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

With so much going on in California politics, I try to focus my commentaries on those items that I think have some significance. But today I will exhaust a few paragraphs of text talking about what I consider to be a non-issue that has been raised in the campaign for Governor – at least it is not an issue that should impact the candidates for office. The ABC affiliate in San Francisco in recent days ran a piece on the news that drew attention to the high costs to taxpayers for the California Highway Patrol to provide law enforcement protection for the state’s constitutional officeholders.

Obviously there is a very high price tag on protecting our celebrity Governor. But according to ABC7 reporter Dan Noyes, in the last fiscal year alone, the CHP spent just over a million dollars guarding the five constitutional officers — $224,193 for Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O’Connell, $139,954 for Treasurer Bill Lockyer, $172,225 for Secretary of State Debra Bowen, $309,436 for Controller John Chiang, and $214,335 for Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner.… Read More

With so much going on in California politics, I try to focus my commentaries on those items that I think have some significance. But today I will exhaust a few paragraphs of text talking about what I consider to be a non-issue that has been raised in the campaign for Governor – at least it is not an issue that should impact the candidates for office. The ABC affiliate in San Francisco in recent days ran a piece on the news that drew attention to the high costs to taxpayers for the California Highway Patrol to provide law enforcement protection for the state’s constitutional officeholders.

Obviously there is a very high price tag on protecting our celebrity Governor. But according to ABC7 reporter Dan Noyes, in the last fiscal year alone, the CHP spent just over a million dollars guarding the five constitutional officers — $224,193 for Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O’Connell, $139,954 for Treasurer Bill Lockyer, $172,225 for Secretary of State Debra Bowen, $309,436 for Controller John Chiang, and $214,335 for Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner.… Read More

We have written before about the meteoric fundraising taking place by attorney Andy Pugno, who is a Republican running for Assembly in the 5th District. Andy continues to impress everyone I know with his ability to raise funds from grassroots donors.

Pugno’s campaign for Assembly has reached a new milestone — he now has over 4,000 separate donors who have now contibuted an aggregate of more than $400,000! I think those numbers are straggering, and clearly establish Andy as the frontrunner for the GOP nomination.

Since announcing his candidacy, Pugno has continued to add hundreds of new supporters to his campaign each month. Many of these individuals have crossed party lines to support Pugno, who has centered his campaign on a message of bringing fiscal responsibility to California state government.

“I am deeply humbled by the… Read More

Yesterday the Governor spent time with the Fresno Bee Editorial Board. The live-streamed it, and now you can watch the archived video… The best moment of the entire interview takes place just after the eight minute mark — the Governor is talking about how you can’t really call the so-called Peripheral Canal a canal, because it may very well be an underground tunnel. He then says that they have advanced tunneling machines, and references a machine that they had similar to these, but much smaller, in the film Total Recall. Check out this video click from Total Recall. Schwarzenegger actually destroys the boring machine — wonder if Alyson Huber will try out that maneuver.

… Read More

I just got the call and am listening in on a Tom Campbell Teletown Hall. It seems like most of the questions are coming from seniors.

If you are not familiar with Teletown Halls, they function like talk radio but works over the phone lines. They call out to thousands of households at one time and they can all listen in and some people can ask questions, the operator can take polls of people on the call and people can leave messages for call back or follow-up.

Based on the people and the talk, it seems that the call is largely including Orange County voters.… Read More

Earlier today the Carly Fiorina for U.S. Senate campaign launched a new web-based splash page, CallMeBarbara.com, where visitors can be reminded about the disrespectful manner in which Senator Boxer berated Brigadier General Michael Walsh from on-high at a Senate Committee hearing. What’s that, you don’t remember that? Here is the video…

Clearly Carly Fiorina wants everyone to remember how the shrill, leftist Junior Senator from California carries herself.

“Barbara Boxer, who by any measure has a failed record as a U.S. Senator, disrespectfully demanded a Brigadier General refer to her as ‘Senator’ instead of ’ma’am’ during a recent Senate hearing. Boxer’s arrogance and disrespect for our nation’s military leaders is way out of line,” said Carly for… Read More