Speaker Karen Bass today temporarily recused Assemblyman Jeff Miller from the Ethics Committee that is investigating Mike Duvall’s actions. Presumably that’s because it was Miller to whom Duvall was regaling with his sexcapades in the infamous video, and bass feels there would be some sort of conflict.

But what about Assemblyman Paul Krekorian, who is the co-chair fo the Ethics Commitee? Here he is at a California Against Waste event with ith Heidi Barsuglia, the lobbyist with whom Duvall was (allegedly) having an affair:

Somehow, I don’t think Speaker Bass will be quite so sensitive to appearances off conflicts in this instance.

[Don’t bother looking for the photo: it’s been dropped down the memory hole].… Read More

I come from the Adam Probolsky school on the issue of self-promotion but regardless this little saga deserves some mention here.

In 2007, Newport Beach’s Bill Ficker, an architect and winner ofThe America’s Cup, the most prestigious regatta and match in the sport of sailing, teamed with local philanthropist Jack Croul and former State Senator Marion Bergeson, and their friend Ron Hendrickson, to advance a plan to place the new Newport Beach City Hall building in a very logical location: an empty lotnear Fashion Island right next to the Main City Library.

But the majority of the City Council didn’t like the idea. They seemed to want the City Hall at a nearby bus station. So Ficker and Company decided to go directly to the people with an initiative campaign. They hired Scott Taylor to do the campaign for them (whose office is nearby Ficker’s in Newport Beach) and Scott recommended me to do the lawyering.

So I wrote a prettystraightforward proposed charter amendment. It had a number of clauses to it, and it was carefully drafted, but its purpose was very clear: any new City… Read More

When the tale is told of this year’s legislative session, clearly one of the major themes we will see is the inability of Senate President Darrell Steinberg to actually achieve major accomplishments — unless you count the inability to do so as some sort of achievement.

Darrell "Deal Killer" Steinberg is so tied and beholdin’ to the most ideologically extreme elements of his caucus that we are about to watch opportunities to resolve issues like the water infrastructure shortage, the prison funding crisis, and our state energy challenge Perhaps I should alter my perspective a bit. As a conservative ideologue, perhaps I should relish the fact that Steinberg’s "leadership" is stopping progress in all of these areas. Invariably I probably would be less than satisfied with compromise solutions on any of these topics.

Nevertheless, I presume that Senate Democrats actually want to achieve nothing of note… Read More

Yesterday, the Governor took a stand and demanded that the Democratic controlled legislature pull back all the bills on his desk until they get their act together and work with Republicans on key issues like water. The Democrats response: use Vietnam Veterans as a trial balloon to test the Governor. "I dare the governor to veto this bill," Assembly Democratic Majority Leader Albert Torrico childishly stated before the close of Tuesday’s session.

Everyone knows there are several issues where I don’t see eye to eye with the Governor, but I support his decision to veto this commemorative resolution 100% and Republicans should not even entertain the idea of an override for two key reasons.

First, we must use every piece of leverage available to force Democrats to give Republicans a seat at the table on major issues. What the Governor did yesterday was to send a powerful signal to Democrats – “Give us a seat at the table for a water package or expect all your bills to come back with a fat veto stamp.” (Frankly, I would love it if the Governor vetoed every single bill regardless.)

Second, we cannot allow Democrats to use a Veterans… Read More

***BREAKING NEWS*** (UPDATED – WE WILL ADD LINKS AS MORE ARE AVAILABLE)

KCAL/KCBS television just ran a story live on the 10pm news that 2nd term Assemblyman Mike Duvall (pictured) a Republican from Orange County, has been having extra-marital affairs with two women, one of them a lobbyist for a major utility — Duvall is the Vice Chairman of the influential Assembly Utilities and Commerce Committee. The report appears on KCBS/KCAL, and also featured on the Orange County Weekly website contains a startling video and audio that appears to be from a legislative committee room, where the Assemblyman was caught on a live microphone that he was not aware was on…

Here is the link to the KCBS/KCAL story… Here is the … Read More

If you feel like someone has hit the fast forward button on the DVR, you aren’t alone. I just got a call from Orange County Supervisor Chris Norby saying that we here at the FlashReport were the first to get the news — he is "all in" in the pending special election to fill out the unexpired term of Assemblyman Mike Duvall in the 72nd Assembly District, encompassing most of North Orange County.

Norby is in his 7th year on the Board of Supervisors and faces term limits next year. Norby rather famously won his Supervisor seat by taking out a sitting incumbent (Cynthia Coad) who was seeking reelection. Before that, Norby served for years on the Fullerton Cityu Council, and was a high school teacher.

And for those interested in such things, Norby’s campaign will be handled by the Lewis Consulting Group.

Will Norby clear the field for this run? It’s hit or miss in the OC where some primaries are non-events, and others are spectacularly rancorous. We’ll see how this develops…… Read More

[Publisher’s Note: This post went up a 9:09 on 9/9/9!] The Capitol Resource Institute, one of the state’s leading pro-family organizations, just released a very strong statement from their President, Karen England, concerning the revelations surrounding Assemblyman Mike Duvall. The CRI’s "100%" rating of Duvall was highlighted in the KCBS story exposing the Assemblyman bragging about multiple affairs near a legislative microphone that he was unaware was turned on…

Granting prisoners early release credits for “continuous incarceration” is a win-win policy according to proponents of SB18XXX who claim the proposal will save money while improving the morale of lazy inmates. The idea of rewarding prisoners for doing nothing is not new and has long been advocated by the same legislators who support social promotion for public school students with failing grades. In fact the failing student population and the prison inmate population substantially overlap.

In fact, SB 18XXX, strikes the following words from the existing law: “Worktime credits shall apply for performance in work assignments and performance in elementary, Under current law, a convicted felon can earn early release credits as follows: “For every six months of full-time performance in a credit qualifying program, as designated by the director, a prisoner shall be awarded work time credit reductions from his or her term of confinement of six months.”

Accordingly, a felon newly convicted of carrying a loaded… Read More