Category: California Politics

  • California GOP Death Spiral: What Are You Selling?

    California GOP Death Spiral: What Are You Selling?

    Steven Greenhut offers an insightful analysis of the current state of the California Republican Party following the 2016 general election. An election that saw the California GOP slide further into irrelevance, giving California Democrats Super Majorities in both the State Assembly and the State Senate. Greenhut observes: In swing districts, the GOP can grab the…

  • Boom Or Bust – The Story Of California’s… Ballot Referendum Process

    Boom Or Bust – The Story Of California’s… Ballot Referendum Process

    Rant ahead: Please review the press release from the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Department regarding the impact of the just passed California Proposition 47. See also an article from the Los Angeles Times regarding Proposition 47’s impact in court on it’s very first day OK – This is why the ballot referendum process can be dangerous.…

  • California 2014-2015 Budget In Pictures

    California 2014-2015 Budget In Pictures

    Where we should be:   What the Democratic Legislature has delivered this century:   What the Democratic Legislature WANTS (Safety net!)

  • We’re Gonna Have a Surplus, And It’s Burnin’ A Hole In My Pocket

    We’re Gonna Have a Surplus, And It’s Burnin’ A Hole In My Pocket

    The California  Legislative Analyst’s Office’s Chief Analyst Mac Taylor is forecasting a budget surplus that could reach $2.4 billion by June 2014 and $5.6 billion by June 2015. The actual projection made by the LAO has the state at a $10 billion surplus in six years, provided that revenue and spending patterns continue at the same…

  • Fundraising With The Smear Of Guilt

    Fundraising With The Smear Of Guilt

    Received a delightful letter from the Republican National Committee. Seems that they are concerned that, well, I’ve gone loco.     I’ve got… a problem with  this. First, I’ve never contributed directly to the RNC. I’ve never been a member of the RNC. I have contributed to individual candidates. But I’ve never contributed to the…

  • National GOP and the California ATM: Or, how I learned to stop worrying, and love losing elections

    National GOP and the California ATM: Or, how I learned to stop worrying, and love losing elections

    I received a charming call from a national GOP fundraiser on Saturday asking me to ‘renew‘ my commitment to the National Party. I demurred, making certain that she understood that while I had contributed to the Presidential campaign in the general election, I was dissatisfied with the national party’s efforts across all fronts: Congressional, Senatorial, and the…

  • Let’s Make This Interesting And Start All Over

    Hey fellow Conservatives and the GOP, here’s my post election theme song. Don’t call me, I’ll call you. In January. Maybe.

  • Dominoes. California Style.

    Dominoes. California Style.

    The City of San Bernardino has become the third city in California to file for bankruptcy protection in the past two weeks. Essentially, the city was at a point where they weren’t going to be able to meet their payroll obligations. Stockton filed for bankruptcy protection in June. With a projected $26 million budget deficit, Stockton became the…

  • A Stick Up, or A Pay Off

    Sixteen billion dollars. The California projected deficit for 2012-2013.  Sixteen billion. The California deficit is just three billion short of the entire budget for the state of Colorado, at nineteen billion. The California deficit is three times larger than the entire budget of the state of New Mexico, at $5.6 billion. But it is not…

  • When anyone can spend, it really doesn’t matter where the money comes from, as long as it comes from someone else.

    California has a long history with the ballot initiative process. Most famously, Proposition 13’s passage in 1978 heralded the Tax reform wave that swept the nation in the 1980s. Proposition 13 however, impacted  how the state collected revenue, but it did not impact how the state could spend tax dollars. The larger history of the California…