Embattled Democrat Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez continues to duck debates with her GOP challenger, popular Assemblyman Van Tran. One can presume, I suppose, that the important responsibilities of an important Member of Congress like Sanchez have her too busy for such "luxuries" as debating an opponent before a competitive election.

So what exactly is keeping Representative Sanchez busy?

You need look no farther than the Twitter feed of none other than Playboy Magazine founder and owner Hugh Hefner. Yesterday afternoon Hef tweeted, "Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez is having lunch at the Mansion. I’m a long time supporter."

One has to wonder if the choices that Loretta Sanchez makes in who she hangs with and where … Read More

Yesterday one of the leading conservatives in America, United States Congressman Tom Price of Georgia, stopped into the International Headquarters of the FlashReport (located in the heart of Orange County). Price is the Chairman of the House Republican Study Committee — which to the uninitiated — is the conservative caucus within the House Republican Conference.

We whipped out the handy Flash FlipCam and conducted an on-the-spot interview with Representative Price… It runs just under five minutes. Hope you enjoy it as much as he and I enjoyed taping it!

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The entire membership of the Assembly Republican Caucus in the California State Assembly yesterday signed a letter to Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger urging him and state Attorney General Jerry Brown to file a federal appeal of the Proposition 8 case, Perry v. Schwarzenegger, according to John C. Eastman, Director of the Claremont Institute’s Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence and former Dean of Chapman University School of Law, who helped draft up a very articulate letter.

“This is a significant statement of principle coming from the entirety of the Assembly Republican Caucus,” Eastman said. “It reflects respect for the established rule of law that no matter one’s personal opinion, a validly enacted state initiative must be defended in the courts by the elected officials charged with this responsibility. The Governor and Attorney General have a constitutional duty to appeal the Prop 8 ruling, and it is high time for them to fulfill their oath of office in this regard.”

Proposition 8 was passed by over seven million voters in 2008, gaining 52% of the vote. Its constitutionality was upheld the California Supreme Court in… Read More

Update:Apparently the OCBC did communicate their support for this bill to its proponents. We’re still waiting for the full story, but if there is an issue here, it would be internal to the OCBC, and not the fault of the social-engineers who want to ban plastic bags. As Drudge would say… developing…

630am – Original Post I penned a commentary on the defeat of AB 1998, the ban on plastic grocery bags, which you can see below this post. In my original draft, I hammered the Orange County Business Council pretty hard for supporting the bill. I made an assumption that because Senator Cedillo… Read More

Today was the final day of the legislative session. For those brave enough, like me, to watch much of the shameful legislation being pushed through by the Democrats – it was almost too much to take. I truly think that we all need to chip in to provide for each Republican legislator to get professional counseling for having had to live through it in person. Mid-day yesterday, Congressman Tom Price (R-GA), the Chairman of the Republican Study Committee in Congress, stopped by my office (we did an interview which you can see on the blog later today). When he came in, I pointed out to him that the State Assembly was debating legislation introduced by Democrats to prohibit employers from using the credit history of a perspective employee as a factor in the hiring decision. He was as outraged as I was.

I did want to share a piece of good news. Much has been written about here on the FlashReport about Assembly Bill 1998 – legislation pushed by an evil coalition of eco-whack legislators and greedy grocers, that sought to both ban the use of plastic bags at grocery and drug stores – and also apply a new state-mandated… Read More

It’s the final hours of the 2009-2010 legislative session here in California and legislators are furiously passing bills left and right to beat the constitutional deadline. Legislators did take the time today to vote down two budget proposals, but as Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg said, "I feel an urgency, but not an urgency at any price, and that’s really what this has come down to."

And that’s the problem. Legislators seem to have no incentive to pass a budget this year. This is the second longest period the state has gone without passing a budget (In 2008, it was 85 days past due.). Some have even speculated Governor Schwarzenegger would like to hand the unpleasant responsibility of trying to hammer out a budget to the next occupant of the horseshoe.

But just because it’s hard work doesn’t mean politicians can be let off the hook that easily. It’s time for legislators and the governor to declare a moratorium on any legislation that isn’t related to the budget process. Americans for Prosperity… Read More

Yesterday, showed exactly why it is hard to get things done in Sacramento . Senate Bill 399 would overturn a voter approved initiative and allow the state to re-sentence violent juveniles that have been sentenced to life without parole. Needless to say this has been controversial. As it came to the floor of the Assembly, it was clear the bill didn’t have the votes to pass. This particular piece of bad legislation has had so many lives I have nearly lost count. I first encountered this public safety nightmare in 2009 when it came before the Assembly Public Safety Committee of which I am vice chair. At that time the committee believed SB 399 was a bad idea and it did not garner the votes to pass. Fast forward to January 2010 during a month when the legislature is focused on getting two year… Read More

People and businesses make economic decisions every day. To spend or not to spend; to borrow or not to borrow; to lend or not to lend; to invest or not to invest. In making these, and arguably almost any decision, we weigh whether the benefits and return from taking that action outweigh the costs and risks. If you believe that your potential return on an investment is greater than the risks, then you are likely to do it. If you think the benefit of buying something is equal to or greater than the cost, then you will spend that money.

On a macro-economic scale, there are a lot of risks out there right now. There is a lot of talk about potential disinflation or deflation, but yet the mounting debt augurs for monetization and rampant inflation in the future. We may have a “double dip” recession, or perhaps not. Gold may stay at its record highs and interest rates at their record lows, or it could all reverse. In the words of Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, the current economy is “unusually uncertain”.

Uncertainty increases the perception of risk and analysis of costs when making those economic decisions. So, the uncertainty causes… Read More