Some Sunday Reading: Round 3 of California’s never-ending budget bout looms Sacramento Bee California’s budget crisis may be on collision course with election year Contra Costa Times Money doesn’t always buy the office Kathleen Decker, LA Times … Read More

Republican National Committee Vice Chairman Jim Bopp has a great column in today’s Washington Times. You can read it here. It ponders the future of the Republican Party.

Bopp has been at the center of controversy lately for his proposal that the RNC adopt a "litmus test" on key GOP issues that candidates must meet before being eligable for RNC support.

Many people do not like that idea.

Yet, Bopp’s proposal addresses a serious problem, which you will see me write about a lot in the coming months. Which, most simply put, is how does the GOP track towards a majority that will achieve the party’s policy goals? It clearly is not the purpose of a political party to accumulate power for power’s sake. Earlier this decade Republicans controlled the Presidency, the United States Senate and the House of Representatives. With all of this, we presided over growth in the size and scope of the federal government, and the expansion of entitlement programs.

If GOP leaders don’t like… Read More

We would like to wish our readers a Merry Christmas or a Happy Hannukah, and a great New Years. The FlashReport is currently in our "holiday break" mode, where we offer much more limited coverage. This takes place annually from the Saturday before Christmas through New Years Day. Traditionally the political news coverage is very slow, and it gives the elves here a chance to recharge their batteries before we return full steam ahead on January 4th. The FlashReport Weblog on California Politics will be up and running during our seasonal break, and so we encourage you to keep an eye on it. Our many bloggers will still be posting, and if there is breaking news or a particularly "yummy" political story or column, that’s where we’ll point it out to you! Thank you so much for making 2009 the most successful year yet, by any measurable standard, for the FlashReport. We had more blog posts and more featured columns than any other year. We’ve had more readers (by far) than we’ve had since we began as an e-mail newsletter in 2001. We’ve had more… Read More

We would like to wish our readers a Merry Christmas or a Happy Hannukah, and a great New Years. The FlashReport is currently in our "holiday break" mode, where we offer much more limited coverage. This takes place annually from the Saturday before Christmas through New Years Day. Traditionally the political news coverage is very slow, and it gives the elves here a chance to recharge their batteries before we return full steam ahead on January 4th. The FlashReport Weblog on California Politics will be up and running during our seasonal break, and so we encourage you to keep an eye on it. Our many bloggers will still be posting, and if there is breaking news or a particularly "yummy" political story or column, that’s where we’ll point it out to you! Thank you so much for making 2009 the most successful year yet, by any measurable standard, for the FlashReport. We had more blog posts and more featured columns than any other year. We’ve had more readers (by far) than we’ve had since we began as an e-mail newsletter in 2001. We’ve had more… Read More

If you transform into aconservative while an undergrad at Yale, then something special happened. It happened to Wm. F. Buckley. AndGovindini Murty, who with her husband founded the wildly successful Liberty Film Festival, became a conservative under liberal group think,and met Jason Apuzzo. Both are film makers with a vivid conservative/libertarian perspective.

Finally they made their own film with Govindini starring as the "girl" entwined in a wicked plot by a Jihad Terrorist to nuke LA.The insane terrorist is desperately seeking fame while stalking an exotic dancer. The same dilemma faced by the the9/11. Before purifying their souls for the suicide attacks, several were habituating strip clubs days before.

The black comedy takes you on a journey though Iran, Gitmo and the rough streets around the LA Harbor. The… Read More

The Tony Amador for Congress campaign has actually put out a release that highlights Amador’s endorsement from the Sheriffs of Sacramento, Merced and Solano counties. While that’s fine and dandy even though none of those counties are part of the 11th Congressional District, it’s pretty amusing to see they added a scorecard on the release stating "Primary Scoreboard: Amador 3 Goehring 2." I guess it’s hard to be a good scorekeeper when one campaign is playing on the junior varsity level and being dominated in every aspect of the game by a clearly superior opponent.

Maybe it’s just me and I could be wrong here being that I’m biased and all in favor of my client Brad Goehring, but it seems to me you might not want to highlight the fact that your opponent has the support of the Sheriffs who represent the two largest counties in the district and are very popular and respected officials while your endorsements mean ZIP, ZERO and NADA in the 11th Congressional district.

Or maybe you would think of avoiding discussing endorsements when Brad Goehring has not only locked down the support of those two local Sheriffs but… Read More

As you may know, earlier this year I submitted the Vote SAFE Now initiative (which would require voters to produce photo identification at the polls) to Attorney General Brown’s office. While the California Constitution requires the Attorney General to write fair and balanced title and summaries, what Brown wrote for the Vote SAFE initiative was politically tilted and factually incorrect. As a result, I sued Brown this past fall.

Brown’s latest attempt at the title and summary for the Vote SAFE initiative is materially more accurate than the prior version. Thus, I have dropped the suit. It’s not perfect, but we believe we can move forward with the language in all but one respect.

However, I still plan to re-submit the initiative this week to the Attorney General in an effort to bring clarity to one of the initiative’s provisions – the one which would allowthe county registrar of voters 15… Read More

The Lieutenant Governors race is sure different than just a few months ago. Back in that day Sen. Jeff Denham had been campaigning for over a year. His successful defeat of a recall aimed at his “no” vote on a bloated unbalanced budget allowed him to raise money and develop contacts statewide. Sen. Aanestad had jumped in and need to raise money quick.

Today, Denham is running for Assembly, Aanestad still needs to raise money (he can win if he can get his message out)and the Governor has vaulted Sen. Abel Maldonado into the LG race. Whether he is confirmed or not, Maldonado is in the LG race to stay.

It is no secret that with a little money a candidate can beat Maldonado in the GOP Primary. It is difficult to choose which betrayal of mainstream GOP and Californian voters to list as a reason to reject his candidacy, but I hope someone does an ad about his signing the no new tax pledge and then voting for huge tax increases. (His consistent betrayal of the GOP core principles and his ability to break his word does explain why he is good fit for the Governor as LG.)

So now that the field has changed, does Bill Simon say yes to running for LG?

There… Read More