With the reports in, here is how the fundraising is shaping up in the Riverside County State races for the period of January 1 through June 30. I posted only Republicans in the 37th SD and 64th AD since they are Republican seats. I will post the Democrats in a day or so for the 80th AD which is more highly Democrat than Republican:

SD 37 to replace termed out Jim Battin

Current 64th State Assemblyman John J. Benoit $441,000 Cash on Hand, $218,019 raised in the period.

Former 65th State Assemblyman Russ Bogh $427,000 Cash on Hand, $157,664 raised in the period.

Bothhave raised a mix of Sacramento and local funds.

AD 64 to replace termed out John J. Benoit

Rose Ramirez Girard$78,920 Cash on Hand, $101,901 raised. Loaned campaign $66,000, raised $37,000 from district

Kelly McCarty$81,078 Cash on Hand, raised $81,795. No personal money. Virtually all came from individual collision centers throughout the state.

John Pate$100,394 Cash on Hand, $106,840 raised. Loaned campaign… Read More

The State Senate is in session tonight, and despite knowing that the Republican Caucus has not agreed to a budget deal, Perata forced yet another vote on the fat, bloated state budget.

The vote failed, but it is notable that moderate Republican Abel Maldonado decided that hanging tough for real spending cuts and programmatic reforms was a bit too much for him. I don’t know what his pressure points were but when choosin’ time came, and he voted, he went with all of the Democrats instead of his colleagues.

To be commended are the 14 solid Senate Republicans who are keeping faith with each other, and are commited to some real reforms and spending cuts.

More to come, I’m sure…… Read More

You may well have seen TV news statewide of a structure collapse on a highway construction project up here in Butte County on Hwy 149, between Oroville and Chico. The early Wednesday morning accident was a result of a collapsing heavy-steel structure that would support the forms to pourconcrete upon for a new overcrossing where 70 meets 149. It was not a collapse of an actual overcrossing as first reported [or even hyped], nor justa scaffolding forpersonnel to work from.

A Fed Ex truck was struck by the falling steel girders, 3000 lbs each or more, as the driver was proceeding north. He was trapped for 3 hours as safety personnel worked to extract him, pinned under wreckage held down by the steel I-beams. The happy ending for him was only an ankle sprain, some cuts and bruises and a harrowing experience. He is already at home tonight with his family.

A construction worker atop the collapsing structure, rode it 50 feet down and he suffered several broken bones and is still hospitalized in serious condition.

A third injurya few minutes later, was to a woman who drove upon the scene and rearended a parked CalTrans vehicle and broke… Read More

Legitimate, real and important policy differences separate Senate Republicans and Democrats in the budget debate.

After it was clear that no forward momentum on a budget would take place (Senator Dennis Hollingsworth attempted to bring up GOP programmic changes and belt-tightening trailer bills to no avail), Senator Jeff Denham tried to bring up a motion to fund vital government services during this impasse. The Democrats voted as a block against this reasonable accomodation.

So to all of you TV, radio and newspaper reporters, you should report that it is the Democrats who want to use those in need of services as “pawns” to try and put on pressure for a bad budget resolution.

The Senate is in recess.… Read More

Earlier this afternoon, the fifteen members of the Senate Republican Caucus went down to Governor Schwarzenegger’s office to discuss the state budget. (Only in the State Capitol would fifteen people go downstairs instead of one man coming upstairs. Then again, he is the Governator. Besides, maybe they smoked cigars, and he does have the only smoking tent in the immediate vicinity…). Apparently the name of the game is still, "Do ANYTHING to get Senate Republicans to vote for the already-passed budget out of the Assembly — we don’t want to crack-open budget negotiations again!" So, we can assume that Governor’s "pitch" to Senate Republicans was made with a big blue pencil in his hand, making the case for how the Governor would trim the state budget over the ears a bit in order to satisfy concerns of GOP Senators. Unfortunately, one has to acknowledge that the blue-pencil (line item veto) approach has its limitations. Yes, the Governor could… Read More

Romney for President “Secure”:30 TV

Mitt Romney (VO): We should secure our border.

We should put in place an employment verification system.

And then when an employer is thinking of hiring someone the federal database immediately tells them whether they’re available to be working or not.

If they’re not you can’t hire them.

People that are here illegally are going to have to get in line with everybody else with no special pathway to becoming citizens

Legal immigration is great, but illegal immigration that we’ve got to end.

Thank you, and Amnesty is not the way to do it.

Mitt Romney (VO): I’m Mitt Romney and I approved this message.

Here’s the video:

[Publisher’s Note: We’re very honored that our own Duane has been tapped as… Read More

This from Christine Hanley of today’s L.A. Times

"Gore is the youngest of Tipper and Al Gore’s four children. He was arrested in 2003 on suspicion of marijuana possession while a student at Harvard University. He completed substance-abuse counseling as part of a program to settle the charge and was not convicted of a crime.

He now lives in Los Angeles, where he is an associate publisher of Good, philanthropy magazine aimed at young people."… Read More

This weekend Larry Dick’s campaign for the 60th Assembly District came to part of the LA County. Walnut Valley Water Board member Ling-Ling Chang and Pomona School Board Member Andrew Wong sponsored Larry’s Luau in Diamond Bar. In the audience were quite a few “Water people”. As water board member Larry is working that angle. Water is big business in CA and there is more money there than some might think. There were also a lot of GOP activists from the SGV Valley, many that were also at the last Curt Hagman events I was at. They must be checking out the field. See here. Assemblyman Huff was there saying very nice things about … Read More