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

AB 1953 (Chan) aims to reduce the amount of lead in plumbing fixtures. (You might say "yawn," but keep reading.) The Leg Counsel’ s Digest says, "Existing law prohibits the introduction into commerce of any pipe, pipe or plumbing fitting, or fixture that is not lead free, except for a pipe that is used in manufacturing or industrial processing," and, "Existing law defines lead free as not more than 8% lead when used with respect to pipes and fittings and not more than 4% by dry weight with respect to plumbing fittings and fixtures. This bill would, commencing on January 1, 2010, revise the term ‘lead free,’ for purposes of manufacturing, industrial processing, and conveying or dispensing water for human consumption, to refer not to the lead content of pipes and pipe fittings, plumbing fittings, and fixtures but to a weighted average lead content of the wetted surface area of the pipes, fittings, and fixtures of not more than 0.25%, to be determined pursuant to a… Read More

AB 1953 (Chan) aims to reduce the amount of lead in plumbing fixtures. (You might say "yawn," but keep reading.) The Leg Counsel’ s Digest says, "Existing law prohibits the introduction into commerce of any pipe, pipe or plumbing fitting, or fixture that is not lead free, except for a pipe that is used in manufacturing or industrial processing," and, "Existing law defines lead free as not more than 8% lead when used with respect to pipes and fittings and not more than 4% by dry weight with respect to plumbing fittings and fixtures. This bill would, commencing on January 1, 2010, revise the term ‘lead free,’ for purposes of manufacturing, industrial processing, and conveying or dispensing water for human consumption, to refer not to the lead content of pipes and pipe fittings, plumbing fittings, and fixtures but to a weighted average lead content of the wetted surface area of the pipes, fittings, and fixtures of not more than 0.25%, to be determined pursuant to a… Read More

Believe it or not, we are quickly approaching the FlashReport’s one year anniversary as an on-line website. Before that, it was an e-mail newsletter for years. You can read the full history of the FR (and find out who it was the inspired me to start it) by reading the entire history of the FR here.

Today I am asking for your help. I am going to update the links menus above this coming week and want to ask for your help in the following four ways:

1) Try the links. If you get time, try to visit some or all of the links to newspapers, editorial pages, cartoons, websites, or blogs. Let me know if the links have a problem, or if they can be pointed more directly than where they take you now.

2) Look over the links and let me know what I am missing. Are there websites that should be on our referral list that are absent? How about blogs that you rely on that you think… Read More