During the entire tenure of Assembly Republican Leader Mike Villines, longtime GOP strategist Joe Justin served in the role of "going point" on the ground for his political efforts to retain Republicans in the Assembly, and to work to increase numbers.

With Sam Blakeslee’s election as Assembly Republican Leader, many people were wondering who would be filling this critical role for the new leader.

That person is going to be none other than Kevin Spillane. I had an opportunity to get to know and to work with Spillane for a long time now — and I think that this is an outstanding hire by Blakeslee. Kevin brings a lot to the table. Not only with a lengthy political resume, but he also, like Joe Justin actually, is a straight shooter who will be very realistic in approaching this position.

Many FR readers will recognize Kevin’s name because he has been the "public face" as it were — a spokesman (and much more) — for many high profile causes. Among those were the successful effort last year to stave off the naked attempt by Fabian Nunez to thwart term-limits. Currently you’ve seen him affiliated… Read More

This morning, Congressman Kevin McCarthy sent over a link to a new video created by House Republican Whip Eric Cantor — McCarthy serves as Chief Deputy Whip. Here is an intro to the piece by McCarthy, followed by the video…

FROM CONGRESSMAN KEVIN MCCARTHYAs unemployment climbs, Speaker Pelosi’s top priority is passing a cap and trade bill, which imposes a national energy tax (aka “cap and tax”) that is predicted by economic experts to result in more American job losses and cost all Americans more in utility and energy bills. Now is the time to focus on job creation and cutting spending. There is also a better energy approach called the American Energy Act that does not impose a burdensome national energy tax on American families and small businesses, helps create American jobs, and puts America on a path towards energy independence by producing more American… Read More

Today the Democrats will put up some bills calling for cuts in state government spending — but cuts that are far short of what is needed to get us through the 2009 – 2010 fiscal year. Or put another way, if we approve only these cuts, this Spring will find us back in a crisis. But, of course, in the Spring, the ability to make cuts to resolve the shortfall will be significantly more difficult — it takes some time to realize the savings from reductions — time we will have with cuts adopted now, but necessarily in the Spring.

There are a lot of cuts that literally need to take place by the end of this fiscal year (such as cuts to education) or else it would mandate even more spending due to funding formulas set in the State Constitution. I get that. But the top priority of Senate and Assembly Republicans, like by a factor of ten, is to avoid a short-term fix that will have us all staring down the barrel of tax increases this Spring.

The politics of the State Capitol is confusing to me. And I have to admit that perhaps my advice to GOP legislators would be different on this subject if I hadn’t, to my disbelief, watched… Read More

My apologies — I am running around a bit today and not by the computer much. A quick data-download. The Senate and Assembly passed out two bills today, on votes of 54-0 in the Senate, and 69-0 in the Assembly, which include a few billion in cuts. No where near the $24 billion that needs to be cut to see California State government not end up back in a crisis-mode sometime in the upcoming fiscal year.

The argument that Assembly Republicans make in supporting these particular bills is that they represent cuts that need to be made in the current fiscal year budget (so within the next five days). Cuts made to some areas, such as education, have extra impact as the required levels of funding for some areas in next year’s budget are based on what those areas received this year.

The argument against these bills made by the Governor (who has pledged to veto the bills) and State Senate Republicans (except for a couple who bolted the caucus to vote with the Dems) is that it is imperative that we pass a comprehensive solution only, and nothing that allows Democrats to push out the tough cuts until later — when it is harder to have the impact of… Read More

I’m watching the Senate and Assembly Floor sessions at www.calchannel.com. Assemblyman Jim Nielsen just delivered a powerful speech on the Assembly Floor highlighting the flawed process that has the legislature considering a major policy proposal that no one has been able to even read. Over on the Senate side, Republican Bob Dutton is dicing up the content of the proposal — noting at this moment the gimmick financing of sliding the state’s June 30 payroll by one day, into the new fiscal year, in order to paper-over well over a billion of the shortfall.… Read More

This morning the Democrats implemented their budget drill — and I am happy to report that all of the Republicans in the State Capitol, whether in the Senate or the Assembly, voted against it (well, with what we call the "Maldonado Exception" — which means he doesn’t play well in the sandbox with fellow Republicans so he was on the Senate Floor, but abstained. The held the bill "open" so I suppose he can drop in a vote later. Unfortunately we don’t have an FR psychiatrist to help us understand the inner-workings of that guy).

Senate President Darrell Steinberg has challenged Republicans, saying that we don’t have a plan. To this, I would say, as I have said before, let’s put Governor Schwarzenegger’s proposed fixes up for a vote. Of course there are some items in there that I don’t like — but on balance, it is vastly better than what the Democrats put forward today. Put up Arnold’s proposal, and let’s have a vote!… Read More

You just can’t make this stuff up. Another one bites the dust. … Read More

I am looking to create a FlashReport/Twitter users list, specifically because we’re in the process of doing some exciting new programming integrating Twitter into the FlashReport, and I want to get input and advice from Twittering Politicos. If you are interested in helping out (not much time involved – mainly contributing ideas and such) — just drop me an email here. We’ll probably cut off the group fairly quickly since I don’t need thousands of helpers, maybe a dozen or two.… Read More