I’ve already posted information regarding Sacramento Supervisor Roberta MacGlashan’s effort to eliminate the $2.4 million Sacramento County spends providing free, non-emergency healthcare to citizens of other countries. Now, the issue caught the ear of the local radio powerhouse Armstrong & Getty program…here’s a clip…

This issue is growing with tight budgets across the state – and ten other counties currently fund similar programs providing free healthcare, above and beyond emergency and public health, to citizens of other countries.… Read More

The massive Obama “porkulus” bill just passed the House. Not one Republican voted for it. Wish I could say that every Senate GOPer would do the same…… Read More

We’ve all seen those "what they’re saying" PR missives organizations send: round-ups of media quotes praising the pet project or cause of the transmitting organization.

But it’s downright depressing to see one from the Senate Republican Caucus promoting tax increases!

It was surreal to open my "Republican Budget Solutions" e-mail the Senate GOP Caucus this morning, and find it chockful of quotes from liberal editorial pages, heaping praise upon the massive tax increase package being touted as a Budget solution."

We have entered through-the-looking glass territory. opposing higher taxes and supporting tax reduction is one of the few issues on which California Republican retain credibility with the voters — and it’s absolutely insane to believe it is worth pawning our party’s soul in exchange for a budget deal that is certain to fail as a solution to the budget deficit.

Sen. Dave Cogdill is dead wrong to claim this is the "best deal" we can get. Enabling the state to gobble an even greater portion of the people’s wealth while simultaeously forsaking the Republican Party… Read More

Tomorrow is the big day. Instead of spending Valentine’s Day with my wife, I will have the privilege of voting on a state budget.

As of this posting, my offices have received 246 phone, faxes or emails from actual constituents opposing the proposed tax increases and 20 phone calls supporting them.

The media talks about the pressure on legislators. It is always easy when you are on the same side as the constituents.

See everybody tomorrow.… Read More

From John Fund of the Wall Street Journal:

I feel like I am watching a split screen – and both are depicting horror movies in public policy. As I write, one screen shows our lawmakers in Congress rushing a gigantic spending bill through so quickly that Democratic Senator Frank Lautenberg admitted that none of his colleagues would be able to read a final version before they vote on it. Lobbyists with goodies in the bill had copies of the bill yesterday, even before lawmakers did. The second screen I am watching is one focused on my home state of California. There “Five Men In A Room,” the state’s… Read More

Apologists for the massive $14 billion tax increase being advanced as a solution to the chronic state deficit like to point to 1991 as validation of this strategy.

Then, as now, California was in the depths of recession. Then, as now, the confronted a historically huge budget deficit — which at the time was $14 billion.

At the end of the day, Gov. Pete Wilson struck a deal with the Democratic majority to erase the deficit with $7 billion in tax hikes and $7 billion spending cuts, and succeeding in toppling Assembly GOP Leader Ross Johnson and pealing off the necessary 7 Republicans to vote for the deal.

Conventional wisdom, viewing that deal through the gauzy mists of time, hails it as a grand compromise of statesmanlike proportion that restored health to the budget, and as a model that we should emulate today.

Too bad it’s a myth, because inflicting a massive tax increase on a weak economy had the opposite effect, and the next year the state was faced with a $3 billion deficit.

Former Sen. Ray Haynes laid out the truth of what transpired in this 2005… Read More

Despite the fact that this is the second day that I have requested a briefing on this budget "deal" from Senate Republican Leader Dave Cogdill and/or Assembly Republican Leader Mike Villines, the silence is deafening.

It is unfortunate because I am all ears — and as I wrote with a bunch of fellow leaders of the State Republican Party, we would like to gain some perspective from our two legislative leaders, whom we hold in high regard.

In the absence of any more information — I continue to judge this "deal" based on the information available through main stream media sources.

So let me just say what I am thinking and what I have heard from literally every GOP leader, donor and activist to whom I have spoken or heard from via e-mail — this plan is terrible for California and extremely injurious to the Republican Party’s ability to win elections next year.

Over in the Capitol Weekly, there is a headline about Republicans winning "concessions" on what I will call relative minor policy… Read More

As you have probably read,a panel of federal judges tentatively ruled to release tens of thousands of California prisoners before their time is served. The liberal judgesclaim that the prisoners are non-serious and non-violent offenders,and thus won’t present a problem to public safety.

Here’s a look at the offenses that count as non-serious and non-violent:

• Human trafficking • Child abuse likely to produce great bodily injury • Stalking • Solicitation to commit murder or a designated sexual assault • Taking a hostage to prevent arrest or as a shield • Selling, offering for sale, or transporting a destructive device • Possessing components with intent to make destructive device • Possession, development, manufacture, production, transfer, acquisition, or retention of a weapon of mass destruction • Threatening to use a weapon of mass destruction • Possessing restricted biological agents • Exploding a destructive device to terrorize • Elder abuse • Manufacture or sale of drugs even while armed with a firearm • Burglary in which the defendant is armed with… Read More