Assemblyman Sam Blakeslee introduced legislation that would strengthen punishment for patients at Atascadero State Hospital (ASH) who escape or attack their healthcare workers. According to an article in this morning’s San Luis Obispo Tribune, last year there were 393 acts of aggression toward staff, 26 of which resulted in serious injury. At a hospital where recruiting quality healthcare professionals is already a challenge, the threat of attack with little to no consequence is hardly helpful.

A similar measure in 2002, proposed by then Assemblyman Maldonado would have made it illegal for those housed in state hospitals to escape. The bill died in Public Safety committee as a result of pressure from patient’s rights advocacy groups who contend that the bill unfairly punishes the mentally ill housed at ASH.

As the laws are currently written it is lawful for those committed at ASH to escape as they are technically “patients” and not “prisoners—“even if the patient is a sexually violent predator.… Read More

Today if you are driving around the sleepy town of San Luis Obispo, you may hear an ad on the radio that concerns you. You’ll hear that one of your local officials, State Senator Abel Maldonado, has introduced a job-killing state mandate to employers, requiring them to raise employee salaries.

You probably would shake your head, since all of the things you have read about your Senator make it sound like this is the last thing he would do.

Nevetheless, Republican Senator Abel Maldonado has introduced legislation to increase the state’s minimum wage by a dollar, and the California Republican Assembly is calling him on it. Starting today, the CRA has purchased radio ads on four stations throughout Maldonado’s sprawling Central Coast District.

How all of this plays out in Maldonado’s bid for State Controller is not certain. But it is certainly controversial to reach over to the platform of the State Democrat Party for a major piece of his … Read More

It seems as though every day, it is getting harder and harder to read the tea leaves and keep track of the changing dynamics of the special election in the 50th Congressional, to replace the disgraced and resigned Randy "Duke" Cunningham, who infamously admitted his guilt in taking over $2 million in compensation for doling out government contracts.

It is the backdrop of this being ground-zero for an electorate betrayed by their Congressman that makes the drama so intense. There is a dynamic here that has never existed in a California Congressional special election before…

I have told a number of people that because of the pricy real estate values in much of this coastal San Diego district, there are literally tens of thousands of potential candidates one mortgage away from self-funding a race. Well, today there is a new Republican candidate jumping into the race, and he won’t have to mortgage any of his (multiple) houses, including the one in Rancho Santa Fe that he, his wife, and their five children call home.

… Read More

Congressman David Dreier’s 26th Congressional District covers significant parts of two counties. The eastern portion includes the San Bernardino County cities of Rancho Cucamonga, Upland and Montclair. Moving west, the 26th covers a large swath of Los Angeles County in the San Gabriel Valley before dipping south to include San Marino. Registration figures for CD 26 stand at 46 percent Republican and 35 percent Democrat.

Dreier (pictured above)survived a scare in 2004 when popular Los Angeles talk radio hosts John Kobylt and Ken Chiampou of KFI relentlessly blasted Dreier for allegedly being soft on illegal immigration. Despite the two-pronged attack David Drier faced — on his right from the John and Ken show, and on his left from Democrat challenger Cynthia Matthews — Dreier won with 53 percent of the vote. In 2002, Dreier had beaten his Democrat opponent with 63 percent of the vote.

In December, I wrote a… Read More

It seems as though every day, it is getting harder and harder to read the tea leaves and keep track of the changing dynamics of the special election in the 50th Congressional, to replace the disgraced and resigned Randy "Duke" Cunningham, who infamously admitted his guilt in taking over $2 million in compensation for doling out government contracts.

It is the backdrop of this being ground-zero for an electorate betrayed by their Congressman that makes the drama so intense. There is a dynamic here that has never existed in a California Congressional special election before…

I have told a number of people that because of the pricy real estate values in much of this coastal San Diego district, there are literally tens of thousands of potential candidates one mortgage away from self-funding a race. Well, today there is a new Republican candidate jumping into the race, and he won’t have to mortgage any of his (multiple) houses, including the one in Rancho Santa Fe that he, his wife, and their five children call home.

… Read More

The City of Torrance is nestled in the South Bay of Los Angeles County. The population is about 140,000. Michelle Kwan hails from there and I love eating at the nearby Alpine Village. It has a conservative reputation, even though two of the last three Assemblymen from the area were Democrats on the Torrance City Council.

i was wrong about the 100K it is actually more that you would need. The Daily Breeze has an article about the upcoming June 6 election for Mayor. The challenger has loaned his campaign 100K and expects to get outspent by current GOP registered Mayor Dan Walker. See the article here.

Remember the days when 110K meant you were a leading Assembly candidate?… Read More

As the famed, late Assembly Speaker Jesse Unruh (pictured) was famed for saying, "Money is the mother’s milk of politics."

For years now, Matt Rexroad over at Meridian Pacific has been known for producing some of the best information to keep track of how much folks have raised and spent on their campaigns. Hopefully Matt will continue with his great tracking of late-expenditures when we get to that season. But for now, you can direct your browser over to Meridian’s Cal-Races website and download an Excel Spreadsheet for your computer, that will allow you to look up any statewide or legislative races, and see the current snapshot of latest numbers filed with the Secretary of State.

THANK YOU to Matt and the team at Meridian for providing this resource!… Read More

Anyone reading my posts knows by now (yeah, ad nausem, you may say) that the San Diego County Board of Education will fill Ernie Dronenburg’s vacancy Monday night. The Union-Tribune this morning runs a detailed list of the 11 candidates, as well as another story, "Education board to fill seat," on the recent history and responsibilities of this sometimes enigma-of-a-body.

The latter-mentioned story, although not crediting the FlashReport (every other newspaper around seems to be lately), does make mention that "Conservative blogger and La Mesa Councilman Barry Jantz and online newspaper Voice of San Diego both raised questions about the county Office of Education’s failure to post news of the board vacancy until just days before the Jan. 27 deadline to apply." Factual, althoughI didn’t know that a strong belief in fully transparent government processes was something conservative. I thought it was common sense,… Read More