No, the Vessel With the Pestle Has the Brew that is True

From 1955’s The Court Jester. Danny Kaye and Mildred Natwick as Hubert Hawkins and Griselda:

Hawkins: The pellet with the poison is in the vessel with the pestle. The chalice from the palace has the brew that is true! Right?

Griselda: Right. But there’s been a change: They broke the chalice from the palace!    Read more »

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Read the Governor’s March 24 AB 32 Letter to the Air Board

There was a good deal of angst and tumult in the AB 32 world on March 25 resulting from a letter to the Air Resources Board form Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in which he appears to back several implementation strategies favored by business.

The two-page letter appears to advocate a more deliberate timetable in meeting the landmark law’s mandate of reducing greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by the end of the decade.    Read more »

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Pay-as-You-Go? No, Go as I Pay, Everybody Pay-Go Tonight

When did “pay-as-you-go” become “pay-go?”

No memo was received that “as,” “you” and two hyphens have gone the way of the dodo.

Are we in that much of a hurry that “as” and “you,” which are the two words that actually explain the budgetary concept of “pay-as-you-go,” must be eliminated?

Apparently in the busy world of the California state Legislature, there simply isn’t sufficient time to say “pay-as-you-go,” only enough time for “pay-go.”    Read more »

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Of Charter Schools, Inconsistencies and Profiles in Courage

Someone who wishes to become the governor of California should form the habit of reading legislation before making pronouncements about it.

Former eBay CEO Meg Whitman has commissioned a series of wildly disingenuous 15-second, substance-free television commercials about her GOP opponent for governor, Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner.

Poizner, for his part, is engaged in a similarly vapid ad campaign, attempting to portray himself as the most “conservative” GOP candidate, a bold tax-cutter and rescuer of California “from liberal failure,” who would “require law enforcement to report illegal aliens who are arrested” and will “save billions by cutting taxpayer-funded benefits to illegal aliens.”    Read more »

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Not Much ‘New Leadership’ in Whitman’s Anti-Poizner Ads

Daffy Duck would call it “despicable.”

It’s possible George “Don’t Call Me Daffy” Deukmejian, the choice of California’s Capitol for greatest governor in recent memory, would use the same word — accompanied by far less spittle — to describe one of the recent television ads created by Meg Whitman attacking her GOP gubernatorial opponent, Steve Poizner.    Read more »

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Correction

(Editor’s Note: It is with sadness that management pens yet another correction stemming from the work of the chief correspondent of California’s Capitol. This latest foul-up occurred in a recent “Angry Man” post. While management extends a certain amount of latitude to the chief correspondent in this category, allowing the expression of opinion and a higher degree of what we call S&V — Sarcasm and Vitriol — facts should never be error.    Read more »

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Just a Few Quick Questions for Assemblyman Chris Norby

During the Assembly debate over a resolution, which carries no force of law, urging people to not curse during the first week of March, freshman lawmaker, Chris Norby, a Fullerton Republican, rose and told his colleagues:

“With the state broke, I don’t know if this is what we should be spending our time on in here.”    Read more »

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It’s More About Legislative Job Retention Than Job Creation

Jobs.

Californians want them.

They want to keep the ones they have or get new ones, preferably at higher pay.

A recent poll by the Public Policy institute of California found that half of those surveyed were most concerned about jobs and the economy.

So isn’t it remarkable that California’s Senate Democrats are pimping a package of 25 bills – “Agenda 2010” – that they say will generate 140,000 jobs.    Read more »

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An Explication of the Didactic Duality of the Demon Sheep

I have seen the Demon Sheep and it is us.

Fleeced.

Crawling in muck.

Casting covetous eyes on the plenty of our fellow ovis aries, ready to pounce on less powerful.

Eating and regurgitating.

Before his fatal automobile accident, Albert Camus had begun outlining what would have been his greatest work, The Sheep.    Read more »

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The Ripple Effect of the Fiorina Campaign Strategem Grows

A Google search for “sheeplike synonym” at synonyms.net yields as the Number 1 related site: “Tom Campbell: U.S. Senate — Our Best Hope to Replace Sen. Boxer. GOP’s Best Bet in CA. Learn More.”

Number Two but trying harder is “Synonym” followed by “Synonyms and Antonyms.”

Finally, “More Farm Animals Please.    Read more »

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