There’s been a lot of talk in Orange County about the tone of the Special Election for the Senate seat vacated by Mimi Walters upon her election to Congress, with boosters of former Supervisor John Moorlach loudly complaining about the negativity. But an examination of the campaign doesn’t quite fit the narrative.

The “negative campaigning” started when John Moorlach announced his campaign, immediately launching into attacks on Assemblyman Don Wagner. His primary attack, that Wagner was a stooge for the unions, was not supported by any votes cast by Wagner, who had the endorsement of every pro-business organization at the state and local level, but because he received a couple thousand dollars from law enforcement associations. This Moorlach attack was supported by a website, paid for by Moorlach’s campaign, and devoted to attacking Wagner.

A review of the Wagner Campaign shows half of the mail pieces produced didn’t even mention Moorlach’s name. Two pieces were comparison, i.e., side-by-side comparisons of the two candidates on key issues. And three focused exclusively on Moorlach’s record. Three.

How about… Read More

“We’re trying to make these guys’ money toxic because, as we’ve seen, their money is toxic,” Jonathan Westin, the director of New York Communities for Change, told Business Insider on Thursday. “I think it’s connecting the dots that many people don’t always connect.” – “Activists think they found a way to convince Democrats to stay away from ‘toxic’ hedge fund money,” March 13, 2015

There’s nothing new about this talking point, courtesy of thelabor funded ACORN successor“New York Communities for Change.” If you don’t like an idea, don’t attack by arguingits merits. Just attack the “dark money,” or the “toxic money,” that funded whomever had the inspiration and did the work to developthe idea.

The long list of causes whose advocates may or may not have accepted “toxic money” just got longer, since the New York Communities for Change – and their inevitable spawn in… Read More

When reading through the hundreds of bills introduced into the California legislature, the word “neverendum” comes to mind: – a series of referendums on the same issue held in an attempt to achieve an unpopular result. AB 1335 (Atkins) is basically just that – a re-introduction of SB 391 (DeSaulnier), which failed to make it off of the assembly floor last year. County Recorders manage and protect the integrity of land records for the public. The basic cost to record a document ranges from $6 to $10 depending on where you live in the state. This bill would place a $75 tax on this service, increasing the basic recording fee to anywhere between $81 and $85 per document; amounting to a tax increase of up to 1,250%.

The intent of AB 1335 is to fund a state-run affordable housing program for Californians. Yet, this bill would impose an additional tax burden on those vulnerable homeowners that are already struggling to pay their mortgages. This is because families experiencing financial difficulties only have two options when it comes to the inability to pay their mortgage – refinance or default on the loan. Both the typical refinance and the process… Read More

You probably don’t know it, but you could be subsidizing the health care costs of foreign diplomats. That is, the many thousands of foreign officials who represent their countries in Washington, New York and elsewhere. Buried in Obamacare, the U.S. Tax Code now permits foreign diplomats serving throughout the United States and at the United Nations to receive premium tax credits and cost-sharing reductions for Obamacare plans. Worse yet, the State Department is actually encouraging Foreign Missions and U.N. staff to take advantage of this benefit,… Read More

President Obama’s name wasn’t on the ballot when Israelis went to the polls yesterday. But it may as well have been as the President, his top officials and political team all weighed in to defeat Israel’s Churchillian Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

They failed, and their miscalculation needlessly soured U.S.-Israeli relations while making a negotiated peace between Israel and the Palestinians during the President’s remaining time in office even less likely.

I last met Mr. Netanyahu during a Republican Jewish Coalition mission to Israel during my tenure as California Republican Party Chairman. The man I met was the same formidable leader in person as he appeared when speaking before a… Read More

The epitome of special interest legislation was recently introduced, but the special interest is state government.

“Sacramento’s Worst Boss” may be carrying legislation for Sacramento’s worst state employee. Assemblywomen Nora Campos, D-San Jose, hasauthored legislationon behalf of the Agricultural Labor Relations Board General Counsel, to grant the general counsel unheard-of authority.

AB 561would grant Sylvia Torres Guillén, the ALRB general counsel, “primary authority with respect to the calculation and litigation of makewhole awards, backpay calculations, and other monetary awards in compliance proceedings of agricultural employers before the board.”

In other words, Torres Guillén would have unlimited authority over the contract negotiations with agriculture employers and farmworkers.

Keeping an apparent wicked agenda, Torres Guillén has targeted several big farming employers with a vengeance, as well as some ALRB… Read More

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[Publisher’s Note: As part of an ongoing effort to bring original, thoughtful commentary to you here at the FlashReport, we are pleased to present this column from Lance T. Izumi, Koret Senior Fellow and Senior Director of Education Studiesat Pacific Research Institute.]

If you are new to the FlashReport, please check out the main site and the acclaimed FlashReport Weblog on California politics.

As California students take new state tests aligned to the controversial and much-criticized Common Core national education standards, the State Board of Education announced that scores on the tests will not be used to hold public schools accountable for performance in the 2014-15 school year. More troubling, however, are the findings of a just released report detailing major flaws and deficiencies in the tests themselves.

Supporters of the Common Core national standards, which replaced California’s own state education standards, claim, among other things, that student scores on the new tests, which… Read More

Voter turnout in California is low. Just three weeks ago, the election held in Los Angeles saw an embarrassing 10 percent turnout. And, of course, the statewide turnout just last November was almost as bad.

Irrespective of political affiliation, the immediate reaction among those of us who are politically engaged is that low voter turnout is not good for democracy. But perhaps we should challenge that bit of conventional wisdom. Is voting for voting’s sake really a good thing?

Members of the self-serving political class, made up of politicians and the special interests that support them, complain about the lack of voter participation because they believe they should be seen as patriotically promoting the democratic process. But their faux sincerity is based entirely on whether or not they see a greater political advantage to a higher voter turnout. If they believe that a higher turnout will drive more low information voters, who can be easily persuaded by glossy mailers, they are all for more voters. (At one point it was suggested that Los Angeles should increase turnout by providing those who vote a chance to win cash through a lottery system.) If… Read More