For over a year State Senator Jeff Denham has been running for the GOP nomination for Lt. Governor. Senate Republican Leader Dennis Hollingsworth had endorsed his colleague in his bid for higher office.

Today off the transom came a release from the campaign of State Senator Sam Aanastad, who recently announced that he, too, is seeking the GOP nomination for LG. The release announced the endorsement of Hollingsworth of his candidacy.

Needless to say, it seemed like an interesting story if Hollingsworth was dropping his support for Denham in favor of Aanestad. Were Hollingsworth not the leader, that wouldn’t be too shocking. Between Aanastad and Denham, the former is more ideologically conservative. But because he is the leader, it would have been a head-turned.

**There is more – click the link**

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Matt Cunningham has posted up over on Red County that a significant amount of money is now coming to AD 72 voters on behalf of Linda Ackerman through an independent expenditure out of Sacramento — tens of thousands of dollars so far in just a couple of days of late-IE reporting. The mail is all listed as being in support of Ackerman (it could otherwise be marked as "opposing" Norby). We’ve written before that many of the Sacramento based associations that have been close with former Senator Dick Ackerman were rumored to be working towards an independent expenditure. We’ll have to look more closely to see exactly who is funding this one…

The Ackerman campaign has dropped another piece of mail today (linked below) that clearly is throwing down the gauntlet. The message from Ackerman to voters essentially is this: elect Chris Norby and you’re getting more of what you had with the last guy. That’s quite a case to make. Heck, the campaign has even entitled this piece, "Fresh Start."

Will that stick with the… Read More

Over the weekend the Western Conservative Political Action Conference was held in Newport Beach. We’ll be penning and overview of the conference later today, which will run down the great program and participants — including great speeches from Tim Pawlenty, Ralph Reed, Chuck DeVore, Tom Fuentes, Steve Poizner and many others. We’ll also look at a couple of more controversial moments of the conference including a show-down between former talk radio show host John Ziegler and American Conservative Union President David Keene, and a dust up between one of board members of WCPAC and one of the prominent bloggers that flew in to cover the event. All in all, what could be more fun that conservatives and controversy? A full weekend indeed.

Look for my write up to appear tomorrow morning on FR.

If you attended the conference and have any feedback or insights, drop me a line here.… Read More

From today’s Wall Street Journal Political Diary E-mail:

A Left Coast Bellwether

The New Jersey and Virginia governor’s races aren’t the only contests in which Democrats are feeling pressure from the growing unpopularity of President Obama’s policies. A GOP upset may also be in the making in a California House special election on November 3. Democratic Lt. Governor John Garamendi and Republican attorney David Harmer are battling for the Bay Area congressional seat vacated by Democrat Ellen Tauscher, who left to join the Obama state department. Normally a staunch Democratic seat, there is a growing chance it could swing to the GOP given the state’s latest budget collapse and the 13% approval… Read More

Death Tax: When I am home in California, I get many questions about legislation relating to the Death Tax. As many of you know, the Death Tax currently kicks in at a 45% rate for estates over $3.5 million. But under current law, the tax will go away on January 1st, 2010 for 1 year. Then, it comes back on January 1st, 2011 at a 55% rate for estates over $1 million. This strange vacillation in the tax and the exemption has occurred in order to comply with arcane House rules calling for no increase in the deficit more than 10 years out from when the reduction in the death tax was passed. Obviously, the idea that the tax would go away and then come back 12 months later at its highest level in a decade is ridiculous public policy. There is universal agreement that this has to be changed.

But that’s where the agreement ends. Most Republicans, including this one, believe that the tax should be permanently eliminated. This wealth has already been taxed at least once when it was earned. Furthermore, this is a very inefficient tax. The direct costs of collection are actually over 50% of the tax collected. And many studies show that the government… Read More

U.S. Rep. Devin Nunes is fired up about so-called "leaders" of the Ag Community who are thwarting efforts to get the water pumps turned on.… Read More

This week, scandal prone Democrat San Diego City Councilwoman came under fire yet again. This time it was for forming an “Advisory Council” and having that group meet with representatives from the Mayor’s office on two very controversial topics which Emerald supports — building a downtown library and a new City Hall (controversial because the city is about broke). Then the 20 member Advisory Council voted to support both projects, and Emerald was so ‘surprised’ by the vote by these unbiased members of the community she issued a press release crowing about it.

Then the problems started. When bloggers and the press started asking who the 20 were, Emerald wouldn’t answer. Instead, she mysteriously answered that she was talking to the City Attorney about the matter. Then, under pressure, four days later on Friday night her office released the names of a larger 34 person group. On inspection on Saturday, one of the bloggers on www.sdrostra.com found some 70% of this group were Emerald contributors. Emerald still hasn’t answered exactly which of the 20 people were at the meeting… and no doubt the legitimate community… Read More

Senate pro Tempore Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) had a press event last week to argue the Governor’s furlough of state workers is not saving as much as advertised.A huge number of state workers live in his district.Steinberg and a group from UC Berkeley gave compelling arguments.If they and others are successful in convincing the public and the Governor that the furloughs are not producing enough savings, the Governor’s only viable alternative is to exercise his executive power to unilaterally layoff tens of thousands of state workers with a single stroke of his pen. http://www.ibabuzz.com/politics/2009/10/14/steinberg-seeks-a-one-two-punch-on-furloughs/ … Read More