One of my favorite Eagles songs is on their Hell Freezes Over album, “Get Over It.” There are days when I just want to hook a loudspeaker to the roof of my car and ride through the streets of California blaring that song.

The song came to mind the other day when Diane Schachterle of the American Civil Rights Institute (Ward Connerly’s 501(c)3) sent me a notice about an event happening in San Francisco this afternoon. While I would have liked to attend, it would have to be with three kids in tow so I won’t, but frankly, I’m not sure I’d have the stomach for it anyway. See, the “Discrimination… Read More

"Bullet Voting" is when a candidate in a multi-candidateelection tries to get people to just vote for one candidate. The ballots normally come with an instruction toVote for no more thantwo or three. In the case of LA Central Committees 7. If you can do thisbeyond you and your family, it can make the difference in close elections. The reality is most normal non-activist types think they are wasting a vote if they don’t use it.

The County recently mailed ballots in theTorrance Municipal elections that toldvoters to vote for no more than one. Hope this trend continues. We all know there can’t ever be three really good council candidates at the same time! If youlive in Torrance "Bullet Vote" for Rod Guyton, a former CRA VP.

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The next Santa Ana City Council meeting might be a little more tense than usual. Long-time directly elected Santa Ana Mayor Miguel Pulido has endorsed Councilman Jose Solorio over Councilwoman Claudia Alvarez for the 69th Assembly District (one of Orange County’s two Dem Assembly seats, the other is the 56th which only takes in Buena Park).

While Pulido is not a powerhouse in Dem politics, he certainly has respect among the voters. There have been dueling polls on the race that show dramatically different results.

According to a new release from the Solorio campaign–Jose is polling slightly ahead of Alvarez:

A recent poll of likely Democratic voters in the 69th showed Solorio with a slight lead over Alvarez. Just last week in the Los Angeles Times, the publisher of the California Target Book, which analyzes assembly races said, "It’s really a tossup between Alvarez and Solorio, and I’d give a slight nod to Solorio."… Read More

A couple of weeks ago, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger called together a group of leaders of taxpayer advocacy groups in his office in Sacramento. The purpose of the meeting was two-fold — for the Governor to restate his commitment to holding the line against any new taxes, and also to strategize about how to tackle the upcoming state budget negotiations. I asked FR friend Jon Coupal, the President of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, who was at that meeting, if he would put pen to paper (or is that fingers to keyboard?) and tell us all about that meeting. When reading his piece, featured today on the main page, I was especially pleased to hear that the Governor made it clear that his opposition is to new taxes and to NEW FEES. As Coupal points out, this will foreshadow a host of vetoes during this legislative session as the Democrats love to pass fee increases left and right. Coupal’s piece ends with a warning, though. Which is that holding the line on taxation is very important, but that the big challenge ahead of the Governor is the reigning in of spending…. … Read More

A couple of weeks ago, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger called together a group of leaders of taxpayer advocacy groups in his office in Sacramento. The purpose of the meeting was two-fold — for the Governor to restate his commitment to holding the line against any new taxes, and also to strategize about how to tackle the upcoming state budget negotiations. I asked FR friend Jon Coupal, the President of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, who was at that meeting, if he would put pen to paper (or is that fingers to keyboard?) and tell us all about that meeting. When reading his piece, featured today on the main page, I was especially pleased to hear that the Governor made it clear that his opposition is to new taxes and to NEW FEES. As Coupal points out, this will foreshadow a host of vetoes during this legislative session as the Democrats love to pass fee increases left and right. Coupal’s piece ends with a warning, though. Which is that holding the line on taxation is very important, but that the big challenge ahead of the Governor is the reigning in of spending…. … Read More

San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors Chairman Bill Postmus scored a legal victory today in his campaign for County Assessor when Superior Court Judge Christopher J. Warner denied incumbent Assessor Don Williamson’s motion for a temporary restraining order against Postmus’ use of acampaign logo.

Williamson’s lawsuit alleged that Postmus’ logo (pictured right) implies that Postmus is the incumbent Assessor because it includes the name "Bill Postmus" and the words "County Assessor" below it in the logo graphic, without the words "Elect" or "For" included.

Ben Davidian, Postmus’ attorney and former Chairman of the California Fair Political Practices Commission, argued that the Postmus campaign logo was created in accordance with standard business practices and design techniques used for decades in American political campaigns, and thatWilliamson’s motion was tantamount to asking the Court to design Postmus’… Read More

David Drucker penned this piece in today’s Roll Call Magazine:

CALIFORNIA Businessman Will Reveal 50th District Plans Soon Millionaire businessman Eric Roach (R) may be out, but another millionaire businessman, Bill Hauf (R), said he is very likely in and will mount a challenge to ex-Rep. Brian Bilbray (R) in the 50th district GOP primary on June 6 < even as the former Congressman battles Democrat Francine Busby the same day in the special election to replace ex-Rep. Duke Cunningham (R). "I can tell you that if I go ahead it will be… Read More

FR friend Shane Goldmacher (who writes for CapWeekly) has reported on his blog that conservative Republican Assemblyman Ray Haynes has endorsed…Abel Maldonado in his bid for Controller. On one level, this is surprising because idoliogically and stylistically, Haynes and Maldonado’s primary opponent, former Assemblyman Tony Strickland are very much on the same page.

At first blush, this would simply seem to be a calculated ‘pay back’ from Haynes to Strickland, who has endorsed Haynes’ primary opponent in his race for Board of Equalization, conservative businesswoman Michelle Steel.

The key difference here, of course, is that Haynes and Steel are both hardline conservatives. So you can’t really say that someone is more or less conservative based on which of the two someone endorse. Either Haynes or Steel would be a marked improvement over Claude Parrish, who seems to relish the regulatory role of the BOE, instead of seeing it as a resource to come to the aid of taxpayers.

Anyways, I think I am… Read More