Back in the year 2000, Texas Governor George W. Bush was elected as the 43rd President of the United States on a platform of opposing higher taxes. I remember that election season well as I was Executive Director of the California Republican Party at the time. That same election cycle, popular Modesto City Councilman Dave Cogdill was running for the State Assembly in the Central Valley. Cogdill campaigned as a conservative, proudly, publicly signing a pledge to oppose higher taxes in Sacramento. He won his primary by a healthy margin, in a safe GOP seat.

Six years later Cogdill ran in an uncontested race for a safe GOP State Senate seat, going on to easily win the general election against a token Democrat opponent. Cogdill was able to advance into the State Senate without a primary fight because of the trust he had built up with his Republican constituents. Cogdill had pledged to oppose tax increases in the Assembly, and had kept that promise. Very early in that State Senate campaign, on February 25, 2005 to be precise, Cogdill again signed a pledge to oppose higher taxes — and why should Republican voters have doubted him? It was a matter of… Read More

I’m glad the Governor signed compromise legislation today to help get some California affiliates back to work and bring thousands of Amazon.com distribution jobs to California. That’s very good news.

Unfortunately, this legislation is by no means a cure-all. It does nothing to solve the long-term problems created by the Legislature’s botched efforts to compel out-of-state retailers to serve as California’s tax collectors.

Absent a federal solution, which is highly unlikely in such a short time frame given all of the competing interests, we’ll be right back in the same mess in a year. The State of California will again be killing California jobs, driving away investment and inviting costly litigation.

Let me be clear: this compromise legislation, while welcome, provides only a short-term delay to a bad law that will never produce the revenues, nor the level-playing field, its proponents imagine.… Read More

[Publisher’s Note: We are pleased to present this guest column from FR friend Scott Hounsell… Flash]

Division, Unity and the Party Platform By Scott Hounsell

Divide and Conquer: It’s a military strategy that has been implemented in warfare for the last three thousand years. Often times a smaller or less effective military force invades a larger nation not with a frontal attack, but rather with a slow and insidious bleed that separates the invaded country into easily conquerable parts. The Babylonians, Assyrians, Romans and European countries all used this tactic in their attacks on neighboring nations as they expanded their empires.

Nations that could foresee this attack against their sovereignty, often banded together to face the threat as a united force. It would be laughable to have any nation regardless of internal differences, with foreknowledge of this advancing army, do anything other than defend… Read More

From the House floor…remarks in opposition to Klamath dam removal.

September 22, 2011

Mr. Speaker: This generation is facing spiraling electricity prices and increasingly scarce supplies. Californians have had to cut back to the point that their per capita electricity consumption is now lower than that of Guam, Luxembourg and Aruba.

What is the administration’s solution?

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced yesterday that the administration is moving forward with a plan to destroy four perfectly good hydroelectric dams on the Klamath River capable of producing 155,000 megawatts of the cleanest and cheapest electricity on the planet – enough for 155,000 homes.

Why would the administration pursue such a ludicrous policy?

They say it’s is necessary to help increase the salmon population. We did that a long time ago by building the Iron Gate Fish Hatchery. The Iron Gate Fish Hatchery produces five million salmon smolts each year – 17,000 of which return annually as fully grown adults to spawn. The problem is, they don’t include them in the population count!

And to add insult to insanity, when… Read More

There is a story about three governors that should be told because it highlights the choices we face as a party in who we nominate to carry our banner in 2012.

The September 2007 California Republican Party convention provided a moment of the clearest possible contrasts in how we can define our party.

On Friday evening of the convention the delegates heard from three governors at one dinner, and it turned out to be the most unusual political dinners in the recent history of the state Republican Party.

Shortly before the dinner, walking with Governor Schwarzenegger down from a private suite in the Renaissance Esmeralda hotel, a member of his staff asked if I had been briefed on what the Governor was planning to say that night. I indicated I had not been. Surprised, the staffer went on to explain that the Governor would have some “tough things to say about the party.” This struck me as unusual, since conventions are an opportunity to thank volunteers and activists for their hard work, and inspire them… Read More

Apparently Governor Jerry Brown, in a speech yesterday, was once again lamenting that he is having trouble getting Republicans to support his public policy agenda. Never mind the fact that the center-piece of his “ask” of Republicans was a massive (vastly so) increase in the state’s income, sales and car taxes.

But my attention was particularly drawn to this statement, appearing in the New York Times…

“They are afraid that letting the people vote on a tax extension that, in a mailer, can be stigmatized as a vote for taxes. Four people control the Republican Party. Jon Coupal, who works for Howard Jarvis; Grover Norquist; the Ken and John talk show; the guy who does the Flash Report. Any two of those can stop any bill in the Legislature where Republicans are needed. They basically work for them. They are like, when I was growing up, the Catholic Church had something called the Legion of Decency. The Legion of Decency rated the films. And if you got it condemned… Read More

The former California Congressional seat 11 has seen three consecutive hard fought battles, with Jerry McNerney defeating Richard Pombo, Dean Andal, and then, barely, David Harmer. But the new seat, numbered California 9, is a different seat. This time around it is almost wholly within the conservative San Joaquin Valley. Looking at the numbers, Republican Attorney General candidate Steve Cooley won the district, which Republican US Senate candidate Carly Fiorina narrowly lost. After the drubbings Democrats took last Tuesday, one could predict that CD-9 would be already moving into the NRCC crosshairs.

It gets worse for Democrats eager to hold the seat. Jerry McNerney has decided to move 60 miles from the East Bay to defend the more conservative portion of his seat. Note to readers: yes this is the same Jerry McNerney who is a former wind farmer. He has been busy touting green jobs (such as those at Solyndra) and the Obama stimulus for the last three years. Unemployment is 17% in the new district, and probably more like 20% when you consider the seasonal farm work.

The Republican who may finally retake the district was only 18 years old when Jerry McNerney first… Read More

The President’s latest proposal to make “the rich pay their fair share” is just another awful idea in a series of awful ideas from this Administration. First of all, it again defines a taxpayer making $200,000 as “rich”. I know a number of such people and I suspect you do too. They live comfortable lives, but I don’t think they deserve the suddenly pejorative term “rich”, particularly if they come to that income by way of 2 working spouses and some investment income because they have saved money over time.

But, the new wrinkle here is the so-called “Millionaires” tax on incomes over $1 million. Obama’s rhetoric explains that he will only require that these incomes pay the same tax rate as “middle class families”. Well, obviously, the tax rate on these incomes is already much higher than for lower tax brackets. Most deductions for higher income people have already been largely eliminated through the alternative minimum tax and other tax laws over the last 20 years. There are really only 2 ways to get the tax rate on your $1 million income down. The first is if a bunch of that income is derived… Read More