I am pleased to present this "Guest Cartoon" from FR friend Kevin O’Neill. We’re thinking about including cartoons from Kevin, on California political issues, as a regular feature on the site. Let us know what you think about that, either by commenting below, or e-mailing me – Flash … Read More

As the falling rain pings against my window here in North California, I am relieved that it will alleviatesome of the shortage of stored water predicted for this upcoming usage season in California. Dramatic reductions in water delivery, especially to Central Valley agriculture are very likely. Those in the cattle business are lamentingwhat has been the shortest rainfallduring this area’s winter months, [January being one of the driest on record in California]for as long as they can remember, with grazing lands short of foliage and already starting to turn to the summer brown. These rains in recent days can only help.

What else would help is some real action by humans on providing for their own water needs. Relying on rain dances, good luck, or if you’re the 1948 Boston Braves with only 2 reliable pitchers for a7 gameWorld Series, "Spahn and Sain and pray for rain", we canask for Divine intervention every rain year and do nothing with our God-given abilities to help ourselves.

Governor Schwarzenegger has made a firm commitment to building above ground water storage in this state, something we used to do, and do… Read More

As the falling rain pings against my window here in North California, I am relieved that it will alleviatesome of the shortage of stored water predicted for this upcoming usage season in California. Dramatic reductions in water delivery, especially to Central Valley agriculture are very likely. Those in the cattle business are lamentingwhat has been the shortest rainfallduring this area’s winter months, [January being one of the driest on record in California]for as long as they can remember, with grazing lands short of foliage and already starting to turn to the summer brown. These rains in recent days can only help.

What else would help is some real action by humans on providing for their own water needs. Relying on rain dances, good luck, or if you’re the 1948 Boston Braves with only 2 reliable pitchers for a7 gameWorld Series, "Spahn and Sain and pray for rain", we canask for Divine intervention every rain year and do nothing with our God-given abilities to help ourselves.

Governor Schwarzenegger has made a firm commitment to building above ground water storage in this state, something we used to do, and do… Read More

For quite some time, this website tracked all of Governor Schwarzenegger’s appointments — with a careful eye on partisan registration. We ultimately stopped because it was too disappointing. As a Republican Governor, I expected Schwarzenegger (like Wilson, like Deukmejian) to fill his open positions in state government with like-minded Republicans. By setting this standard for the Governor, I found myself being consistenly disappointed. The number of Democrats who have been appointed to judgeships is downright appalling. And on the plethora of non-judicial appointments, it was often the case where barely 50% of any given list (appointments typically are announced in groupings of 10 to 15) were GOPers, with most of the rest being Democrats, and a smattering of appointees to registered as Decline-to-State (one appointee wasn’t registered to vote at all!). I had one FR reader who follows things closely tell me that the numbers are even more misleading as a significant number of the Republican appointments are to positions like local Fair Boards thus ‘inflating’ the GOP numbers… This week, the Governor released two lists… Read More

For quite some time, this website tracked all of Governor Schwarzenegger’s appointments — with a careful eye on partisan registration. We ultimately stopped because it was too disappointing. As a Republican Governor, I expected Schwarzenegger (like Wilson, like Deukmejian) to fill his open positions in state government with like-minded Republicans. By setting this standard for the Governor, I found myself being consistenly disappointed. The number of Democrats who have been appointed to judgeships is downright appalling. And on the plethora of non-judicial appointments, it was often the case where barely 50% of any given list (appointments typically are announced in groupings of 10 to 15) were GOPers, with most of the rest being Democrats, and a smattering of appointees to registered as Decline-to-State (one appointee wasn’t registered to vote at all!). I had one FR reader who follows things closely tell me that the numbers are even more misleading as a significant number of the Republican appointments are to positions like local Fair Boards thus ‘inflating’ the GOP numbers… This week, the Governor released two lists… Read More

According to Google, there are 538 articles online talking about the situation with Congressman John Doolittle.

But I digress. I thought if you were stopping by the FR this weekend, you might enjoy this video from the Heritage Foundation, on the big deficits that exist in funding current Social Security and Medicare obligations. It’s about two minutes long. … Read More

Spring Cleaning

House Republican leaders moved swiftly to pressure two of their conference members under federal investigation to step down from key committee posts this week. Yesterday saw Rep. John Doolittle of California step down from his Appropriations Committee assignment after word leaked that his Virginia home had been raided by FBI agents seeking documents linking him with convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

Similarly, Rep. Rick Renzi of Arizona stepped down from the Intelligence Committee after it was revealed that the FBI had raided a business tied to his wife as part of an ongoing probe into his official actions.

House Republicans were often slow in the last Congress to… Read More

The San Gabriel Valley Lincoln club meeting this morning offered more intrigue than I could have imagined in the 60th AD GOP race. Two candidates showed up. Larry Dick and Curt Hagman. You can see my last post on this race here. I asked both to say a few words. At the end of the meeting, one of our Lincoln Club members told me he was a potential candidate, but hasn’t decided yet. NO, I’m not hearing voices in my head. See post here. It was none other than La Habra Heights Councilman Stan Carroll. I pretty sure he has been elected at least two times to the council. Stan is a professor at Rio Hondo College and a formerprosecutor in San Bernardino. Did I … Read More