Francine Busby, the Democratic candidate running in the 50th CD special election against moderate GOPer Brian Bilbray, was speaking at the Joclyn Senior Center. After she spoke, during "Q&A" she was asked by a man in the audience (in Spanish):

"I want to help, but I don’t have papers."

Busby responded: "Everybody can help, yeah, absolutely…you can all help. You don’t need papers for voting, you don’t need to be a registered voter to help."

**There is MUCH, MUCH, more – click the link**

View Full Commentary… Read More

Francine Busby, the Democratic candidate running in the 50th CD special election against moderate GOPer Brian Bilbray, was speaking at the Joclyn Senior Center. After she spoke, during "Q&A" she was asked by a man in the audience (in Spanish): "I want to help, but I don’t have papers." Busby responded: "Everybody can help, yeah, absolutely…you can all help. You don’t need papers for voting, you don’t need to be a registered voter to help." Can you believe this?!? Well, don’t take my word for it… click here… Read More

In a CD50 race focused on illegal immigration, those could be Francine Busby’s dying words…or Brian Bilbray’s last nail for her coffin. Kinda like "We don’t need no steenkin badgches." I could come up with cliches all day on this one.

I know Jon will link to the SDUT story on the main page this morning, but it’s worth doing so here as well. Staff Writer Dani Dodge nails it withher lede, "If an election can turn on a sentence, this could be the one."

The taped Busby comments are floating around, but you can hear them right here on FR…just go to Jon’s daily commentary.… Read More

The 36th AD is very safe. The fued between the Runners and Jim Ledford has been around as long as I can remember. Ledford is a Liberal, the Runners aren’t. His challenge to Sharon in preparation of a 2008 bid has been nasty. See article here. Of course the big question is Who is donating to Ledford? He is the Treas. for the campaign and hasn’t filed. See article here.… Read More

I know I’m going to get a bunch of flak for posting this, considering I can’t let on where I got the numbers. And, yep, I’m sure the veracity of an auto-survey will be questioned (similar to that by done Datamar in the past, but just to be clear, they didn’t do this one). And, yeah too, I know the results indicate nada about likely voters, representative samplings, etc.

Whatever. I know the survey was done, I know who did it, I know how it was conducted, and I know the results. It was not done by Horn or Thompson. That’s what I do know. I can’t speak to anything past that. If that’s not good enough for you, well, ok….there’s plenty of web out there to blog on….plus you can always post pithy comments on this page.

The survey was conducted 5/22-5/30, asking the respondents to press the corresponding numbers on their keypad. Here are the results:

1) If you are a registered Voter.

Yes – 501 No – 0

2) How would you rate Bill Horn’s job performance as County Supervisor?

Very good– 37 Good – 67… Read More

“HUGE PORTIONS OF PRIMARY VOTERS HAVE YET TO MAKE UP THEIR MINDS ABOUT THE ‘DOWN BALLOT’ RACES FOR STATEWIDE OFFICE.”

That was the Field Poll headline on Feb. 28. 2002, the final poll before the primary election that year.

With one exception, the final Field Poll results reflected the Election Day results. The exception was the Democratic race for Secretary of State where March Fong Eu led the pack with 34% of the vote. Michela Alioto followed with 11% and Kevin Shelley (who went on to win in 2002 but was forced to resign in shame in 2005) trailed badly with a mere 6%.

In every statewide down ballot race in 2002, the undecideds were between 48% to 67%. Expect similar numbers tomorrow when Field shows us a snapshot of the 2006 primary campaigns less than a week before the election.

My money is on Field. What you see tomorrow is what you get on June 6th.… Read More

I don’t know about the rest of the state, but if you watch TV in Sacramento for any length of time you’re bound to see Senator Jackie Speier’s political ad for Lt. Governor.

Speier is running against Insurance Commissioner John Garamendi in the Democratic primary and may be gaining ground on him. Her ad buy is around $2.4 million while Garamendi has spent a mere $700K on TV (plus whatever he spent on those ridiculous billboards he’s known for).

If Speier wins the primary, the race for Lt. Governor gets very interesting. She would be the first woman LG in California history and her political baggage is nothing compared to Garamendi’s.

Of note is the fact that her sex offender bill, SB 1178, received unanimous support on the Senate floor this week. I can’t imagine that it won’t land on the governor’s desk before the November election. Given that Republicansvoted for it in the senate, the governor will likely sign it, providing Speier with a great photo-op later this summer. Here’s what the bill would do, according to the senate rules analysis:

“This bill, commencing July 1, 2008,… Read More

Over the years I’ve worked for candidates from the top of the ticket all the way down to Mosquito Abatement District. They all have one thing in common: they are obsessive about yard signs. How many they have up (never enough, although the bill for the signs is always outrageous), how many their opponents have up (always tens of thousands), and, of course, who is ripping down whose signs (not us, them).

The ripping down of signs. Years ago, this was fairly common practice for signs placed in public places. There were even clever little devises invented for the task, like “The Hook” which was basically a tree branch trimmer with which you could easily cut down hard to reach signs. Or sharp straight edge blades on a stick that could cut through those new plastic fiberboard signs like a hot knife through butter. Some years ago I nearly got beat to a pulp by a particularly muscular union thug in a wife-beater t-shirt who had big long chains behind his truck with steel hooks that, when attached to a 4×8 firmly planted firmly, allowed the truck to rip the sign to shreds. Or liquids that could be brushed or squirted on signs that would make the ink… Read More