In today’s Sacramento Bee, Steve Wiegand has an important article that every FlashReport reader should take in, entitled Long Hours In Capitol Mean Lousy Lawmaking, Critics Say. There’s a great photo of a worn-out Senator George Runner accompanying the piece.

Weigands piece takes note of the fact that four times this year alone, the State Legislature has engaged in the practice of having long, late-night marathon sessions where our elected representatives are forced to fight exhaustion and sleep deprivation as "deals" are put together.

We saw this happen first with the February budget debacle that brought us the largest tax increase in the history of any state. In July, another long time dealing with budget gets and an early morning gauging of taxpayers by adjusting withholding timelines, then there was the end of session with adjourned at 6am — and finally last week the embarrassing water-torture exercize that went to the wee hours.

**There is more – click the… Read More

Following yesterday’s breaking news by Andrew Breitbard’s BigGovernment.comthat a San Diego ACORN official was recently caught on tape claiming a whitewash by Attorney General Jerry Brown’s office of the ongoing investigation of the organization (also hilited on today’s FR mainpage), the Republican Party of San Diego County today demanded answers.

Chairman Tony Krvaric shot off a letter to Brown, as well as hand delivered a letter to the local ACORN office in National City. The KGTV Channel 10 video of today’s GOP activities sums up the entire story very nicely (make sure you click on the video to the right of the linked page)…

http://www.10news.com/news/21588591/detail.html

Krvaric had the following to say…

We can recall the appalling videos from the National City office of ACORN, where an employee was caught on tape… Read More

Chris Norby will finish first in the special election scheduled for Tuesday, November 17th, for the 72nd Assembly District, and here are the reasons why:

1. A big base of the district is in Fullerton and Norby polls very well there, having been a City Councilman and Supervisor therefor several terms. While former State Senator Dick Ackerman, the husband of candidate Linda Ackerman, also served on the council, a transfer of Dick’s local experience and qualifications to Linda isn’t happening, according to polls.

2. There is a significant anti-incumbent fervor capturing voters attention across the nation. In New Jersey, an incumbent Democrat Governor was thrown out of office by an upstart Republican pledging cleaner government. The Democrats were also thrown out of the Governor’s mansion in Virginia. This fervor is best tapped in the Orange County race by Norby, who is perceived as a party "outsider" in Orange County, unlike Linda Ackerman, who is saddled with her position as National Committeewoman of the Republican Party, the party that brought us President Barack Obama,and could be perceived by just… Read More

I’m a little concerned…… we have a Governor today that, in order to prove his environmental "credentials", signed AB 32 into law, "greenhouse emissions" legislation that will slam another nail into our faltering economy and drive away industry.

Now, we have yet another "Republican" running for Governor with the same close ties to radical environmental interests. I am really, really puzzled by this.

On Monday, I blogged on Meg Whitman’s personal foundation donating thousands of dollars to the Environmental Defense Fund in 2007 to protect the delta smelt and that Whitman personally embarked on a climate change cruise in 2008 with Jimmy Carter and Van Jones.

Yesterday on the Capitol Hour with Eric Hogue, Meg… Read More

Check out the latest from ReasonTV…

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California Republican Lawyers Association Demands Attorney General Allow for an Independent Investigation Calls on the District Attorneys of Alameda and San Francisco to Conduct the Investigation

In response to the office of Attorney General Jerry Brown attempts to close an internal investigation surrounding the resignation of his Communications Director Scott Gerber, the following letter was sent to the Attorney General today by Steven Baric, President of the California Republican Lawyers Association and former prosecutor.

Furthermore, given the need for an unbiased and transparent handling of this matter to ensure the integrity of the Office of the Attorney General to California’s taxpayers and voters, Mr. Baric sent the following letters to the District Attorneys of Alameda County and the City… Read More

Governor Schwarzenegger did the right thing when he vetoed legislation setting the state bar’s dues last month. Even the California state bar’s president has called the Governor’s concerns about mismanagement at the state bar offices “legitimate.” What surprises me is that the story of embezzlement and other problems at the regulatory office for California’s lawyers hasn’t gotten the attention in the main stream media that it deserves.

According to the California Bar Journal, an audit found that an employee of the state bar stole $675,000 from the organization, and someone else made an unauthorized disclosure of a rating of a candidate for the appellate bench.

I generally believe that the state bar ought to stay out of judicial ratings completely. I have served on a state bar committee and there is no way I could ever be convinced that politics is not at the core of much of the committee work. It simply is impossible for lawyers to give “neutral” ratings to judicial candidates. Anyone who thinks that might also believe that a shark only eats enough prey to preserve the Eco-balance in it’s… Read More

This afternoon I read a statement that State Senator Dave Cogdill plans on retiring from the legislature at the end of his first term in the legislature’s upper chamber, I contemplated what I wanted to say. And decided to think about it for a little while.

Let me start this way. I’ve known Senator Cogdill for some years now. While not a close friend, I have known him to be an honorable person, and someone who is dedicated to the ideas of liberty and freedom for Californians. I have found that you can tell a lot about the character of a legislator by the staff that they hire, and the loyalty engendered to that legislator by the people in their organization. Chuck Hahn, Erin Guerero, Sabrina Lockhart, and for his time as leader, Ron Rogers are all people whom I respect greatly and it speaks volumes about Cogdill that these people have all been or continue to be a part of "Team Cogdill" — not to mention the other great people whom i just don’t know or know as… Read More