Well, 120 California legislators can enjoy their weekends, as I just got off of the phone with Senate Republican Leader Dick Ackerman who told me that there will not be any budget nogiations taking place over the weekend, at least not on the Senate side of the building.

Ackerman did say that he expects more activity on the budget next week.

In the meantime, the taxpayers can be assured that the legislature will not be convening over the weekend. UPDATE: Genuinely nice guy and devout socialist Frank Russo has a post up at the left-of-Berkeley California Progress Report website that (if you can get past Frank’s rhetoric) contains a nifty transcript of the from-the-roster dialogue between Perata and Ackerman at the end of the lock-down this morning.… Read More

I am a little worked-up that our intrepid publisher tag-lined my last post on the Fabrizio national Republican poll to somehow undercut the import of this unbiased survey showing broad support for Giuliani as a secondary note of the poll, by qualifying my post, in red no less, that I am also a Giuliani supporter! In response, and rather than bury my thoughts in a comment, I am issuing this blog challenge, and not to Fleischman! Hey Jon, I’m just reporting what I heard a respected pollster say, who is not a Giuliani consultant. I hope when I go see the Red Sox play the Angels in a couple of weeks here in Anaheim, that you won’t tag-line my further posts thinking I’ve joined the Romney road show with Mike Schroeder (former CRP Chairman), Scott Baugh (current OC GOP Chairman), and Adam Probolsky (respected OC-based pollster), all of whom have endorsed Romney, and call Orange County "Romney country." Well, I’ll be rooting for the Angels during that series. I hereby challenge Schroeder, Baugh and Probolsky to show up at the upcoming Angels/Red Sox series wearing those same questionable Red Sox hats they quite visably sported in the media when… Read More

Missed in the morning craziness of checking 50+ websites every morning for relevant news on California politics was a column today in the LA Times by Dana Parsons, profiling Republican political guru (and FR friend) Ken Khachigian. Ken is ‘answering the call’ to help out Fred Thompson in his bid for the White House.

The column begins below, and then there is a link over the the Times’ site for the rest.

A veteran advisor answers yet another bell Ken Khachigian, a lawyer in San Clemente, has advised Reagan, Nixon and others. This cycle, he’s aiding Fred Thompson. By Dana Parsons, The Los Angeles Times — July 21, 2007 … Read More

MEMO TO GOP SENATORS

TO: Sam Aanastad, Dick Ackerman, Roy Ashburn, Jim Battin, Dave Cogdill, Dave Cox, Jeff Denham, Bob Dutton, Tom Harmon, Dennis Hollingsworth, Abel Maldonado, Bob Margett, Tom McClintock, George Runner, Mark Wyland

FROM: Jon Fleischman and the FR Team

RE: The Immaturity of Don Perata

You fifteen are now officially martyrs for all California taxpayers. Don Perata (pictured) clearly is acting about four years old with this tactic of ‘locking you in’ the Senate chambers throughout the night.

It’s actually quite unbelievable.

It is a demonstration of how far out of touch liberal Democrats truly are with the reason WHY you folks have not signed off on a budget. They just don’t understand that the state government of California is too big and spends too much. The idea of not spending more than you make is a foreign concept. But then these are the people that see an increase of less than what they want as a spending cut.

Well, I cannot imagine being in your… Read More

Freshman GOP Assemblyman Cameron Smyth just dropped us some comments on the budget, which we present below:

I have really enjoyed keeping up with the Senate debate on the budget this weekend, but I wanted to offer the perspective of a Republican Assemblymember who did oppose this year’s spending plan. As the FlashReport readers are now well aware, early Friday morning (4:15AM) the Assembly concluded several weeks of discussion and passed out our version of the state budget, which is now held up in the Senate until Wednesday. Although nine of my Assembly Republican colleagues voted in favor of the plan, I simply could not. I believe our leadership negotiated a solid deal, considering our minority status, and included many supportable provisions.

However after consulting with more senior members of the caucus and theState Senators with whom I share areas of representation, too many uncertainties… Read More

So in the wee hours, the DEMOCRAT budget passes, as does the controversial health trailer bill that contains the "poison pill" amongst other programs.

The budget, SB 77, required 54 votes (2/3) to pass the Assembly. One Democrat was absent which means seven GOP votes were needed for passage, and the following NINE Republicans voted for it: Adams, Aghazarian, Berryhill, Blakeslee, Emmerson, Horton, Keene, Niello, and Villines.

The Health Serves also required 54 votes, and it got 55. They were: Adams, Aghazarian, Berryhill, Blakeslee, Emmerson, Maze, Niello, and Villines went up on that.

Quick observations:

1) Due to the hard work of Mike Villines and his leadership team, this DEMOCRAT budget is better than it was before they insisted on some reforms. They should be recognized for some real impacts to take this from worse to bad. 2) Despite their best efforts, stepping back and looking at this DEMOCRAT budget, it is no where near what Republicans would have put forth if we had a majority. It is still a terrible fiscal plan for California. 3) This is demonstrated by the fact that the overwhelming majority of Republican… Read More

Last night the California State Assembly passed a budget and sent it over to the Senate for their approval or rejection. The budget came out of the lower house with the support of all Democrats present, and slightly over the minimum number of Republican votes to get to the two-thirds required.

Let me start this commentary by reminding FR readers that like almost all of you, I am a far-away spectator to what goes on under the Capitol dome — I am in Southern California myself. Not being a denizen of the State Capitol, one tends to have a better perspective, I think, of the big picture. So from here, I can tell you that the passage of this budget out of the Assembly is nothing that should excite taxpayers, and certainly it is not good news for Republican Party leaders, donors and activists. The budget that was passed this morning was not support by over two-thirds of GOP legislators for a reason — it is a vastly inferior budget to one that would have been passed if there was a Republican majority in the… Read More

Last night the California State Assembly passed a budget and sent it over to the Senate for their approval or rejection. The budget came out of the lower house with the support of all Democrats present, and slightly over the minimum number of Republican votes to get to the two-thirds required.

Let me start this commentary by reminding FR readers that like almost all of you, I am a far-away spectator to what goes on under the Capitol dome — I am in Southern California myself. Not being a denizen of the State Capitol, one tends to have a better perspective, I think, of the big picture. So from here, I can tell you that the passage of this budget out of the Assembly is nothing that should excite taxpayers, and certainly it is not good news for Republican Party leaders, donors and activists. The budget that was passed this morning was not support by over two-thirds of GOP legislators for a reason — it is a vastly inferior budget to one that would have been passed if there was a Republican majority in… Read More