From today’s San Bernardino County Sun (missed this on the news roundup):

Discouraging words aimed at Lewis George Watson, Staff Writer Though he won re-election, November has not been kind to Rep. Jerry Lewis, R-Redlands. First, his party lost control of the House of Representatives. That meant Lewis will lose his chairmanship of the House Appropriations Committee, which made him one of the most powerful lawmakers in the nation. And now, already facing a federal… Read More

* Conservative Republican Bill Simon, Jr., who ran unsucessfully for Governor in 2002, was in NYC for an exclusive meeting of supporters of Rudy Giuliani’s bid for the Presidency.

* Milton Friedman was a noted economist and an ardent libertarian. I attended a dinner once where his talk centered around his opposition to the war on drugs and the need to decriminalize prostitution. Nice.

* Margita Thompson, who is departing as the Governor’s Press Secretary, is rumored to be leaving for Nepal, to trek up to the top of Mount Everest – time for her to take it easy.

* Clearly conservative Simon wouldn’t be attracted to Giuliani’s mold of East Coast liberal Republicanism. But Simon used to work for Giuliani as a prosecutor… They are close personal friends I am told…

* Former Schwarzenegger Campaign Deputy Communications Director Matt David is rumored to be in consideration to replace Thompson. That would be a great pick. I give Matt my strongest recommendation (sorry, Matt, I may have sunk your chances).

* Success or failure for legislative leaders, under this redistricting plan, must be… Read More

I know I am starting to sound like I am beating the same drum over and over. But I am still reflecting with wonder on the fact that earlier today House Republicans gathered in a room and largely re-elected the same leadership that they had while in the majority.

The gravity of the problem for House Republicans is highlighted by my reaction to reading a speech I found online given by Roy Blunt (right), who was re-elected into House Leadership. In it he gives a speech that makes it sound as if he suddenly has turned over a new leaf. This the man who for years literally whipped up the votes to massively grow government. Now, stripped of his majority status and power, he is giving lip service to past mistakes.

Why would anyone believe that if Republicans took back the majority, things would be appreciably different than before, with the same leadership?… Read More

On election night I was in the McClintock suite at the Beverly Hilton Hotel as the election results came in. I knew we were in trouble when Tom has a couple of percentage point lead and LA still hadn’t been counted. Pollster Stephen Kinney was there. It was his and other polling that had told us that McClintock, McPherson had slight leads and that Strickland was getting close.

Today Kinney made his post-election analysis at the meeting of the San Gabriel Valley Lincoln Club (For disclosure purposes I chair this Lincoln Club chaper)

Steve went through all the pre and post polling. Why did we lose the down ticket races? TURNOUT

Kinney thinks that the spread between Dem and GOP turnout may hit 10%. Some big Southern California GOP counties had lower turnout than in 2002. Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino to name them.

The reason. Kinney points to the nationalization of the election that didn’t come to California really until the last few days. Republicans were demoralized and didn’t show up. According to Kinney Arnold won by only 2% on election day.

I agree… Read More

Senator Ackerman sent me the latest numbers, not so good for Reps. Lou has pulled out to a 783 vote lead, a little less than the Otto Bade write-in number of yesterday, 800+ votes. These seem to be all provisional day-of ballots. If they were still the absentees it would be better. 55147-54364, advantage Lou.… Read More

That’s right. The tax increases are coming! A while back a reporter asked me if I feared an Angelides tax increase. I told him I didn’t, because Republicans would block, like we did during the Gray Davis years. I feared an increase from the Governor, because he might get some GOP votes for it. See the interview here.

I know you didn’t see it in the advertising for the bonds but with the State 5 Billion in debt (This is without lots of bad things like prison reform, pensions etc.. not figured in), that fear is reality.I have now confirmed that the governor’s office is considering tax increases. Specifically, I have heard these at least in play. A taxon satellite and cable television and radio and TV advertising. I assume that is the tip if the iceberg.

If you see some GOP legislators. Grabthe and tell them they have to vote no. That is the only thing that may stop these increases

I hope the governor proposes to tax retroactively all the advertisements that ended just a couple of weeks ago… Read More

Today, our nation and the world lost a great mind and an individual dedicated to the advancement of personal freedom. Milton Friedman’s contributions to the study of economics and his ability to articulate its complexities to the public helped awaken the modern conservative movement and advance protections of personal freedoms in this country and around the world. In my life, his writings and works had a tremendous impact on me and helped shape my understanding of public policy as an economics major in college.

Milton Friedman said that, "The society that puts equality before freedom will end up with neither. The society that puts freedom before equality will end up with a great measure of both."

As a nation we can honor the contributions of this brilliant mind by dedicating ourselves to this principle and continually reexamining the effect our government has on the freedoms that have allowed our nation to thrive. For the whole world to know and understand what it means to be free, we need more leaders, teachers, and economists like Milton Freedman.… Read More

I had the opportunity to attend private schools as a kid and later I graduated from one of the top public high schools in the country. Having had that experience, it pains me see the conditions, academic and otherwise in public schools in Southern CA when I go out and speak on various campuses. No matter how much bond money you throw at public education you will never fix the problems.

That is one reason I am such a big fan of Charter Schools.

Yesterday the CA Charter Schools Assoc. launched a public awareness campaign that they hope will double the number of parents who have access to charter schools for their kids. They call it My School (see www.myschool.org) and it offers resources to help parents take ownership of local schools and start new charter schools.

The web page has a cool tool that allows parents to find out where the closest charter school is (there are over 600 statewide).

The Association claims that a recent poll (which my firm curiously didn’t get the chance to do despite my personal support of charter schools) shows 78% of the public believe giving parents choices within the… Read More