Speaker Karen Bass today temporarily recused Assemblyman Jeff Miller from the Ethics Committee that is investigating Mike Duvall’s actions. Presumably that’s because it was Miller to whom Duvall was regaling with his sexcapades in the infamous video, and bass feels there would be some sort of conflict.

But what about Assemblyman Paul Krekorian, who is the co-chair fo the Ethics Commitee? Here he is at a California Against Waste event with ith Heidi Barsuglia, the lobbyist with whom Duvall was (allegedly) having an affair:

Somehow, I don’t think Speaker Bass will be quite so sensitive to appearances off conflicts in this instance.

[Don’t bother looking for the photo: it’s been dropped down the memory hole].… Read More

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Green Jobs is a feel-good buzz term that inspires visions of blending environmental kindness with job creation and economic development in our communities.

However, the reality is California really doesn’t have a strong green job industry. Other states, like next door neighbors Nevada and Arizona, have green job industries because they have built a foundation for green job manufacturing with a friendlier overall job creation environment. (Click here to watch a video of my opposition to a measure that is predicated on California’s green job myth).

Unfortunately, California has failed to create green job manufacturing because we have spent the past decade divesting our state of the once vibrant manufacturing job sector – Another 120,000 manufacturing jobs left California just this last year.

Sure we have created a few sparks of success in niche industries related to green jobs, but we do not have full-blown manufacturing jobs because manufacturers have gone to friendlier business climes.

If the California Legislature wants to make the state a serious player in the green jobs… Read More

When the tale is told of this year’s legislative session, clearly one of the major themes we will see is the inability of Senate President Darrell Steinberg to actually achieve major accomplishments — unless you count the inability to do so as some sort of achievement.

Darrell "Deal Killer" Steinberg is so tied and beholdin’ to the most ideologically extreme elements of his caucus that we are about to watch opportunities to resolve issues like the water infrastructure shortage, the prison funding crisis, and our state energy challenge Perhaps I should alter my perspective a bit. As a conservative ideologue, perhaps I should relish the fact that Steinberg’s "leadership" is stopping progress in all of these areas. Invariably I probably would be less than satisfied with compromise solutions on any of these topics.

Nevertheless, I presume that Senate Democrats actually want to achieve nothing of note… Read More

Anyone who believes that voter fraud is a thing of the past or not a serious problem in the United States should read these headlines that were published in papers around the country in recent days:

* Two more charged with voting fraud in Lexington election * Update: Atlantic City councilman’s job status still undecided

* 11 accused of faking voter registration cards in Miami-Dade

Our right to vote is one of our most cherished freedoms. Therefore, we must never tolerate voter fraud.

To learn more what we are doing to prevent voter fraud in California, visit www.votesafenow.org… Read More

I come from the Adam Probolsky school on the issue of self-promotion but regardless this little saga deserves some mention here.

In 2007, Newport Beach’s Bill Ficker, an architect and winner ofThe America’s Cup, the most prestigious regatta and match in the sport of sailing, teamed with local philanthropist Jack Croul and former State Senator Marion Bergeson, and their friend Ron Hendrickson, to advance a plan to place the new Newport Beach City Hall building in a very logical location: an empty lotnear Fashion Island right next to the Main City Library.

But the majority of the City Council didn’t like the idea. They seemed to want the City Hall at a nearby bus station. So Ficker and Company decided to go directly to the people with an initiative campaign. They hired Scott Taylor to do the campaign for them (whose office is nearby Ficker’s in Newport Beach) and Scott recommended me to do the lawyering.

So I wrote a prettystraightforward proposed charter amendment. It had a number of clauses to it, and it was carefully drafted, but its purpose was very clear: any new City… Read More

I spent an early hour this morning reviewing the full text of President Obama’s health care policy appeal delivered last night to a joint session of Congress. I had originally intended to outline his rhetorical arguments and point out his continuing and repeated use of the straw man construct, something noted previously by Karl Rove in the Wall Street Journal, here.

But I keep getting hung up on the logic of the remedy he proposed especially after reading my recent copy of The Atlantic.

What’s holding me up in this case was a compelling, and lengthy, essay penned by media executive (and Democratic contributor) David Goldhill in the September issue of The Atlantic. Barrons also wrote on it here. Goldhill’s piece is powerful for two reasons: it illustrates the structural problems facing proponents of the President’s health care plan; and it should be especially powerful for conservatives who might see some members of our party (the… Read More

I’m working on something more in-depth on last night’s heralded (and heckled!) health care speech, but in the meantime, George Will’s Washington Post column profiles gubernatorial candidate and current insurance commissioner Steve Poizner.

Some highlights of Will’s reporting on California:

"The education code, by which state legislators micromanage California’s thousands of schools at the behest of teachers unions, is, Poizner says, 2,000 pages ‘and growing rapidly.’ He is disgusted that more than half of the 600,000 employees in primary and secondary education are not in classrooms."

"California depends on 200,000 wealthy taxpayers for 25 percent of its revenue." [Author’s note: that is .00571 of the population, based on 35 million]

"California has the lowest debt rating of any state, the fourth-highest unemployment rate (11.9 percent) and its job growth rate since 2000 is almost 20 percent below the national average. Some county and state public safety employees… Read More