Last week, Gov. Jerry Brown said California has an overpopulation problem. He said the ongoing drought is a sure sign that the explosion of population in California has reached the limit of what Nature can provide.

“We are altering this planet with this incredible power of science, technology and economic advance,” Brown said during a discussion with Austin Beutner, publisher and chief executive of the Los Angeles Times and the San Diego Union-Tribune.“If California is going to have 50 million people, they’re not going to live the same way the native people lived, much less the way people do today.… You have to find a more elegant way of relating to material things. You have to use… Read More

Clint Olivier just announced he’s running for California State Assembly for the 31st Assembly District. If Olivier’s name isn’t familiar, be thankful. He’s not the son of a politician. He’s not from Hollywood. He didn’t get independently wealthy as a hedge-fund manager on oil and coal investments. He hasn’t sold rocket launchers to Filipino Muslim separatists, or offered bribes to FBI agents.

Clint Olivier is a member of the Fresno, California City Council, representing District 7, first elected to the council in 2010, and a former television news reporter. He’s married and has two… Read More

Flexing Republican muscle, the Irvine City Council is making headway on repealing years of heavy-handed Democrat policies, which are bad for business, and worse for taxpayers.

On the heels of passage of the new Los Angeles minimum wage of $15.00 per hour by 2020, the new GOP supermajority in Irvine just repealed its “living wage” ordinance. While the rest of the state seems to be pushing for mandatory minimum wage laws, or higher minimum wage laws under Democrat majorities, killing free market principles, as well as driving up the cost of city contracts, and preventing many employable students from getting important work experience, Irvine is doing things differently.

The Irvine City Council voted last week to repeal its Living Wage Ordinance, the only of its kind in all of Orange County.Where Republicans are governing, ridiculous and burdensome top-down mandates get cut.

The City of Irvine website explains the living wage:

… Read More

As Gov. Jerry Brown prepares to sign another climate change agreementwith “government leaders from around the world,” as his office announced, remember the recent agreement Brown got into with the scandalized Oregon Gov. Kitzhaber. “In October 2013,California Gov. Jerry Brown, together with the Governors of Oregon and Washington and the British Columbia Premier,signedthePacific Coast Action Plan on Climate and Energy, “to align climate change policies and promote clean energy,’” I wrote in February.

The Pacific Coast Collaborative links with theWest Coast Infrastructure Exchange(WCX), a compact betweenCalifornia, Oregon, Washington and British Columbia, formed in 2013 to promote “the type of new thinking necessary to solve the West Coast’s infrastructure crisis.” And the WCX is linked to… Read More

‘Transparency’ is probably the most overused word in political speech, while at the same time, the most underutilized in practice.In a free society, transparency in government means openness, accountability, and honesty. It is the obligation of government to share information with citizens, yet is increasingly difficult to access – even in California, home to Silicon Valley.

Without transparency, citizens are unable to hold public officials accountable. And that’s the problem –government is responsible for making itself available to be accountable. It’s unnatural. While the true statesman values principle above popularity, today’s era of politics in California doesn’t breed an abundance of statesmen.

However, one of the good guys – a real statesman – former State Sen. Sam Blakeslee, has tackled the problem of transparency in politics. The Institute for Advanced Technology and Public Policy, under the leadership of Blakeslee, officially launched the Digital Democracy Project, to provide a searchable database of all legislative hearings. “This package… Read More

California Gov. Jerry Brown issued an Executive Order Wednesday for a new target for greenhouse gas emissions cuts. Brown said it was critical to address what he called “an ever-growing threat” posed by global warming to California’s economy and well-being. Brown’s order goes even further than Pres. Obama’s radical proposals, but aligns with the European Union and United Nations proposals. Jerry Brown hasjumped-the-sharkon climate change (Origin of this phrase comes from a Happy Days episode where the Fonz jumped a shark on waterskis. Thus was labeled the lowest point of the show).

Senate Republican Minority Leader Bob Huff correctly replied to Brown’s latest edict:

“The state already has the nation’s most stringent goals. Before moving the goal post, we should be careful about the impact of increased energy costs. These higher costs will hurt the low income and working poor the hardest and will create an even greater divide between the haves and have nots. At what point does being on the leading edge of climate change and… Read More

The 2015 report on economic competitiveness between states is out, and it still doesn’t look good for California. The Rich States, Poor States report by the American Legislative Exchange Council annually ranks states on economic competitiveness. For the 8th year in a row, Utah wins. And for the 8th year in a row, California ranks poorly on the economic freedom and competitiveness scale.

‘Rich States’ embrace free market reforms and cut taxes.

‘Poor States’ raise taxes on income, have high property taxes,… Read More

The California Democratic Party claims to be for the poor and middle class, but killed a bill Monday which would have cut California’s highest-in-the-nation gas tax.Californians pay 68 cents tax on every gallon of gasoline – the highest gas tax in the nation.

Not content to be the first state in the country to tax the air we breathe, California is the first in the nation to impose a cap and trade tax on transportation fuels.

In response, Assemblyman Jim Patterson, R-Fresno, and more than 20 other Republican lawmakers, introduced AB 23, theAffordable Gas for California Families Act,legislation to exempt transportation fuels and natural gas from the California Air… Read More