I have had the great privilege of representing Riverside County for 14 years – first in the Assembly and now in the Senate.

I just can’t express here well enough how honored and grateful I am to have had the opportunity to serve the people of the 37th Senate District. It’s been a once in a lifetime job – and I’m glad I had the opportunity to be involved.

I take my job and mypolitical beliefsvery seriously and I thought long and hard before I endorsed in my Senate seat.

After all, I am a voter in SD 37 and I want a conservative Republican I can always count on to represent me in the Senate. Someone I can trust to do the right thing.

Russ Bogh is that man. Yesterday, I stood with Russ and endorsed him for my seat. I’m very comfortable with my decision and know he’ll do a great job. Russ is a steady, solid conservative vote.

Here’smy statement we gave to the… Read More

Update: The Senate bill, SB 8xxx,concerning the RV’s, aircraft, and boats use tax, did come up as "promised" and was defeated on the Assembly floor again, this timein it’s Senate iteration. It received less "aye" votes than last week, 47, where it had 49 before. The Assembly today [Friday, Feb 15] passed 6 bills that in some way addressed the mid-year budget shortfall under the emergency declaration by the Guv. Disappointingly, much of it was borrowing or putting off making payments, but there was also contained in the bills some reduced mid-budget year spending. It is a bit of progress towards our huge challenge budget-wise the rest of the year. All the bills passed with very strong bipartisan support, all of them receiving at least 70 votes if my memory serves.

What did not happen was the proposal to affect owners of aircraft, RV’s and boats with a plan to expand the time from 90 days to one year that the vessel would have to remain out of state to not be taxed as a new vessel or other technical reasons,etc. Some look at it as closing a loophole, others as a… Read More

The Race to 270 by Daron R. Shaw was written several years ago but is perfectly relevant in the political discussions occurring today.

Shaw is a Professor at the University of Texas at Austin. In 1999, he helped craft some of the techniques to be able to get then-Governor Bush to the magic number of 270 electoral college votes. He was also involved in the 2004 re-election campaign.

The subtitle of the book is "The Electoral College and the Campaign Strategies of 2000 and 2004." That is what this book is all about. The reading text is only 170 pages that are a quick read.

**There is more – click the link**

View Full Commentary… Read More

These Members of the California State Assembly have now also endorsed McCain (some had announced before, but this is a comprehensive list, apparently):

Michael N. Villines Assembly Republican Leader, 29th District

George Plescia Assemblyman, 75th District

Van Tran Assemblyman, 68th District

Greg Aghazarian Assemblyman, 26th District

John Benoit Assemblyman, 64th District

Tom Berryhill Assemblyman, 26th District… Read More

Today the Presidential campaign of Senator John McCain announced the endorsements of California Republican Party Chairman Ron Nehring, and California’s Republican National Committeeman, Tim Morgan. McCain’s campaign announced the endorsement last week of California’s Republican National Comiitteewoman Barbara Alby.

These three are California’s three "Superdelegates" at the RNC Convention.… Read More

A Chino company was slapped with a huge recall of meat, (reportedly thelargest in history)some 143 million pounds–the company’s entire lot from the last two years. The Washington Post has the story, here. This follows a story in the Post broken a day or two before the So Cal papers, noted in my blog at RedCounty, here.

The recall and Post coverage were sparked by undercover video and sleuthing by the Humane Society. It originally seemed the society gave the story to the Post before the Times or PE, the Humame Society top communicator’s alma mater.

Quiet day in DC otherwise. Happy President’s Day!… Read More

Former California Republican Party Chairman Shawn Steel was endorsed by the Orange County Republican Party tonight for National Committeeman.

The vote was overwhelmingly for Shawn.… Read More

The Race to 270 by Daron R. Shaw was written several years ago but is perfectly relevant in the political discussions occurring today.

Shaw is a Professor at the University of Texas at Austin. In 1999, he helped craft some of the techniques to be able to get then-Governor Bush to the magic number of 270 electoral college votes. He was also involved in the 2004 re-election campaign.

The subtitle of the book is "The Electoral College and the Campaign Strategies of 2000 and 2004." That is what this book is all about. The reading text is only 170 pages that are a quick read.

We all know that states like Texas, Utah, and Idaho were going to vote Republican. We also know that Massachusetts and New York were going Democrat. This book provides some good information on the way that the Bush, Gore, and Kerry campaigns determined the battleground states and what they did in them and why.

What Shaw does better than any other analysis I have read is to look at the… Read More