This June may feature the dirtiest campaign in the history of Los Angeles. How dirty? Just over 270,000 tons of sludge. That’s right, sludge created by the sanitation departments in LA and OC when they treat and "clean" the sewagedonated by some of the finest citizens in LA and Orange counties. Perhaps even some from yours truly. This sludge is then used as fertilizer on some farms in Kern County.

Some in Kern County don’t like getting dumped on from those down under. They have qulaified an initiative that will ban the import of sludge from outside Kern County. It appears tha Kern County’ssludge doesn’t stink and is far superior to others and will not be banned. G

The Kern County Board of Supervisors will vote shortly on whether to adopt the initiative or place it on the ballot. I hope they do the election. Imagine all the great direct mail!!!!! See the article here.… Read More

Sacramento Bee’s veteran political columnist, Dan Walters, pens a piece today where he laments that that despite extremely low public-approval ratings for the legislature, the partisan redistricting plan ensures that virtually every legislative seat will be retained by the political party that holds it now.

He does note two areas where seats held by Democrats are in trouble — the upper San Joaquin Valley (Stockton area) and central Orange County:

There will be, as noted earlier, a few vacant districts in which there could be at least a ghost of partisan competition in November, the gerrymander notwithstanding. The suburban San Joaquin Valley seat held by termed-out Democrat Barbara Matthews of Tracy, for example, could turn over because the Democrats have lost four percentage points of their voter registration margin in the last four years.

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Although the mayor’s race will grab headlines this year in Oakland, another big story is the potential walkout by Oakland teachers. The teachers are working without a contract after rejecting an offer by the district last spring which did not give them the pay increase and protected benefit package that they wanted.

For the teachers unions, it always comes down to money. That’s why the Oakland Teachers Association is talking more and more about striking, likely in the early part of 2006. They want district officials to restore a four percent cut in pay they agreed to 2003 and don’t want to pay any additional money for their health care coverage. Unfortunately, … Read More

This morning’s San Diego Union-Tribune calls Rob Reiner unethical and charges him with abuse of power. Check these blurbs:

Reiner and his allies have abandoned any claim to the moral high ground. Their role in the misuse of taxpayer dollars for what is little more than promotion of Reiner’s latest crusade – a 2006 initiative to provide free preschool to all the state’s 4-year-olds – is far more sleazy than noble … The next time you read a gushy article about Reiner, the rich show-biz mogul who so cares about kids, feel free to groan. He may care about kids, but he doesn’t give a rip about ethics.

Read the complete editorial here. And, have a great New Year!… Read More

Governor Schwarzenegger wants to raise the minimum wage in California and Bill Dombrowski a sorry excuse for a retail industry rep supports the idea.

I feel like we have entered a parallel universe. The lone sane voice on the issue is Senate Minority Leader Dick Ackerman who gets the big picture: Forced higher wages mean fewer jobs.

For those who think this is the latest in a string of job-killing proposals being spearheaded by new COS Susan Kennedy, you may be right.

I have suggested before that the governor’s role is in many ways reduced to the opportunistic veto. He could surely veto any attempt to raise the minimum wage. Why he is looking to compromise on this is unclear. Even more bizarre is the retail industry’s acquiescence.… Read More

This yearhas been a year of turmoil, infighting, budget problems, controversial staff changes and changing focus. And I’m not talking about the Governor’s office! I’m talking about a church, but not any church. This is oneof the most famous churches in Los Angeles.

First Hollywood Presbyterian is no ordinary church. It has a storied history that includes the start of the Billy Graham Ministries andserved as the pulpitfor current U.S. Senate Chaplain Lloyd Ogilvie.Although considered a "liberal" denomination. There was always a soft spot among more conservative Christians for Hollywood Presbyterian because of its history and location. To have a high profile church in a place like Hollywood was a always a good thing.

The LA Weekly has a decent, if little liberal view of the problems facing this Los Angeleslandmark. See it here.… Read More

This morning the anonymous (but great) San Diego Politics Blog picked up on the just-published San DiegoCityBeat review of 2005 in politics. I don’t typically go out of my way to find a copy of City Beat, avery left-leaning (heck, socialist) tabloid, but when I run across it I pick it up, at least to see which Republicans they’re bashing that week … and which GOP moderates are labeled as right-wing fascists.

This week’s CityBeat piece by David Rolland, "HEY NINETEEN: Recalling the newsmakers of 2005—oh, how they entertained us," does make for fun reading … as long as you take some of it with a grain of salt.

To be sure, San Diego area politics has most assuredly provided some newsmakers this past year … stripper-gate and Duke Cunningham alone were enough for a mouthful, but then throw in a few other ongoing scandals, crises and mayoral elections…… Read More

I was having this very debate with a couple reporters at a Christmas party the other day. Who produces better journalism?: A reporter that is close to the people she covers–has relationships and knows the landscape and has institutional knowledge OR a reporter that is green, has no ties to the community and just purely reports the news?

As someone who values relationships, not because it allows manipulation (after all the green reporter is just as likely to get played) but because it breeds civility and more importantly accuracy I prefer the former.

Jean Pasco of the LA Times is one of the old school reporters who has been around since I got involved more than a dozen years ago. And she knows everyone and remembers everything. There are disadvantages to this but I still would prefer Jean cover a story that involved me or a friend rather than some easy to manipulate but ignorant runt of a reporter.

In true Probolsky style Pasco gives a cool run down of Orange County races in 06 in today’s LA Times. Only a… Read More