Money, Honey

So I asked my baby, “How can this be?”

She looked me over and said to me:

“Money, honey.

Money, honey.

Money, honey

If you wanna hang around with me.” 

Rather than threatening to veto their genius legislation, Gov. Schwarzenegger might have instead asked California’s lawmakers to tithe some of the loot from their prodigious fundraisers to state coffers and erase some of the debt.     Read more »

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They Don’t Make ‘Em Like This Anymore

Dean Misczynski is retiring for state service. If anyone deserves a tip o’ the hat for his contributions to California, it’s Mr. Misczynski.

“He is one of the most remarkable of the extraordinary, quiet people who do their jobs at the capitol with humor and professionalism,” to quote Rob Gunnison, my former colleague at the Chronicle, who has known Dean for several decades.     Read more »

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Lifted from the “Unclear on the Concept” File

Note the salutation on the letter linked below.

This epistle, from the hand of California’s CEO, was sent to state employees late Friday August 8. It explains the ramifications to them of a recent executive order cutting their pay to the federal minimum wage and firing thousands of their friends and co-workers.    Read more »

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Paging Franz Kafka. Mr. Franz Kafka

While this news item, culled from the most recent Cal-TaxReport, needs neither commentary nor cockroach to sharpen its point, the length of time this legal tussle has dragged on is both remarkable and indefensible. 

A protest over a tax audit took more than a decade to be fully adjudicated by a state agency?    Read more »

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High School Exit Exam Question

Using the information below, please answer the following three questions: 

California has 120 legislators and 12 statewide officeholders. 

Despite legislative district lines drawn to protect incumbents, these public officials routinely host fund-raisers — events designed to solicit money to pay for the re-election of the elected official.   

1. How long would it take 132 state public officials to hold 29 fundraising events?     Read more »

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Welcome To The New Fiscal Year. Same As It Ever Was

Say good-bye to California’s 2007-2008 fiscal year. It ends June 30. At midnight, the 2008-2009 fiscal year begins. 

It begins as last year’s did – without a budget. Last year, a budget wasn’t passed until August 24, 55 days into the new fiscal year. 

The constitution requires the Legislature to send a budget to the governor by June 15 so he can work it over, sign the thing, and have a spending plan in place by July 1 to dictate, in this instance, how more than $144 billion in revenue and bond funds get spent.     Read more »

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DeukFest ’08

A shorter version of this ran Tuesday June 17, 2008 in the Capitol Morning Report –

 More than 300 former members of the Deukmejian administration celebrated the 25th anniversary of George Deukmejian taking office at the Hyatt Hotel in Sacramento Saturday night.

Former cabinet secretaries and office secretaries filled the dining room and ended the evening by singing Happy Birthday to the GOP governor who turned 80 on June 6.    Read more »

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Conference Committee Convenes

Three days before the often-missed June 15 deadline for sending a completed budget to the governor, the Legislature convened the special six-member, two-house conference committee that stitches together the state’s phone-book-and-a-half size spending plan. 

It’s a laborious and often-tedious job reconciling the budget prepared by the Senate with that of the Assembly and then turning it into one document.    Read more »

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The More Things Change…

“Governor (______) expressed exasperation with the Assembly, where the simplest tasks become tangled in huge political battles, but praised the state Senate for easily passing parts of a bipartisan compromise to balance the state’s budget.”

 A.Schwarzenegger

B. Wilson

C. Davis

D. Reagan

   Read more »

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Chemical Interdependency

Assemblyman Cameron Smythe, a Santa Clarita Republican, was speaking to a group of chemical industry executives Thursday morning and joked that it wasn’t until he became vice-chair of the lower house’s Environmental Safety and Toxic Materials committee that he learned how truly dangerous the world is. 

Smythe said that sometimes the actions of the committee’s majority can be baffling and that the “science” used to justify some pieces of legislation isn’t always reliable.     Read more »

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