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Dan Lungren
Betrayed
Voters
3rd Congressional District gas price watch:
When this man was elected to Congress, gas was $1.43 a gallon!
Recent price:
$3.05 gallon
Ask yourself why?
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Prison Scandal...
Reader reaction...
"Mr.
Kelso belongs in a mental institution himself. He is mentally ill if he
thinks the Taxpayer needs to spend $96,000 annually on each of these
slimeballs. Mr. Kelso is the epitomy of a power-drunk bureaucrat."
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In the Governor's office:
Governor pledges to help community of Paradise Valley
By Tim Traeger, San Bernardino County Sun
Surrounded
by a cadre of federal, state and local officials, Gov. Arnold
Schwarzenegger toured the flash-flood-ravaged community of Paradise
Valley on Sunday morning, promising to speed aid to the beleaguered
community. After exiting a black SUV, the governor, with Rep. David
Dreier, R-San Dimas, Supervisor Michael Antonovich, state Assemblyman
Anthony Portantino and La Ca ada-Flintridge Mayor Laura Olhasso,
trekked through the mud of Manistee Drive, witnessing first-hand the
destruction from Saturday morning's deluge. At least four inches of
rain pounded already saturated hillsides denuded by last year's
160,000-acre Station Fire, leading to mud and debris flows that damaged
or destroyed at least 30 homes in this tiny community. As he came upon
Karineh Mangassarian's home at 2002 Manistee, the governor paused to
give his condolences and offer a hug to the woman whose house was
buried almost to the roofline in debris. She had been up all night. As
Schwarzenegger left, Mangassarian wasn't awe-struck by a visit from the
governor, saying she just wanted to know how she was going to be able
to deal with the mud and rocks that had overtaken her home of eight
years. "I don't care that much about the governor," she said. After the
nearly 20-minute tour, the governor addressed reporters on the corner
of Ocean View Boulevard and Derwood Drive, but the sign marking the
intersection had been swept away along with parked cars and 4,000-pound
K-rails. "I'm responding to the disaster so I can assess the damage and
act if there are any needs," he said. "We will help with federal and
state permits to help people rebuild. After the rainstorms of two weeks
ago, we thought we would be out of the woods. But the latest rain
brought fantastic damage."
In the Legislature:
State ends free mammograms; cuts to be protested
By Jim Steinberg, San Bernardino County Sun
Women's
health advocates, health care professionals, breast cancer survivors
and consumers will be in Sacramento today to discuss and protest cuts
to the statewide Every Woman Counts program, which provided free
mammograms to underserved women. On Jan. 1, the state suspended the
mammograms for new patients until July. When services are reinstated,
the program will no longer screen women ages 40 to 49. The Assembly
Budget Committee will meet Monday to find out why revenues are falling
on Proposition 99 tobacco tax revenues, which funds the program, said
the committee's chairwoman, Assemblywoman Noreen Evans, D-Santa Rosa.
Of particular concern is whether there will be funding to resume the
mammography screening on July 1, she said. "Too much of the state's
cuts has been on the backs of women and children," she said. Although
reductions to this program do not directly save state revenues, they
will ultimately increase costs for Medi-Cal as cancers are found at a
more advanced stage, Evans said.
Campaign and election news:
 Whitman putting her money where her campaign is
By Phillip Matier and Andrew Ross, San Francisco Chronicle
Republican
gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman talks a lot about how politicians
need a "new attitude" when it comes to excessive spending - but
apparently not when it comes to the former eBay exec's own campaign
spending. According to campaign records, Whitman spent $294,103 in 2009
on charter jets to shuttle her to meetings, appearances and fundraisers
at such locations as the five-star Hotel Bel-Air in Beverly Hills, the
Lodge at Torrey Pines in La Jolla (San Diego County), and the Princeton
and Harvard clubs in New York. In all, Whitman spent $526,015 on
fundraising events, including $12,252 on star chef and caterer Wolfgang
Puck. Another $311,000 was shelled out for meetings and appearances,
including $22,698 to Hartmann Studios - the same high-tech theatrical
outfit that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger used for his "shock and awe"
campaign stunts. And when it comes to her campaign bureaucracy, you
couldn't get much fatter. On the other hand, Whitman's equally wealthy
Republican rival, Steve Poizner - who flies Southwest - spent $1.5
million on consultants, $151,000 on his Web site and $65,000 on
personal appearances and fundraisers. Aides to Whitman, who is running
30 points ahead of Poizner in the polls, make no apologies for their
gold-plated spending. "We have a budget designed to win in the June
primary and to build a top-quality campaign on every level, and we will
continue to do so," said campaign spokeswoman Sarah Pompei.
Welfare issue becomes a hot issue in governor's race
By Ken McLaughlin, San Jose Mercury News
Three
decades after Ronald Reagan catapulted the catchphrase "welfare queen"
into the political lexicon — and 14 years after President Bill Clinton
helped "end welfare as we know it" — welfare has suddenly become a
steamy political issue in the California governor's race. GOP candidate
Steve Poizner, the state's insurance commissioner, first raised the
issue in October, declaring that welfare should be a "transitional
assistance program, not a permanent way of life." And last month
Poizner's opponent, former eBay CEO Meg Whitman, made welfare reform
the subject of her first ad focusing on a single policy issue. In the
radio spot, Whitman picked up on a statistic also used by Poizner:
California is home to 12 percent of the nation's people but more than
30 percent of its welfare recipients. Nobody disputes the figures. And
they're often cited by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who for years has
proposed major changes in CalWorks, the state's welfare-to-work
program. He is now threatening to eliminate CalWorks and other social
programs if the federal government doesn't cough up additional billions
for California. But many welfare experts and advocates for the poor are
crying foul over the latest rhetoric, including Whitman's on-air
assertion that "California is the welfare state."
 GOP rivals in governor's race target welfare costsBy Jack Chang, Sacramento BeeRonald
Reagan singled out what he called a "welfare queen" for abusing
government aid. Newt Gingrich pushed welfare reform as part of his
Contract With America. Now, Meg Whitman and Steve Poizner, the top
Republican candidates for California governor, are bringing back
welfare as a key issue in their quest for primary votes. Welfare's
high-profile role in the race became clear last month when Whitman, the
billionaire former CEO of eBay, unveiled her first issue-specific radio
ad. "Some people worry that we're creating a welfare state," Whitman
says at the start of the spot. "The fact is, California is the welfare
state." Poizner, another ultra-wealthy former Silicon Valley CEO, has
made tightening welfare rules a key part of his plan to balance the
state budget. Like Whitman, Poizner proposes cutting lifetime welfare
limits to two years from five. "Welfare is an example of where we're
spending, in my opinion, several billion more than we should because we
don't enforce the work rules and our benefit structure is too high,"
Poizner said in an interview. "I just don't think it should be a
magnet." Whitman declined to participate in an interview on the issues
in the governor's race. The candidates' decisions to highlight welfare
match public opinion polls that have shown Republican voters
particularly dislike aid programs.
Energy scandal:
PG&E customers feel sticker shock from rising rates
By Tim Sheehan, Fresno Bee
A
Jan. 1 electricity-rate increase by Pacific Gas & Electric Co. may
not feel like much now. But when Valley temperatures climb into the 90s
and air conditioners start to hum in earnest, the utility company could
feel the heat as customers lose their cool over electric bills. As
PG&E prepares to make its case for yet another rate increase next
year, growing frustration over high bills and mounting skepticism about
the utility's new SmartMeters are prompting greater scrutiny of the
company's prices. Fresnans already grumble about getting higher bills
for electricity than people elsewhere. A look at rates in other
hot-weather communities in the southwestern U.S. suggests that they are
right. Compared to other utilities, PG&E's high-energy-use
households bear a greater burden to subsidize lower rates for customers
who use less electricity. To encourage energy conservation in
California, the prices charged for electricity by privately owned
utilities slide upward as a household's consumption goes up. So the
more power you use, the higher your rate. For PG&E customers, it
stands to be much higher. Its highest residential electric rate for
single-family households is as much as four times what people pay in
some other sun-scorched cities in the West.
Around the state:
San Francisco schools consider costly gay support program
By Jill Tucker, San Francisco Chronicle
With
everything from art classes, summer school and jobs on the chopping
block this year, the San Francisco school board will decide this week
whether to greatly expand school services, support and instruction on
issues of sexual orientation. The decision could cost the school
district, which is facing a $113 million budget shortfall over the next
two years, at least $120,000 a year - enough cash to cover the salaries
of two classroom teachers. The school board is expected to vote Tuesday
on the fiscally controversial resolution calling for San Francisco
Unified to add a new full-time staffer to manage "lesbian, gay,
bisexual, transgender and questioning" youth issues in the district's
Student Support Services Department. It also would require the district
to track harassment and discrimination based on sexual orientation and
distribute an educational packet to parents, encouraging them to
discuss "the issues of sexuality, gender identity and safety" with
their children. That commitment probably would cost about $90,000 a
year for the staffer and maybe another $30,000 for the rest. San
Francisco school officials have long backed education and support of
gay and lesbian support services and recently created the nation's
first school district Web site for gay youth. That's in contrast to
some other school districts. Last year in Alameda, for example, a
torrent of controversy was unleashed over plans to introduce a
45-minute lesson on gay and lesbian issues. The lesson was eventually
adopted by that school board over the objections of some parents who
said it violated their rights to teach their children their opinion of
such issues. That's not the issue in San Francisco. Money is.
Clinics object to bill that would let hospitals hire doctors
By E.J. Schultz, Fresno Bee
Community
health clinics and rural hospitals in the Valley both struggle to
attract doctors -- but they are on opposite sides of legislation that
seeks to fix the problem. Senate Bill 726 would relax the state's ban
on the direct hiring of doctors by hospitals, greatly expanding a pilot
program that started in 2004. The bill is supported by health districts
such as Kaweah Delta Medical Center in Visalia, where a top official
says the change is needed to help recruit doctors seeking the security
of regular paychecks. Today, most doctors are independent and negotiate
hospital privileges. "Physicians are just not trained to be business
people," said Steve Jacobs, who recruits doctors for Kaweah. "So it
becomes very burdensome if you don't have a business mind." But the
bill is opposed by a network of clinics that enjoy an exemption to the
hiring ban. The Central Valley Health Network fears it would lose staff
if nearby hospitals could hire doctors. The network's doctor shortage
is "so dire that [we] don't want to make it worse," said David
Quackenbush, chief executive officer of the network, a consortium of 13
federally qualified health centers. California's doctor hiring
restrictions are rooted in a ban on the "corporate practice of
medicine," which seeks to preserve physician autonomy.
Miller pushes to exclude illegal workers in jobs
By James Rufus Koren, San Bernardin County Sun
Make
it harder for companies to hire illegal immigrant workers, and those
illegal immigrants won't be able to find work. If they can't find work,
they'll leave. That's partly the thinking behind a bill proposed by
Rep. Gary Miller, R-Diamond Bar, that would require employers to verify
their employees are citizens or otherwise eligible to work in the U.S.
The bill, proposed last year, hasn't gone anywhere, but Miller plans to
push for it and similar legislation with members of a new Congressional
group: the Reclaim American Jobs Caucus. "You've got about 15 million
people out of work and we've got about 8 million illegals working in
this country," Miller said. "If you're a citizen or you're here
legally, you should have the first opportunity to take that job. It's
very simple." Last year, Miller introduced the Loophole Elimination and
Verification Enforcement Act - not so subtly called the LEAVE Act -
that would, among other things, require employers to verify they are
hiring only citizens or immigrants who are allowed to work in the U.S.
He said he wants to force businesses to use E-Verify, a free online
program employers can use to check employees' legal status, and create
penalties for employers that break the rules.
Central Valley Reps. want to open federal spigot for water projects
By Agustin Armendariz, California Watch
A
bill authored by Representatives Jim Costa, D-Fresno, and Dennis
Cardoza, D-Merced, is winding its way through Congress and would make
federal money, including stimulus funds, available to pay for a slew of
California water projects. Under present regulations, local
stakeholders share the cost of water projects with the federal
government; the bill would allow federal dollars to pay for the whole
thing. As justification for the increased federal expense, Costa and
Cardoza cite the record unemployment and drought conditions affecting
California. They argue that increased federal spending would create
jobs directly, through water projects, and indirectly, through
agricultural businesses, which would benefit from increased water. "Our
Valley’s farms cannot exist on a 10 percent allocation this year,"
Costa said in a statement posted on his Web site. "It’s unacceptable."
"If we are at 117 percent of snowpack in the Sierra, and to give our
farmers a 10 percent allocation is nonsensical and unexplainable. Our
farmers and farm workers need to be put back to work to grow the best
food and fiber in America." Taxpayers for Common Sense and the National
Wildlife Federation came out against the bill. In a joint
statement, the organizations content that in addition to "undermining
decades of hard won cost-sharing principles," the looseness of the
language in the bill could allow for abuse.
 McClintock's refusal to consider budget earmarks hurts his district, critics say
By Ed Fletcher, Sacramento Bee
As
the federal budget season heats up, some Placer County officials are
grumbling that Republican Rep. Tom McClintock's ideological opposition
to congressional earmarks puts their constituents at a disadvantage.
"It's already hurt us," Supervisor F.C. "Rocky" Rockholm said in a
recent interview. McClintock said he will not seek congressional
earmarks – budget requests made outside of the budget process. "I've
made it very clear that I will fight for our district through the
normal appropriations process," he said. In a telephone interview last
week, he said requiring earmarks to be public, as President Barack
Obama suggested in the State of the Union address, is a "step in the
right direction," but he'd prohibit them if he were writing the reform
measure. But the view among several Placer County officials – all of
them Republicans in nonpartisan elective offices – is that
congressional earmarks aren't inherently dirty. "The key for any budget
expenditure is whether it's reasonable and whether it has a federal
nexus," said Supervisor Robert Weygandt. Roseville Mayor Gina Garbolino
said earmarks shouldn't be abused but aren't always bad. "Earmarks have
been really good for Roseville," she said. McClintock said funding for
projects should be based solely on their merits, not on seniority or
who wields the gavel as the majority party. "It's basic advocacy; that
is how the process is supposed to work," said McClintock, who lives in
Elk Grove and is in his first year representing the 4th Congressional
District. He said he's worked through the normal process to secure
funding for as many as 29 area projects.
| Don't blame public
Establishment tries to excuse away its dysfunction yet again
By the San Diego Union-Tribune
A
new poll is out that’s absolute catnip for the members of the
California political and media establishment who like to say the
ignorant public demands services via ballot initiatives but then
refuses to pay for them with higher taxes. The Public Policy Institute
of California survey found residents don’t have a good sense of where
state revenue comes from or what the state spends most of its money on.
What does this unsurprising revelation translate into when interpreted
by the Los Angeles Times? A snarky news story that said Californians
who disdain our leaders and institutions “should save a little distaste
for ourselves. ... Those who favored the comics pages in decades past
may recall the words of the possum philosopher Pogo: ‘We have met the
enemy, and he is us.’” Other coverage had a similar tone. This is
nonsense – easily refuted nonsense.
Fiorina's demon sheep ad destroys real debate
By the San Jose Mercury News
When
Carly Fiorina tossed her corporate hat into the ring for Barbara
Boxer's California Senate seat, we wondered about her lack of
experience in civic life. But we had high expectations for her
discourse. We'd get straight talk, we hoped, from an articulate,
all-business woman — thoughtful discussion of complicated issues that
career politicians, burdened with actual records in office, sometimes
avoid. But the demon sheep? Man, we did not see that coming. Unless you
spent the week on Mars, you've probably watched the ad trashing Tom
Campbell, who jumped into the GOP race just last month and quickly
became the front-runner. Most of the attention has been on the
weirdness quotient: The amateurish production, with melodramatic music
and apocalyptic, choppy narration, portrays conservatives as sheep and
Campbell as an evil wolf in sheep's clothing with laser-red eyes — a
faux fiscal conservative.
Portugal, Ireland, Greece, Spain...California?
By Robert Cruickshank, Calitics
The
financial news in recent weeks has been dominated by concerns about the
possibility of "sovereign default" in several key Eurozone countries.
Often known as the PIGS (Portugal, Ireland, Greece, and Spain,
sometimes called PIIGS when you throw Italy into the mix), their high
levels of unemployment and debt are claimed to be a ticking time bomb
for the euro currency and the European Union as a whole. In recent
weeks Greece has been forced into promising "austerity" - meaning huge
budget cuts - in an effort to bring its debt levels down. Portugal is
exploring similar options after a debt sale didn't go as well as
expected, and now Spain is expected to follow suit with the Socialist
government proposing its own spending freeze.
SB 918 (Pavley) - Safe, Environmentally Sound Water Supply
By Traci Sheehan, California Progress Report
Last
Friday, Senator Fran Pavley introduced SB 918 which is currently
co-sponsored by the Planning and Conservation League and Water Reuse
California . This bill would help improve the availability of safe
recycled drinking water by requiring the Department of Public Health to
develop and adopt uniform health standards. If passed, the bill will
help California develop a new drought-proof source of safe, clean
water. Every year, California discharges nearly 4 million acre feet of
used water into the ocean - more than the State Water Project delivers
to the Bay Area, the Central Valley, and Southern California . Much of
that water could be recycled, but because uniform safety standards have
not been adopted, the permitting and design processes for creating
recycling facilities are unpredictable, discouraging local communities
from tapping into this major water source. By adopting uniform health
criteria for using recycled water to augment local drinking water
supplies, the Department of Public Health can provide project designers
with the guidance they need to cost-effectively create new water
recycling facilities that are fully protective of public health.
Playing games with Maldonado could backfire for the Assembly
By George Skelton, Los Angeles Times
The
Legislature is about to decide whether to allow a colleague to become
the first Republican Latino to hold statewide office in 135 years. But
more important questions also will be answered: Can the Legislature's
Democratic majority vote for a Republican? Can Democratic Latinos vote
for a potentially rival Republican Latino? Can Republican conservatives
vote for one of the Legislature's very rare Republican moderates? In
short, can this Legislature behave in a bipartisan manner? Or will it
act out in a spat of petty politics? The Senate seems to be answering
these questions on the side of -- as Sen. Gil Cedillo (D-Los Angeles)
puts it -- "comity." As in: civility, cooperation and camaraderie.
Logrolling lives large in California budget
By Dan Walters, Sacramento Bee
A
year ago, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Legislature enacted a
budget package noteworthy for a rare increase in taxes – but getting
the required two-thirds votes involved old-fashioned horse
trading. A top-to-bottom overhaul of how property taxes are
allocated, replacing the jury-rigged structure that evolved after
Proposition 13's passage in 1978, is clearly overdue. Otherwise, we'll
continue to see more juicy deals for legislators whose counties want
money and whose votes are needed for budgets or other bits of
legislation.
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