [the Oval Office] making the tough decisions. He expressed great confidence in McCain’s ability to lead, and had a bit of fun with the press in the process.

My hats off to Senator McCain for hanging with it and picking himself up off the deck in the primary process and getting the job done. Although I was with another candidate until soon after the Super Tuesday primary results, Senator McCain has and will act with honoras Commander In Chief, a very important distinction between he and whoever is his November Democrat opponent will be…critical for the future direction of our country and it’s affairs such as:

-Seeing through and honoring the… Read More

Wednesday, March 5th, 2008

As I suspected, the Presidential election is occupying much of the media attention now and much of the attention of members of Congress as well. Furthermore, the controlling Democrats are generally of the belief that their candidate (whoever that is) will win in November and then, if they hold Congress, they can do what they want without having to make deals with President Bush. So, I expect much action on things like energy, immigration, health care, etc to be held until at least after November and probably next year. There are a few things scheduled to expire this year, like farm subsidies, on which some action is expected. But, there is still no agreement in the House on the now expired Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act which passed the Senate by a wide margin. So, even those items that are on a deadline of sorts don’t seem to be moving in this paralyzed Congress.

Federal Budget: One of the items that Congress is supposed to take up each year (but sometimes doesn’t) is a federal budget. By the Constitution, spending and tax bills must originate in the House. So, the House is beginning… Read More