Taken at surface value, there ought to be minimal identity of interests between these three special interests. But if you follow the money and power instead of the rhetoric and stereotypes, you will find this unhealthy alliance is alive and thriving. For example, unions use “greenmail,” the threat of a lawsuit on environmentalist grounds, to block developments until the businesses involved concede to union demands. Once they back down, the environmental problem magically disappears.

California’s much vaunted high-speed rail and delta tunnel proposals are also examples of the unhealthy rapprochement between unions (public and private) and environmentalists. Because the construction unions, God bless ‘em, want thousands of good new construction jobs, and the only big projects that are environmentally correct are these monstrosities. The unions have a choice – fight the environmentalists in order to lobby for public works that actually yield economic benefits to society, or enjoy their considerable support for a couple of misguided mega-projects.

Beyond obvious examples, how unions, environmentalists, and America’s overbuilt financial sector collude –… Read More

Recently, Democrat leadership in the California legislature have rallied around ethics. They’ve even held mandatory ethics training, banning legislators from bringing their cell phones into the room, lest their attention be diverted for even an instant.

With this new laser-focus, one would think they would surely be ready to genuinely address the ethics violations right under their noses. Yet, as new criminal behavior comes to light, we see that Democrats are focused on passing ethics laws, not on following them.

The Majority party is in hot water from the felony charges brought against three of their own. Senator Roderick Wright (D-Inglewood) was found guilty of eight felonies and was expected to be sentenced in court next Friday — a judge has now pushed his sentencing into July. Senator Ron Calderon (D-Montebello) was indicted on federal corruption charges after an FBI sting, and Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco) was charged in federal court with accepting bribes and gun trafficking.

When faced with this patently unethical behavior within its ranks, the Democratic Senate Leadership refused to let a vote for expulsion be addressed on the Senate… Read More

The Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association is pleased to welcome Ryan Cogdill to our expanding legal department. Cogdill, who graduated from McGeorge School of Law in 2011, will assist the Association with its legal efforts on behalf of California taxpayers, including the defense of Propositions 13 and 218, the integrity of the initiative process and government accountability. He joins HJTA’s litigation team headed by Director of Legal Affairs, Timothy Bittle.

We are excited to include Ryan’s knowledge and experience in our team. The addition of Ryan to our staff will enable the Association to remain California taxpayers’ leading resource to turn to when their government acts unjustly.

Cogdill, who is relocating to Sacramento from Modesto, has extensive litigation experience, most recently with the Curtis Legal Group, PLC.In addition, he served as a Fellow for the California Senate and as a Judicial Extern for the California Court of Appeal for the Third Appellate District.He also has experience in the California Department of Justice as well as serving as a law clerk for the Fair Political Practices Commission. Cogdill also serves as a… Read More

Vote-by-mail ballots go out today (at least in Orange County, and voters will begin marking their choices in a number of competitive races in Orange County. One of those is the race to succeed Supervisor Pat Bates in the 5th Supervisor District.

There are five candidates running, but the contest to make the November run-off is widely viewed as being between Mission Viejo Councilman Frank Ury, Laguna Niguel Councilman Robert Ming and Dana Point Councilwoman Lisa Bartlett. [Let me disclose up front that I am strongly supporting Ury.]

While Ury has been picking up steam since the new year, Ming’s campaign – after a burst of momentum during the last few months of 2013 — has begun to slow and lately has been dogged by a series of embarrassing revelations.

Pay Yourself First Ming sprinted to an early fundraising lead, in large part by personally loaning his campaign $50,000. However, his campaign disclosure report for January 1 – March 17 of this year showed he had already paid himself back $10,000. – meaning nearly all of the $12,449 he raised during that period went to retire his campaign debt to… Read More

Republicans respect and value hard work, believing every man and woman who aspires to live the American Dream deserves the opportunity to control their destiny through hard work, tenacity and a good heart. I’ve found this to be true from my own experience.

My family came to the United States from Taiwan when I was a boy, fleeing persecution and following their aspiration for a better life. My mother and father rolled up their sleeves and invested everything they had to open a restaurant in San Jose. Through years of scrubbing dishes and busing tables, I learned the value of hard work early in life. The lessons shaped my philosophy and… Read More

Just two months ago this column criticized Sacramento for subsidizing those politically connected companies that are part of the “in” crowd with millions in tax credits while maintaining high taxes on less glamorous industries. Auto maker Tesla has recently been “gifted” $35 million in this fashion and both Democratic and Republican lawmakers are lining up to ingratiate themselves with movie moguls while bearing offerings of hundreds of millions in tax subsidies.

Now we have a new… Read More

As I walked out of the Capitol Thursday, May 1 at just after 5:00 pm, I noticed a fledgling labor rally beginning.

It was May Day, the date chosen by the Socialists and Communists for International Workers’ Day.

But there weren’t any of the usual purple shirt-wearing protestors – this crowd was a real potpourri of odd people, including a group of leathered, old hippies, acting as if their brains had been fried years ago by drugs.

As I was walked past, guest speaker Assemblyman Roger Dickinson, was introduced.

Dickinson, a Democrat from Sacramento, is known as a good friend to labor. Dickinson took the microphone and began to speak as if there were thousands of purple-shirt SEIU members in the crowd.

“The direction we are going is putting the wealth of this country in the hands of fewer and fewer, at the expense of everyone!” Assemblyman Roger Dickinson said.

So compelling was his statement, I stopped to write it down. But that was about as much as I could take; I didn’t stick around for the rest of the speech. I knew where it was going.

Income “inequality”

Democrats across the country… Read More

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It is no secret that for generations, China, India, and other nations have had a strong cultural preference for bearing male offspring. Boys are viewed as a blessing – future working men who can provide for their parents. Girls are often treated as a burden. As a local Telugu saying goes in India, “rearing a daughter is like watering a neighbor’s tree.” In China, a fascist one-child policy has only served to intensify the desire to have a son instead of a daughter.

As a result, the United Nations now estimates that as many as 200 million females worldwide have had their lives ended either through sex-selection abortion or infanticide, simply for being the “wrong” gender.

The sex ratio in India is now 112 males for every 100 females. In China there are now 120 boys for every 100 girls.

What has come to be known as “gendercide” is proving to have disastrous societal effects, where sex trafficking flourishes as a result of tens of millions of young men unable to find a spouse.

While this practice is rightly shunned from afar in the United States, most elected officials here have turned a blind eye to the fact that “gendercide”… Read More