I read yesterday’s Flashreport with all of the stories in the mainstream media about laying off, and furloughing, state employees, and the negative impact that is having on state employee morale.

But look what is happening in the private sector. Thousands of private sector workers are losing their job, which is having a negative effect on state income and sales tax revenue, and that drop in revenue is resulting in state deficits. These deficits leave the state with the options of cutting spending, raising taxes, or both. Raising taxes will reduce private sector spending, costing more private sector jobs, further reducing income and sales tax revenues, and quite frankly, reducing the effectiveness that any tax increase may have toward increasing state revenue. Quite frankly, raising taxes will make the short term revenue problems worse.

Cutting spending will cost government jobs, for sure, but lots of people are losing their jobs right now. Government workers, and government worker unions, think that somehow they ought to be immune from these economic ups and downs. They always want more spending when revenues are up, and they never want to cut… Read More

Recently in the FlashReport my friend Jon Fleischman wrote to urge the Constitutional elected officers to bend to the will of the Governor on the issue of employee furloughs. I disagree. Actually, I oppose furloughs on both constitutional and pragmatic grounds. First, the Constitution. If it means anything (and these days, that seems open to question) the Constitution of California set up a divided executive branch. Unlike the Federal government, California has 11 officials elected independently of the governor. The drafters in both 1850 and 1879 had concerns about an all-powerful executive and wanted to add checks and balances beyond the three separate branches of government.

The Board of Equalization, where I serve, and the other Constitutional officers, do not answer to the Governor. He cannot order us to give a taxpayer a break, nor can he order us to audit a taxpayer who has crossed him. In other states and in the Federal government, I believe that both have happened. (Think of Nixon’s infamous Saturday Night Massacre as an example of an executive wielding inappropriate power of the employees of another agency.) It is a… Read More

Since the old saw goes – "Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery" – I’m flattered that it appears my weekly Waste Watch posts are going to be continued on FR.

As you all know, the top-notch staff in the Republican Senate Caucusactually write the Waste Watch – as they always did for me. They do a great job of highlighting the never ending waste of government.

I always felt is was important to constantly demonstrate government’s inability to spend taxpayer’s dollars efficiently even while my Democrat colleagues continued their call for higher and higher taxes. Apparently my successor, Senator John Benoit does too – he’s started posting his version today. You can find it below.

John, I’m flattered you want to keep this great tradtion alive. Thanks.… Read More

IF Hilda Solis is confirmed as Secretary of Labor, a special election will be held to replace her. Conventional wisdom has that no GOP candidate can win. Some local GOP elected officials have even endorsed Judy Chu for that office. State Senator Gil Cedillo is also a big Democratic contender.

While Republican registration is 21%, the 32nd District (West Covina, Covina, Azusa, Baldwin Park, El Monte, Rosemead, Monterey Park and parts of Los Angeles) is more conservative than some areas. It is heavily Latino with a sizeable Asian population. Every city passed Proposition 8 easily.

Some have asked me to run. I am way to busy to have that kind of fun.

I recently met with a candidate that is viable in a special election low turnout scenario.

Teresa Hernandez was born and raised in the district. Teresa own with her husband Cielito Lindo Restaurant (the… Read More

Yesterday, my friend Patrick Dorinson penned a column for Fox and Hounds Daily, Inherit the Wind, where he questioned the wisdom and tactics of my decision to introduce a resolution for the upcoming California Republican Party convention that would officially censure any Republican legislator that voted to increase taxes. This resolution is accompanied by another one that praises Republican legislators for holding the line against higher taxes. It is my sincere hope that the first resolution gets tabled as being inapplicable, and that the party faithful will be able to unanimously pass the latter – a well deserved thank you to Republican legislators that have, despite a very high degree of pressure on them from the special interest groups that dominate the State Capitol, and the battering by the political left who occupy their high chairs on many of the editorial boards of major California newspapers.

In Patrick’s piece, he makes this statement: “Political parties exist to win… Read More

Capitol Weekly and Probolsky Research (my firm) debut our statewide poll today, a poll that is less pedestrian than the other regularly published statewide polls.

The first article on the results highlight support among California voters for a part-time legislature. John Howard and Anthony York wrote an article about the poll in Capitol Weekly’s Thursday edition.

Another article by Anthony York discusses the difference between our results and results from a Enviro group sponsored poll on the prospect of loosening environmental regulations for new projects in California.

Overall we found that voters are not happy with the direction the state is headed nor the leadership of the governor.

We also identified a more than two-to-one Democratic preference among Decline to State voters over Republicans.

The actual poll reports can be viewed by visiting… Read More

Barack H. Obama has nominated David Ogden, an accomplished lawyer for the "skin-flick" industry, for the important job of Deputy Attorney General of the United States. The Deputy AG serves as the prime manager of the Agency and the Administration’s justice policy. The Deputy AG post is also seen as a stepping stone and has been held bya number of prominent lawyers on their way up in government including William P. Rogers (later Nixon’s Secretary of State), Lawrence Walsh (later Iran-Contra prosecutor), Richard Kleindienst (who went on to be Attorney General), Ramsey Clark (anotherDemocrat mistake), Warren Christopher (later Carter’s Secretary of State), Benjamin Civiletti (whoalso went on to be Attorney General), and Eric Holder, the current Attorney General.

Ogden’s legal skills as a porn lawyer include representation ofthe biggest distributor ofhard-core pornographic films,as well as raunchy Penthouse magazine and tamer Playboy. His cases include opposition to spam filters on computers in public libraries, even where unsupervised children have… Read More

"He really didn’t used to be this bad," I can imagine Congressman Kevin McCarthy telling his fellow Republican Congressman from California at their weekly delegation meeting, as they absorb the fact that despite the fact that every one of them opposed President Obama’s pork-laden "stimulus" boondoggle plan, Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger embraced the plan, signing a letter encouraging its passage.

Perhaps the next time that Governor Schwarzenegger is in Washington, D.C., he can stop by a meeting of the California GOPers. Of course, if he did, I would recommend that freshman Representative Duncan D. Hunter stop by the office of his local Assemblyman, Joel Anderson, who can make him some name tags.

It seems remarkably shallow if the only criteria that Governor Schwarzenegger uses on judging this terrible legislation is "how much welfare do we get for California government" — we expect the Governor to apply more sophistication, and reject this kind of redistributive, Keynesian policy… Read More