Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, fresh on the heels of landing LA as the site of the big Microsoft World Partners Conference, has set his sights on bringing Comic-Con — the world’s largest convention for comic book enthusiasts — to the City of the Angels and to the downtown LA Convention Center. Bringing this massive gathering to Los Angeles would be a big feather in the cap of the beleaguered Mayor and welcome news as he and his City Council cope with a massive shortfall in the city’s budget that is dominating the news.

Unfortunately for Antonio, he has two well known Angelinos working at cross-purposes with him … Read More

As we get close to the June primary, we thought we would check in on Audra Strickland’s campaign for Ventura County Supervisor. FR readers may recall that Strickland is challenging an incumbent Supervisor who, while a "registered" Republican actually endorsed and supported liberal Democrat Hannah Beth Jackson for State Senate against Audra’s husband, now State Senator Tony Strickland.

As a State Party officer, I am well aware that the Ventura County Republican Party and the California Republican Party have both endorsed Strickland, and are engaged in a substantive member communications effort to GOP voters on her behalf. But here’s a more "on the ground" perspective from FR friend Eric Ingemunson…

AUDRA STRICKLAND – CLOSING STRONG IN THE CLUTCH Eric Ingemunson

Audra Strickland has a date Friday night, but it looks like she… Read More

DATE: 5/25/10 TO: DEMOCRAT LEADERS IN D.C. AND SACRAMENTO FROM: JON FLEISCHMAN, CALIFORNIA REPUBLICAN PARTY RE: KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK! As the saying goes, “adversity creates opportunity.” Your opportunity as Democrats who are supposed to be in charge, given the fiscal crisis facing… Read More

DATE: 5/25/10 TO: DEMOCRAT LEADERS IN D.C. AND SACRAMENTO FROM: JON FLEISCHMAN, CALIFORNIA REPUBLICAN PARTY RE: KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK!

As the saying goes, “adversity creates opportunity.”

Your opportunity as Democrats who are supposed to be in charge, given the fiscal crisis facing California state government, would be to put aside your left-wing, socialistic passions, roll up your sleeves, and deal with the fact that we are going to have to make do with less – a lot less – as has been… Read More

Two pieces. FIORINA FOR US SENATE “Clear Choice”. Quite a bit of reading: the Palin endorsement I think is the important part. YES ON 16 “Don’t Write the Politicians a Blank Check”.… Read More

The campaign of State Senator Tom Harman, who is running for the GOP nomination for Attorney General, has released this web ad slamming one of his opponents, Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley, for being soft on the state’s 3-Strikes law…

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Steve Poizner has launched a new television spot — and has put conservative icon Tom McClintock front and center. Tom is the "gold standard" endorsement for California Republicans, and expect to see a LOT of this ad through June 8th…

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Tales of the bizarre — I just got an email from State Senate hopeful moderate Jeff Stone who in a contest with conservative Assemblyman (and front runner) Joel Anderson to succeed Dennis Hollingsworth, who is term-limited out of office. The note appears to be some sort of "pre-innoculation" piece designed to warn the greater political community of impending attacks against him.

The interesting part is that this note goes well beyond the normal generalizations that you would expect, "My opponents will seek to paint me in a bad light — but don’t you believe them!"

Instead, check out this paragraph: In the final days of the campaign one of my opponents, well known for his dirty campaigning, will sling a bunch of outrageous charges against me. He will probably call me a drug dealer; he will tell you that I harm my patients; that I don’t pay my taxes or that I voted to hike your taxes; he will probably say I belong to an extremist Religious group and he will claim I have violated the public trust while an elected… Read More