Recently I was riding in a desert race on my dirt bike.The course was tough, the competition heated, and I was, quite honestly, too out of shape to be there.I crested a tough single track, loose sand and rocks, full of switchbacks, hill climb and immediately had to lean andskid hard left to avoid going off the 20 or so foot drop on the other side.I missed the turn and flew off the side.Right before I was launched, I had a split second to look over at the fall I was about to take.I took in the drop, the fact that I was going over the bars and my bike would most likely hit me on its way down, all the rocks that would break my fall, and I thought to myself, “ I’m too old for this @#&*.”And then I fell.And it really hurt. I got up and continued on, but really, I was out of the race. Steve Clute is having that kind of fall in the 80th Assembly District.And, for all intents and purposes, he is out of the race. … Read More

Yesterday’s FR included a link to the SDUT story about Saturday’s rally in National City on sanctuary. Apparently, more than a confrontation than a rally. Mayor Nick Inzunza, purveyor of ignoring illegal immigrants in "his" city, wasn’t even on hand, it was reported.

If Mayor Nick’s goal was to garner some nice news coverage for the city, he achieved it. If his agenda is to get the Chargers to drop a potential National City stadium deal like a greased football, he is doing an outstanding job in that department as well.

I ask again, you think anyone was checking IDs during the event? Ha.

Here is a link tothe KFMB-TV "coverage," as well as video footage.

As I wrote yesterday, Inzunza probably didn’t see his crazy proposal as an election issue, but… Read More

UPDATED Governor Favors Taxing Wealthy Drivers More

The top story on the main page today is the coverage of the Governor’s remarks to the Sacramento Bee. The Governor, according to the Bee, seemed to be lamenting the fact that the sales and excise taxes on gasoline are regressive, or fixed, taxes having a greater affect on the poor. While he’s correct about this characterization of the taxes, he said, "Ideally, if we had such a thing where those that have more money paid more and those that have no money paid less or nothing, if there could be such a thing. … But we don’t. There’s no computer when you walk up to the gas station, to the pump, that automatically when you put the (card) up says, ‘OK, you have $18,000 in income a year, so you pay only this.’ That doesn’t exist." I don’t see anything "ideal" about this concept.

While, yes, the sales and excise taxes are… Read More

UPDATED Governor Favors Taxing Wealthy Drivers More

The top story on the main page today is the coverage of the Governor’s remarks to the Sacramento Bee. The Governor, according to the Bee, seemed to be lamenting the fact that the sales and excise taxes on gasoline are regressive, or fixed, taxes having a greater affect on the poor. While he’s correct about this characterization of the taxes, he said, "Ideally, if we had such a thing where those that have more money paid more and those that have no money paid less or nothing, if there could be such a thing. … But we don’t. There’s no computer when you walk up to the gas station, to the pump, that automatically when you put the (card) up says, ‘OK, you have $18,000 in income a year, so you pay only this.’ That doesn’t exist." I don’t see anything "ideal" about this concept.

While, yes, the sales and excise taxes are… Read More

Since thousands of volunteers who support the re-election of the Governor read this page every day, this seems like a good time to start to have a dialogue about that will happen in Sacramento when Arnold is re-elected by the voters! Given his very wide lead at the moment, and how his opponent Phil Angelides can’t seem to put it together, I think that everyone who prefers to see Governor Schwarzenegger in January and not Governor Angelides can start to look at the rest of the picture — what kind of environment will Arnold Schwarzenegger be operating in when he returns? (This is not an opportuntiy to slack in your hard work, by the way, but rather an invitation to start to think about the bigger picture). For core Republican voters, I would submit that besides whom we elect Governor, there are two major areas in which we need to focus. One is the defeat of all of spending measures on the November ballot (this includes both the measures that raise taxes to spend, and also the measures that would put our children in debt in order to spend) — and the other is electing down-ticket Republicans into statewide office. We will be talking… Read More

[Republican groups and organizations are encouraged to cut and paste this commentary into an e-mail and send it to their members, link to it on their websites, or place this column in their newsletters.] Since thousands of volunteers who support the re-election of the Governor read this page every day, this seems like a good time to start to have a dialogue about that will happen in Sacramento when Arnold is re-elected by the voters! Given his very wide lead at the moment, and how his opponent Phil Angelides can’t seem to put it together, I think that everyone who prefers to see Governor Schwarzenegger in January and not Governor Angelides can start to look at the rest of the picture — what kind of environment will Arnold Schwarzenegger be operating in when he returns? (This is not an opportuntiy to slack in your hard work, by the way, but rather an invitation to start to think about the bigger picture). For core Republican voters, I would submit that besides whom we elect Governor, there… Read More

The Big Story… There was a ton of political news coverage in San Diego last week. I’ll get to some of that in a minute.

Because, politics or not, there was certainly no bigger story in San Diego than at week’s end, last night on a change-up induced strike-out, placing the Padres’ Trevor Hoffman in a first place tie with Lee Smith for all-time Major League Baseball saves at a whopping 478. The fact that Trevor reached the mark while leading the NL in ’06 saves at nearly 39 years of age, all during a home-stretch pennant race with the hated Dodgers, is simply icing on the… Read More

In competitive campaigns, we’ve all seen candidates of both parties try and create a little "distance" between themselves and their political party. But the Democrat nominee in AD 15 took it to new levels last week.

At a campaign stop Thursday, trial attorney Terry Coleman didn’t just distance himself or even abandoned the Democratic Party, he decided to run against it.

Here is the quote, "Quite frankly, I consider myself to be running against Democrats in this election."

Add to the mix that Coleman isn’t very well known in the East Bay/Central Valley district (his law firm is based out of San Francisco) and incumbent Assemblyman Guy Houston enjoys a 10 to 1 cash-on-hand advantage over Coleman on the last financial disclosures.

Even the Democrat experts over at the California Majority Report call Coleman "a political neophyte" and say that he, "needs to raise cash and profile quickly to have a chance."

Let me translate all this — Democrat leadership didn’t sound too keen on Coleman in the first place, and he has… Read More