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Why Isn’t This Man California’s Next Governor?
When he gets up a decent head of rhetoric steam, State Treasurer Bill Lockyer is remarkable to behold.
On October 22, in approximately 15 minutes of testimony before the Senate and Assembly select committees on Improving State Government, the former Attorney General and Senate president pro tempore said he was “Aristotelian” a “First Amendment purist,” informed the committee that “politics is theater for ugly people” and two-thirds of the bills passed by the Assembly are “junk.” Read more »
There Doesn’t Appear to Be Any Let-up Whatsoever
Although the state Legislature is in recess until the beginning of January the quest for campaign contributions certainly isn’t.
Candidates seeking election to the Legislature and lawmakers seeking re-election or higher office have 22 fundraisers scheduled – so far – from October 27 through December 11.
That does not count two Nevada lawmakers — Assembly Majority Leader John Oceguera and Assembly member Lynn Stewart – who are holding a $1,000-a-head event and $500-a-person event, respectively. Read more »
Two GOP Senators Square Off Against Each Other
There’s some friction in the state Senate Republican caucus because two of its members are running for statewide office – against each other.
Sen. Sam Aanestad of Grass Valley faces Sen. Jeff Denham of Merced in the 2010 lieutenant governor primary.
Aanestad recently launched his campaign. Denham’s view is that in instances where two senators are running against each other, one should not be “favored” as he believes Aanestad is with a seat on the upper house’s powerful Rules Committee. Read more »
California’s Capitol Issues a Correction and Apology
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 20, 2009
Contact for Senator DeSaulnier: Eve Hightower (916-651-4007)
Contact for Assembly member Feuer: Arianna Smith (916-319-2042)
**MEDIA ADVISORY**
GOVERNMENTAL REFORM SOLUTIONS TO BE CONSIDERED IN JOINT HEARINGS
First Hearing Addresses Proposals to Enhance Policy and Budget Development
SACRAMENTO – Senator Mark DeSaulnier (D-Concord) and Assembly member Mike Feuer (D-Los Angeles) will convene the first joint hearing of each house’s Select Committee on Improving State Government. Read more »
Lobbyists Sue to Remove June 2010 Ballot Measure
A group of lobbyists are suing to remove a measure from the June 2010 that would tax them to create a fund to help publicly finance candidates for the office of Secretary of State.
Plaintiffs, which include the tiny non-profit Jericho: A Voice for Justice and the massive California Professional Firefighters, argue that the tax unfairly singles out lobbyists and violates their right to freedom of political expression. Read more »
Long-Time South Bay Senator Bob Beverly Dead at 84
Robert G. Beverly, a Manhattan Beach Republican who represented the South Bay in the state Senate for 20 years died October 16 after a long fight with Parkinson’s Disease. He was 84.
His stentorian voice, courtly demeanor and silver-white hair would have made him Central Casting’s choice to portray a senator were he not one from 1976 until forced out by term limits in 1996. Read more »
Two Tests: One for Admission, One for Graduation
(Below are two tests. One is an entrance examination; the other is California’s high school exit examination which is objected to by its critics as too difficult and an unfair condition of graduation.)
1. Name four leading nations interested in the New World in exploring days. Name an explorer from each and give a good sketch of one of his explorations. Read more »
Robbing Peter to Pay Paul on State School Funding
Among the 240 bills vetoed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2009 was a measure passed in the closing hours of the legislative session to prevent $400 million in cuts to districts containing the state’s lowest performing schools.
Democrats initially backed cutting schools — already the recipient of deepest cuts this year — as a way to lower the size of the GOP governor’s proposed reductions in health and welfare programs. Read more »
How Often Do Governors Say No? The 2009 Edition
(Editor’s Note: Each year, Peter Detwiler, the indefatigable chief consultant of the Senate Local Government Committee compiles a listing of bills signed and vetoed. This listing now stretches back to the first year of Ronald Reagan’s governship in 1967. Here are highlights of this year’s version. The complete listing is HERE.) Read more »
Book Review: California in the Balance
Not many primers on California budget history, processes and strategies begin with a Foreward whose third sentence notes that in earlier times “priests scrutinized the entrails of recently deceased birds and mammals to inspire their analysis.”
They are also the words of State Treasurer Bill Lockyer, himself not a common feature of primers on California budget history, processes and strategies. Read more »
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