maintaing his position as King of the Nanny State, The Governor signed AB 951. AB 951 bans allalochol on rafts on certain holidays on the American River. See press release here.There is no word on whether you can set up a tent in the middle of the river and declare yourself free from such laws.

You can see my take on the ill-advised law here.You can see a defense of the law by the Sheriff of Sacramento here. You will notice that out of 10,000 people average compalints involving 1% of the people. Now they will spend more sources targeting the others AND force some people to drink on other nights while there is no law enforcement around. Arrest law breakers don’t make more people break the law!… Read More

I think that when the voters put term limits in place, one reason that many did so was because being an elected legislator should not be a career. Rather, it should be an opportunity for those who have had very real life experiences to spend a six or eight years in Sacramento, and then they would return back to the private sector, allowing other noble citizens to step forward and give of their time.

Long gone are the days of ‘career-politicians’ who serve twenty, thirty or in some cases over forty years in the legislature. Long gone are the kind of parochial politicians who use their offices to milk millions out of political supporters to enhance their lifestyles, and to live supremus alius – above others. Willie Brown is and his kind are long gone, right? WRONG.

I was absolutely floored today when I received a copy of a complaint filed with the Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC) against State Senate President Don Perata… Read More

WINNERS: The GOP Senators who stepped up and told the President: "Amnesty, proposed by a Republican, is still amnesty." LOSERS: The "dirty dozen" Republican Senators that cast the pro-amnesty vote: Bennett, Craig, Graham, Gregg, Hagel, Kyl, Lott, Lugar, Martinez, McCain, Snow, Specter. WINNERS: Grassroots activists all around America who got active, and made a difference with their lobbying of Washington politicians. THE BIG LOSER: President George W. Bush. My faith in the judgement of the George W. Bush has been profoundly, negatively impacted by this totally outrageous and misguided effort. WINNERS: All legal immigrants to the United States, whose journey to come here would have been immeasurably cheapened with an amnesty for the lawbreaking… Read More

History and arts are full of examples of how the acquisition of power leads to the corruption of the individual who seeks and obtains power. The Stars Wars movies are an anthology of how one person seeks to obtain power for good reasons (to save the life of the woman he loves) and it turns him into the evil Darth Vader. The Lord of the Rings trilogy is about how the power of the one ring can destroy anyone who wields that power, and that the only way to preserve society is to destroy that power. Indeed, the story of the recent Republican reign in Congress is the story of how the acquisition and maintainence of power led to corruption at a variety of levels. Duke Cunningham and Jack Abramoff were not the worst of the offenders. The worst was those who used their power, and the massive federal budget, to try to ensure their continuance in power. Earmarks, pork in the common parlance, are the source of that corruption. Subtle though it may be, the use of other people’s money to buy support for the maintainence of power is the worst kind of corruption there is, and Republicans, who promised not to engage in that kind of behavior, deserved to lose Congress for… Read More

Well, I don’t there is such a caucus, but there is no doubt that if there was one, it’s Chairman would be none other than Orange County’s Assemblyman Mike Duvall.

I get LOTS of e-mail newsletters from state legislators (if I am not on your list, you should add jon@flashreport.org), and today I received Duvall’s Dispatch. I ‘lifted’ this cool photo of the Assemblyman straight from it…

Did you know that Mike Duvall was born on Flag Day? See what you can find out by reading legislative newsletters? Of course, Duvall does not mention that he shares a birthday with none other than Donald Trump!

Perhaps when ill-fated attempt to extend term-limits fails next February, Duvall can go up to Fabian Nunez, and say,… Read More

I don’t have a problem with what Ann Coulter has to say. That’s her right. Her "side show" is all about making herself a pile of money, selling books, and getting obscene speakingfees. But I do have a problem with her doing what she does at the expense of the credibility of the conservative movement. Conservatives and conservative organizations need to rethink continuing to empower her by paying her speaking fees and providing crediblefora forher self-serving antics.

Ann of course is known as the journalist who at the national Conservative Political Action Conference last March sullied the reputation of former Senator John Edwards by callinghim outas a "faggot." Now she is at it again against Edwards. "So I’ve learned my lesson," she said ona recentABC program. "If I’m going to say anything about John Edwards in the future, I’ll just wish he had been killed in a terrorist assassination plot."

When Coulter appeared Tuesday on MSNBC’s "Hardball," Elizabeth Edwards, the wife of the former Senator,called in to ask Coulter to stop making personal… Read More

As the drama regarding the resignation of Michael Kamburowski has been unfolding, I had been hoping that I could get someone on the CRP Board to shoot me straight, explain what actually went on, and tell me how this, let’s call it a “diversion” from Ron Nehring’s ‘Strategic Plan,’ happened in the first place.

But as I woke up yesterday, I never thought it would be as easy as clicking onto the San Francisco Chronicle’s website and reading it straight from the mouth, or I guess rather the keyboard, of the CRP’s National Committeeman, Tim Morgan.

Tim wrote about what a “sad day” it was for the CRP. And in one respect, he was correct. It is a sad day when a CRP Board member goes to arguably the least Republican friendly newspaper in the state to try to air the Party’s dirty laundry and attempt to distance himself from an unfolding controversy.

Beyond the fact that his own piece highlights Tim’s irrelevance on the CRP Board – that not a single other… Read More

The 37th CD Primary is over. Richardson won the Dem primary. Earlier, Iposted about the GOP field. See here. Turns out that among GOP voters. The cop John Kanaly came in first and the convicted kidnapper came in last. … Read More