The Meg Whitman for Governor campaign, just moments ago, released a list of local grassroots leaders from all around the state. Congratulations to the great many FR friends on the list. A special shout out to my good friend Sara Catalan, who in addition to being Deputy Chief of Staff to Congressman Ed Royce, and head of the CWLA Orange County Chapter, is now the Orange County Regional Chair for Meg Whitman’s campaign. Sara is actually quoted in the Whitman release saying, "Meg Whitman is the only gubernatorial candidate who has what it takes to rescue California," said Sara Catalan, the Orange Region Chair. "She is a proven leader with strong values and a sensible plan to restore California’s economy and improve our state government."

Here’s the list…

County Chairs (By Region)

North • North Region Co-Chairs – Bill Brunetti / Cindi Sherrod • Sacramento County Co-Chairs – Roberta MacGlashan / Tom Scott • El Dorado County Chair – Myrlys… Read More

Glendora has always been a pretty conservative town. Most of their school board elections haven’t been that exciting over the years.

This year a familiar Republican activist is running against three incumbents.

Former Three-term Los Angeles County Republican Party Chair Linda Boyd is running for a seat. Many know here and her husband CRP Regional Vice-Chair Doug Boyd as GOP activists.

But they are busier than that. Between them they have eleven children. They have a 3 year old daughter Reagan (a name stolen from the Spence’s) and adopted 2 year old twins Christian and Karleigh So they will soon have skin in the game . In what may be an instance of too full disclosure one board member is Mike Guatreau. Mike is a Republican and principal of West Covina High School. He also is one of two school board members (yes there are two, the other is Covina Valley’s Darrell Myrick) in the state that have had the high privilege of seeing me on a regular basis in a Speedo as my a high school swim coach.

The big issue is a proposed parcel tax. Glendora has been hit hard by declining enrollment and… Read More

According to our friends over at Capitol Weekly, today’s "Big 5" meeting (The Governor and the four Legislative Leaders) "blew up" with tensions high. Republicans are unhappy because legislation they were promised would make it to the Governor’s desk did not. Democrats are unhappy because legislation they want on the Governor’s desk hasn’t gotten there (these particular bills require a 2/3 vote). In the balance is a potential deal on the state’s water crisis, among other things.

In the balance, so they say, are over 700 pieces of legislation that legislative Democrats have put onto the Governor’s desk. If the Governor does not act on these bills by Sunday, apparently they all become law. But the word is that without any legislation on his desk to resolve the water crisis, the Governor will be spending all of his time focused on this goal, without the necessary time to review all of those bills — and that he would, in theory, veto them all rather than allow these bills to become law… Read More

Carla Marinucci looks at Meg Whitman’s 2004 endorsement of Barbara Boxer.Whitman not only endorsed Boxer and donated the maximum $4,000 to the junior California senator’s 2004 re-election campaign, but the former eBay CEO also served on an exclusive committee of Technology Leaders for Boxer in her re-election battle against Republican California Secretary of State Bill Jones, according to election records obtained by The Chronicle.

Umm……. this is like endorsing Harry Reid or Al Franken. Same deal. So, she’s now the second coming of Reagan? We have a RINO in Sacramento already and we’ve seen how that has worked out.

So Meg doesn’t vote before 2002 and she makes her debut in the political world by not only supporting Barbara Boxer, but being heavily involved in her campaign.… Read More

Today, longtime generally center-left columnist George Skelton at the Los Angeles Times penned a lengthy missive that was no less than a full-fletched smack-down of GOP gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman. Skelton’s major assault on Whitman comes from his belief that she is out of line in how she characterizes the massive size of state government and an ever-growing unsustainable state workforce. You can hear Skelton fuming as he types, “Whitman didn’t call them civil servants, of course. She used the time-tested conservative, red meat pejoratives ‘bureaucrats’ and bureaucracy.’”

Skelton assaults Whitman as if she is literally attacking every single state government employee as terrible and evil. The reality is that it is pretty clear, from reading Whitman’s remarks (the whole speech to which Skelton refers can be read here), that she is making a generalization about the vast size of the state’s work force, and when Whitman says, “…And a… Read More

Are you signed up yet for the upcoming Western Conservative Political Action Conference? Let me tell you that this is one event you will not want to miss. It will be held in Orange County on Friday, October 16 and Saturday, October 17. Rather than me trying to lobby you, as a Co-Chairman of the event, to attend — let me just direct you to the Western CPAC website where you can check out the fantastic agenda and pre-register for this must-attend conference.

For those following the GOP primary for Governor, it is of note that both Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner and former eBay CEO Meg Whitman will be appearing at this event (while I know Western CPAC Chairman Jim Lacy will have tried to get them both into a mud pit, I think they are both scheduled to speak at a reception).… Read More

According to Capitol Weekly, Governor Schwarzenegger has all but said that without a comprehensive water deal coming together, he is prepared to nuke all of the hundreds of bills sitting on his desk.

We here at the FlashReport have said solving the state’s water problems in a fiscally responsible way should be a top priority of the legislature and Governor.

That said, I think that it would be tremendous bonus, at this point, if the process of reaching an accord on a solution to the water problems could take just long enough to allow the Governor to veto every bill on his desk.

This would save the taxpayers vast amounts of money, and kill tons of new fees and regulations that Capitol Democrats sent to his desk despite the sour state of the economy.

As former Assembly Speaker Willie Brown basically says in… Read More

Our California political system makes party nominees and the party the focus of the November general election. However, for the June primary election the candidates are on their own. Although the state and local parties have the legal power they rarely intervene in a primary fight and should never do so without some overriding reason where the endorsement helps the party.

Never until a week ago when the Ventura County Republican Central Committee endorsed a candidate for my job, and I am told they did so with no candidate debate, and in fact only one candidate invited. I am termed-out of my position on the Board of Equalization and there are 4 candidates pursuing the campaign. There is no reason in the world that the Republican Party voters in the 2nd District should not be allowed to choose their own nominee without party interference. This is an insult to the Republican voters in the 2nd District.

Now Barbara Alby (whom I have endorsed), Alan Nakanishi, and Roy Ashburn will have no political choice but to go after county central committee endorsements. I… Read More