There are 230 bond, tax and fee increase proposals on the 2012 ballot in California. Gov. Jerry Brown’s Proposition 30 tax increase measure is the least of voters’ problems this election.

There are 100 school bond measures on the ballot throughout California. There are more than 30 sales tax increase initiatives, business tax increases, parcel taxes, utility taxes, and hotel taxes. There are even tax increase measures for sodas and abandoned-cars.

How many tax increases will “fix” California?

The answer is easy. None.

What’s really wrong California?

Local governments would have everyone in the state believe that they are struggling to make ends meet. But they grossly misuse the word “struggle.” The only downsizing done in local government has been to cut the lower paid employees who probably weren’t eligible for pensions anyway.

In Sacramento, the City Council is pushing hard to pass several ballot initiatives:

* Measure Q: Sacramento City Unified School District;

* Measure R: Sacramento City Unified School District;

* Measure T: Sacramento (City of) Mandates on Garden and Yard Refuse… Read More

Much has been written on this website about the horrific state budget deal of 2009, a deal that saw California taxpayers slammed with the largest single tax increase in state history – with increases in sales, income and car taxes, and a reduction in the child tax credit. For two years, roughly $14 billion each year was transferred from the private sector into the sink-hole that is state government. It’s worthy of note that mere months after that budget deal, California voters were asked whether to extend those tax increases for two more years, and rejected them by nearly a two-thirds vote.

What if Republicans had held the line that year? How much better off would state government be today had tough decisions about cuts in state spending been made three years ago? But that’s not what happened. Five of the six Republican legislators who voted to hike those taxes were elected to office after pledging that they would never do that – that they would not raise taxes.

This year three of those five pledge-breakers… Read More

This Saturday, the action was right here at 30th and Euclid in downtown Cleveland.

Crowds were lined up at the Board of Elections despite gray skies and 40 degree weather, or what Californians might consider perfect ski weather. The weekend before Election Day, hundreds not thousands of voters were being processing

… Read More

The following are FlashReport.org’s recommendations on the eleven measures that will appear on the November ballot measures. These positions were arrived at through discussion by the members of our editorial board.

PROPOSITION 30: NO This proposition is a $50 billion sales and income tax increase on all Californians. This will further weaken an already fragile California economy and destroy more jobs in the Golden State. The Governor is trying to blackmail California’s taxpayers by holding education hostage and extorting these taxes despite the fact that the proposition does not guarantee net new funding for education. These taxes are simply not necessary as California has a spending problem and not a revenue problem. Rejecting this proposition will force Sacramento politicians to realign their priorities and successfully fund education. We strongly recommend a… Read More

Comparing headquarters in Cleveland, Ohio, it is clear that Republicans have the edge.

Fully Staffed Romney-Ryan Headquarters: There are three fully staffed Romney Victory Headquarters in Cuyahoga County–east, south and west of downtown Cleveland. On Saturday, I visited the city of Independence headquarters, an appropriately named town for a major Romney-Ryan command post.

There are many Republicans in Cuyahoga County; they just don’t live downtown. The bigquestionon Tuesday:will Republicans turn out in greater numbers to make up for the… Read More

Thanks to Jerry Brown’s recent appointment of Walnut Creek City Councilman Kish Rajan as director Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development (GO-Biz), Rajan has withdrawn from his race for re-election to the Council. Councilman Rajan was the only Democrat in this year’s race.

Rajan’s departure has left four candidates competing for three open seats: Contra Costa County Deputy District Attorney Barry Grove, CPA Loella Haskew, Mayor Bob Simmons, and local business owner Justin Wedel. Grove, Haskew, and Wedel are Republicans, and Simmons is registered decline-to-state. The two remaining councilmembers, who are not up for reelection until 2014, are decline-to-state Kristina Lawson, and Republican Cindy Silva.

Even if Simmons, the only non-Republican in the race, wins re-election, the remaining two spots are guaranteed to go to Republicans. If all goes well, and the three Republicans win all three spots, Republicans will have a 4/5 supermajority on the Council.

This is certainly welcome news for Bay Area Republicans, who have seen the party’s share of voter registration decline in nearly every city in the region during the past… Read More

Republican Party membership has now dropped below 30% in the Golden State, marking a further decline in the party’s statewide strength and affecting the prospects of Republican victories in future years.

Understanding what is, and what isn’t, contributing to this development is important so Republican candidates, and more importantly, elected officials, can make increasingly necessary adjustments. Misdiagnosing the problem risks sending precious resources off in the wrong direction.

First, let’s recognize that party registration follows party self-identification. People register with the party with whom they identify.

Paid voter registration programs focused in targeted districts are designed to register people who by and large already consider themselves Republicans. By concentrating a disproportionate effort into a tightly confined area we can, and do, move the needle. Think of placing a hot poker into a bathtub: the water next to the poker becomes much hotter, but not the water at the… Read More

Recently at a forum in Yorba Linda, I was asked to present the statewide initiatives in my customary non-biased informational way and answer any questions.

Representatives of some initiatives did show up and received a few minutes to present their case. One representative from the local teachers union explained why in her view Proposition 32 was flawed. She then said anybody that wants to exempt themselves from political dues can. It is easy.

Really?

The West Covina School Board of which I am a member unanimously changed some of our policies.

The Classified Service Employees Association (CSEA) recently filed a charge of us committing “unfair labor practices”. I know, like I would be unfair to a union? They already are so disadvantaged with having state law mandate that they represent all employees and forcing employees to pay whether they likeit or not. Add in the disadvantages suffered from the special laws protecting unions and mandating rules and benefits passed in Sacramento and the factunions being the top political spenders. One would never want to be “unfair”.

The “charges” contained a lot of… Read More