It’s being reported that Governor Jerry Brown flew down to Los Angeles yesterday to go pitch the businesses in the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce on why they should support his budget plan (and put pressure on GOP legislators to do the same). Jerry Brown just doesn’t get it. Look in the rear view mirror. In 2009, the very same taxes he wants to extend for five years were enacted as part of a budget deal that spawned an ill-fated ballot measure that would have extended the taxes for just two more years. That ballot measure, as everyone knows, was defeated by almost a two-to-one margin in a June 2009 special election.

I wonder if Jerry Brown is aware of the fact that the “business community” in California (most notably the CalChamber) supported both the terrible budget deal and the passage of the extension of the taxes that appeared on the ballot. It was a clear demonstration of a disconnect between California voters and big business (of course in that budget deal, the Chamber backed higher income, sales and… Read More

Note to State Senator Mark Leno, and the host of other liberal politicians who really, really hate that California’s Constitution includes voter-approved taxpayer protections. There is a sound policy reason for why it takes a two-thirds vote in order to raise taxes — it is to prevent majority tyranny.… Read More

Conservative Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann, a fresher face on the national scene,will be very much in the spotlight at this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference, opening today at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel on upper Connecticut, N.W. in Washington, D.C. And a last minute addition appears to be Donald Trump! CPAC promoters are stating that registration hit 10,000 people yesterday, a staggering number. Other major speakers on the agenda through this weekend, include Newt Gingrich, Senator and Congressman Rand and Ron Paul; Congressmen Paul Ryan and Allen West (West is a black Republican just elected to a Florida district in the recent anti-Obama landslide), Senators Lee, McConnell, and Thune; Governors Daniels, Barbour (both formerly Reagan White House officials) and Perry; and my buddy Herman Cain, former CEO of Godfather’s Pizza and a former Federal Reserveofficial, among many others.

Much of the conference will be available on the CSPAN channels. Speeches will also be available in real time at the CPAC website,… Read More

Prominent California Democrat strategist and consultant Garry South predicts Republicans pick up the United States Senate in 2012… From today’s Wall Street Journal Political Diary E-mail…

Webb Exit Tilts Senate Map How much trouble are Democrats in as a result of Virginia Sen. Jim Webb’s decision to retire in a normally Republican state? A great deal if, you listen to Democratic consultant Garry South. "It would take divine intervention to save Democratic control of the Senate in 2012," Mr. South told Politico.com. "Neither party can defend 23 Senate seats in a single election year."… Read More

Random Thoughts On The Passing California Political Scene…

Sometime in the not-so-distant past, some smart people at the San Francisco Chronicle decided that in order to try and make more income from their website, they would start to charge a fee to read some of the online articles. For our purposes, this has meant that as I we compile political stories from over 80 websites for the FlashReport main page, we regularly have to skip stories from the Chronicle (supposedly these stories get unblocked a couple of days later, when our readers no longer care about the news of a couple of days ago). It is amazing to me that only now, almost two years after many of them voted to put it on the ballot, that state legislators are starting to realize how terrible Proposition 14 actually is — and understand that it actually makes things worse in California (if that is possible). Before the passage of Prop. 14, we had a primary election so that political parties could determine nominees through a broad process that … Read More

My wife Janice and I are in Washington, D.C. visiting old haunts (she is a veteran of the city, too, having served as Deputy Chief Counsel of the Republican National Committee), and I’m preparing for CPAC and the American Conservative Union Board meeting later today.

We visited the Pentagon Memorial for the victims of 9/11 for the first time yesterday. There is no more sobering justification for our continued presence in Afghanistan than this spot. Here are a few pictures of the grounds:

Benches pointing to the Pentagon each memorialize a person killed on the plane. Benches pointing out from the Pentagon memorialize a person killed inside the Pentagon during the 9/11 attack on our country.… Read More

For the first time in 25 years, the American Conservative Union, noted for it’s "coin of the realm" annual Congressional ratings and for being the lead organization in the annual Conservative Political Action Conference has a new Chairman. David Keene, a former national chairman of Young Americans for Freedom, took the reins of ACU in the early 1980s after the prior Chairman, Congressman Bob Bauman (another former YAF national chairman) resigned after a personal scandal. Keene greatly grew CPAC over the years and maintained high regards for the credibility of the ACU ratings. Now David is scheduled to take over soon as the new President of the National Rifle Association, and by his own admission states he just can’t chair two major organizations at the same time. So, he resigned at the ACU board of directors meeting in Washington, D.C. at the Marriott Wardman Park on upper Connecticut, N.W., and today the Chairmanship opened up for the first time in three decades, during the board meeting.

Elected without opposition, but not unanimously, was Al Cardenas of Florida. Al is a former chairman of… Read More

The last two redistricting efforts in California have brought major changes to the Congressional delegation.

The 1992 election saw the election of Lynn Woolsey, Anna Eschoo, Buck McKeon, Xavier Becerra, Maxine Waters, Jane Harman, Ken Calvert, and Bob Filner. Next year will mark twenty years in Congress for this group. Harman would be an exception because of the break she took to unsuccessfully run for Governor but then came back a few years latter but now she is planning to resign mid term.

In 2002 we saw Dennis Cardoza, Devin Nunes, Adam Schiff, and Linda Sanchez go to Washington.

Although every member of the California Congressional delegation has been elected since 1972 (Stark) almost one quarter came to Congress for the first time following these two redistricting cycles.

My prediction is that even though reapportionment did not add any Congressional seats in California retirement will provide at least eight new Members of Congress from California in 2013.

The following members will be 65 or older in 2012. Wally Herger 67, Dan Lungren 66, Doris Matsui 68, Lynn Woolsey 75, George Miller 67, Nancy Pelosi 72, Barbara… Read More