Tom McCintock, one of the few Sacramento pols who has been accurate in truly predicting the financial shortfall that is facing California, says this is just the beginning:

The newspapers are reporting that the fiscal gap is $10 billion. It is actually far more serious than that. The actual figure – according to the LAO – is that the state will spend $14 billion more than it takes in between now and the end of the next fiscal year. The difference is that we will first blow through the $4 billion reserve that the state began the year with. (That reserve, by the way, is already gone.)

But the LAO is still predicting that the state’s general fund revenues will grow about 3.5… Read More

Assemblyman Benoit called me and suggested I check the rest of Riverside’s Republican Delegation’s Cal-Chamber Scoresand write a high -five post to all.

Here they are:

AssemblymembersBenoit,100% (14/14), Cook, 100% (14/14), Emmerson, 100% (14/14), Garcia, 100% (14/14), Jeffries, 100% (14/14), Spitzer, 100% (14/14)

Senators Battin, 100% (13/13), Dutton, 100% (14/14), Hollingsworth, 100% (14/14)

Congratulations!

… Read More

Assemblyman John J. Benoit (R-Bermuda Dunes) received a 100% rating from the California Chamber of Commerce for 2007 according to the organization’s recently released report card. The report, available online for viewing at www.calchamber.com, is published to help local Chambers of Commerce gauge their Legisla­tor’s performance. CalChamber rates each Legislator based on his or her votes dealing directly with business issues

“I appreciate being recognized as a reliable vote against ‘job-killer’ bills,” said Benoit. “When I first came to Sacramento in 2003, the state was in a fiscal crisis as businesses were fleeing the state’s anti-business… Read More

For the past 5 years, Citizens Against Govenment Waste and the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association have collaborated and produced The California Piglet Book, a delightful compilation of egregious examples of government waste. Don’t read it at bedtime unless you can fall asleep burning mad.

Iwas proudly startled to seethat a post I wrote in the FlashReport made it into the book this year.

I guess that makes me a proud poster of piglet prodigality.

‘ Barry Nestande, chief of staff for Assemblyman John Benoit (R-Bermuda Dunes) and a regular contributor on the conservative FlashReport blog, wrote on January 29, 2007 about a re-striping project on the 91 Freeway near the Riverside/Orange County line. Various time delays and other red-tape bureaucracy issues have served to push the cost to $1.5 million. The project is scheduled to take a year and is complicated by the fact that another government entity, the South Coast Air Quality Management Agency, is requiring an air quality impact study, despite the fact that cars already travel on the road. The failure to repaint a freeway stripe in a year is one of many reasons why California does… Read More

Our friends at the Consumer Alliance for a Strong Economy have launched a radio advertising campaign against the ill-advised health care scheme being advanced by the Governor and Legislative Democrats. You can click on the ads below to hear them. CASE, you’ll recall, made a splash when they introduced the Dancing Duck television spot in January.… Read More

Aninitiative to end the practice of governments accepting and spending non–reported dollars for political activity was launched at a press conference in Sacramento today. Proponentsare Jon Coupal of Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Assn., Jim Nielsen, Chairman of the California Alliance to Protect Prvivate Property Rights and former state senator, and Lew Uhler of National Tax Limitation Committee.

Under the present scheme, the League of California Cities and other entities can utilize so called "non-public funds" to weigh in politically on issues like, say, defeating efforts of protecting your property rights from abusive eminent domain takings. $7 million has been raised without accountability to fight Prop 90 previously and now towards the true eminent domain reform initiativecirculating thru Farm Bureau, Howard Jarvis and the CA Alliance to Protect Private Property. [They also have their own clever initiative that they are pushing and funding to make it look like they are reforming EmDo but has such weak and narrow… Read More

What if you had a reoccuring nightmare, that while you were sleeping, thousands of dead bodies were rising out of their graves to come and take…your home! Sound scary? Well it is actually happenning to the owners of homes in posh Sarataga, a suburb of San Jose. In what may prove to be a "poster-child" case for eminent domain reform on next June’s ballot, the Saratoga Cemetary District has officially left their options "open" to pursue the use of eminent domain as they seek to force the owner of a home to sell their house, which abuts the Madrona Cemetary. The "urgent need" — apparently the Saratoga Cemetary District wants to expand the roadway around the graveyard. According to the San Jose Mercury News, Nikki Teeter answered a knock on her door to find a real estate agent there, representing the District, telling her that they want to buy her home. Apparently, despite protests that the Teeters have no interest in selling their home of 29 years, the realtor kept trying to set up meetings. Apparently this Cemetary District is… Read More

Steve Baric’scampaign for CRP Secretary sent out a Campaign Update earlier today.

I have to admit, I knew Steve’s campaign was going well, but even as a friend of his, I’d lost track of just how well.

Really at this point it’d be easier to list who HASN’T yet signed up to support Steve, than who to lay out the lengthy list of who HAS.

Left, Right, Center.

North, Central, South.

Constitutional Officers, Legislators, County Party Leaders, Grassroots Leaders, CRP Board Members.

In other words, just about everyone.

Steve’s campaign isdoing a great jobcircling the wagons andmyhunch is that they’ll continue to do soall the way to February.

For what it’s worth, Steve’s Update is below. Dear Fellow California Republican,

My campaign to be the next Secretary of the California Republican Party continues to garner support throughout the state. In the past month, I have received the support of… Read More