As the State Senate was debating the budget that was rejected by over two thirds of Assembly Republicans, Tom McClintock gave the following floor speech. As you read this, we are all in solidarity with Tom and his colleagues who have been "locked in" to the Senate chambers…

Mr. President: A year ago, this legislature adopted a budget that ran up the biggest general fund deficit in California’s history. The architects of this budget admit to adding another half billion dollars to the cumulative shortfall, and expect that this looks good in comparison. … Read More

We here at the FR have carte blanche to pick up Senator McClintock’s posts from over at the Citizens for the California Republic website, and here’s what he says in the wake of the liberation of the Senators from their chambers: **This is a good chance to remind all of our GOP legislators that if you send in commentary or thoughts on the budget or other issues, we try within reason to get those posted up.**

From the Senator:

BUDGET VICTORY – THANK YOU!!! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU FOR YOUR CALLS AND E-MAILS – YOU MADE A DIFFERENCE. … Read More

Today in Anaheim, the YRFC held their annual State Convention.

Chairman Matt Harper handed off the gavel to longtime conservative leader and activist, Ben Lopez.

YRFC also went on record endorsing the CRP’s recently re-affirmed position that only Republican voters should be able to pick the Republican presidential nominee. The organization also endorsed the CRP campaigns of California Republican Lawyers Association President Steve Baric, and former CRP Chairman Shawn Steel.

We just got done listening to Assemblyman Chuck DeVore, who was just presented with YRFC’s Legislator of the Year Award.

And right now, our FlashReport leader Jon Fleischman was given the YRFC Founder’s Award.

Later tonight, talk show host and author Dennis Prager will be addressing the group.

All in all, a great event put on by the Orange County Young Republicans.

(posted from my Treo)… Read More

Well, 120 California legislators can enjoy their weekends, as I just got off of the phone with Senate Republican Leader Dick Ackerman who told me that there will not be any budget nogiations taking place over the weekend, at least not on the Senate side of the building.

Ackerman did say that he expects more activity on the budget next week.

In the meantime, the taxpayers can be assured that the legislature will not be convening over the weekend. UPDATE: Genuinely nice guy and devout socialist Frank Russo has a post up at the left-of-Berkeley California Progress Report website that (if you can get past Frank’s rhetoric) contains a nifty transcript of the from-the-roster dialogue between Perata and Ackerman at the end of the lock-down this morning.… Read More

I am a little worked-up that our intrepid publisher tag-lined my last post on the Fabrizio national Republican poll to somehow undercut the import of this unbiased survey showing broad support for Giuliani as a secondary note of the poll, by qualifying my post, in red no less, that I am also a Giuliani supporter! In response, and rather than bury my thoughts in a comment, I am issuing this blog challenge, and not to Fleischman! Hey Jon, I’m just reporting what I heard a respected pollster say, who is not a Giuliani consultant. I hope when I go see the Red Sox play the Angels in a couple of weeks here in Anaheim, that you won’t tag-line my further posts thinking I’ve joined the Romney road show with Mike Schroeder (former CRP Chairman), Scott Baugh (current OC GOP Chairman), and Adam Probolsky (respected OC-based pollster), all of whom have endorsed Romney, and call Orange County "Romney country." Well, I’ll be rooting for the Angels during that series. I hereby challenge Schroeder, Baugh and Probolsky to show up at the upcoming Angels/Red Sox series wearing those same questionable Red Sox hats they quite visably sported in the media when… Read More

Missed in the morning craziness of checking 50+ websites every morning for relevant news on California politics was a column today in the LA Times by Dana Parsons, profiling Republican political guru (and FR friend) Ken Khachigian. Ken is ‘answering the call’ to help out Fred Thompson in his bid for the White House.

The column begins below, and then there is a link over the the Times’ site for the rest.

A veteran advisor answers yet another bell Ken Khachigian, a lawyer in San Clemente, has advised Reagan, Nixon and others. This cycle, he’s aiding Fred Thompson. By Dana Parsons, The Los Angeles Times — July 21, 2007 … Read More

Ok, so everyone will be talking about the budget today, and we will hear lots of comments about the budget, about bloat, about special interests, and the like. The good news–it has tax cuts in it. I hear that the Democrats have all the signatures they want on the term limits initiative and want to turn it in as soon as possible. They don’t want to turn them in while the budget impasse continues. Something about bad public relations or something. The bad news, it still has a $105 billion spending plan, and keeps the structural deficits. To put this in perspective, the first budget I voted on was a $40.9 billion general fund plan. The budget when Gray Davis took office was $57 billion general fund, and when Schwarzenegger took office it was $78 billion general fund. Interestingly enough, all of the Davis increases ($21 billion) took place in his first two years in office, and then the budget collapsed. Schwarzenegger has increased the budget by $27 billion in 4 years, and it continues to grow.

The truth is, this budget was lost in January when the Governor submitted the budget.

But now for the off topic subject.

Two weeks ago,… Read More

From the time I was in t-ball, my dad always used to tell me that I needed to use two hands when catching pop ups. Sure, 99 times out of 100 it’s no big deal, and the out is made. But then there’s that other one…

It’s with that in mind that I write about the last night’s budget votes.

Throughout the night, the Assembly leaders hustled to get a budget, some budget, any budget passed. Negotiations took place. Concessions were made. Entire sections of the budget were rewritten hastily in the middle of the night, being fueled by cold pizza and colder coffee.

But last night, unfortunately, it seems someone forgot to remind our leadership to use both hands.

As part of the grand deal that was cut, the Research and Development tax credit for businesses was to be expanded, to provide conformity with the federal tax code relating to R&D. As part of the package that was agreed to, those provisions would then sunset in 5 years.

However, that isn’t exactly what made it’s way into the final product.

Instead of those provisions sunsetting in 5 years, the budget as written sunsets the entire section of the tax code relating to… Read More