Free Republic

Will she? Won't she? And what if she does? That poll Matier and Ross published in The Chronicle showing Sen. Dianne Feinstein beating out all the other Democrats hands down in the governor's primary for 2010 is driving all the other wannabe candidates crazy, especially Attorney General Jerry Brown. I know Dianne has talked to at least one person about the governor's race. But she will never say so publicly, because if it got out that she was even "looking" at a possible run for governor, it would be the same as saying that she's in. But trust me, Dianne...

Sacramento, CA (AP) -- Assembly Speaker Karen Bass is proposing to raise $6.4 billion in taxes to balance the state budget. Bass told the Sacramento Press Club on Wednesday she wants to close tax loopholes and eliminate tax breaks on wealthy Californians. She declined to say which taxes Assembly Democrats want to raise.

The primaries may be over, but the presidential election spending is just warming up - with California once again proving to be the political ATM of choice for candidates from both parties. As of last month, Barack Obama had mined $35 million from the Golden State, Hillary Rodham Clinton had collected $27 million, and John McCain had raised $10 million. In each case, the California cash take accounted for more than 10 percent of each candidate's national total. All told, the presidential primary contenders raised more here than in any other state. So far, the candidates have pretty much been...

With just three Democratic primaries left and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's chances at her party's nomination increasingly a longshot, determined and deep-pocketed supporters based in San Francisco have launched an effort to keep the New York senator's campaign alive - making a case for counting primary votes in Michigan and Florida. Susie Tompkins Buell, a longtime friend of Clinton's and - along with her husband, Mark Buell - one of the country's most generous Democratic donors, is one of the forces behind the WomenCount political action committee. Since its formation earlier this month, the group has spent at least $140,000...

California is facing a cash crisis this summer, putting pressure on elected officials to submit an on-time state budget or risk asking taxpayers to pay a premium on loans. In the past, the state has been able to pay its bills despite projected deficits by borrowing money internally from some state special funds and by selling short-term notes on Wall Street. But a lack of cash reserves this year combined with lagging revenues has led officials to predict that the state will run out of cash as early as August, giving lawmakers a smaller-than-expected window to strike a budget deal....

California's decades-long isolation from national politics ended Tuesday as voters turned out heavily to vote in two close contests for presidential nominations – and they could play a critical role again in November. The political media have made much of the state's non-involvement in choosing presidential candidates for the last several decades, thanks to its traditionally late primary elections, but California also has been taken for granted in the November duels. For decades following World War II, California consistently voted Republican with just two Democrats – Harry Truman in 1948 and Lyndon Johnson in 1964 – winning the state's electoral...

Presidential candidates start final push, or gear up for run at California's delegate treasure trove. Even before the Iowa caucus results came in late Thursday, the four best-funded presidential campaigns were making an aggressive push to recruit California voters, while upstarts were hoping to last long enough to compete here on Feb. 5.The campaigns of Republican Rudy Giuliani and Democrat Hillary Clinton, working to reach permanent absentee voters across the state, were hoping to hold on to leads in the polls in California. The goal was to create firewalls to protect their campaigns against break-through candidates, such as Iowa caucus...

Victories by Sen. Barack Obama and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in the Iowa caucuses mean there's a better chance that Californians will cast a ballot that matters in their Feb. 5 primary - and they could see campaign TV commercials and mailers within days. What's helping to keep California relevant among two dozen other states holding Feb. 5 elections is that upward of 44 percent of its 16 million registered voters are expected to cast ballots by mail, which are scheduled to arrive in voters mailboxes early next week. Most mail-in voters submit their ballots in either the first...

But he still holds a nearly 2-1 advantage over his closest GOP competitors -- The firm hold former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani had on California Republican presidential primary voters is slipping, according to a new Field Poll released Wednesday. Giuliani's support among likely voters in the Feb. 5 primary has eroded to 25 percent, a 10-point slide since Field's last survey just two months ago. He still holds a nearly 2-to-1 lead over his closest competitors, however. Support for former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson remained virtually stagnant from the August poll at 13...

Panel awards the biggest bump -- 5% -- to attorney general and schools chief. California's legislators and other top elected officials -- already among the nation's highest paid -- received annual salary increases Monday ranging from $3,110 to $8,776.Attorney General Jerry Brown and Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell received the highest pay hikes, 5 percent, jumping their salaries to $184,301.Pay for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, state lawmakers and all other constitutional officers rose by 2.75 percent, a little less than the state's cost of living in 2006, records show. Schwarzenegger does not accept a state salary, but if he ever...

IF YOU want to know why the state budget is such a mess, consider the Assembly's 48-29 vote in favor of AB118. The measure, authored by Speaker Fabian Núñez, would raise fees paid by California drivers by $167 million in order to fund research for alternative and renewable fuels. According to the nonpartisan Legislative Analyst's Office, state expenditures are expected to exceed revenue by more than $3 billion for this budget year (2007-08), and the deficit is expected to grow to more than $5 billion in 2008-2009. So what does Sacramento do? Raise fees to pay for new programs, even...

For much of the past century, California has often seen itself -- and been seen by others -- as America's avant-garde state. John Gunther, writing in his famous "Inside USA" in 1946, gushingly described it as "the most spectacular and most diversified American state ... so ripe, golden." Recently, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger compared California to "the ancient city-states of Rome and Sparta," praising it as "the harmonious, the prosperous state, the cutting-edge state." Perhaps it's time to ditch the celebratory rhetoric and take a closer look at the sober realities. Our magnificent state may still be the home to Silicon...

Presidential hopefuls swarm the Golden State - Just as surely as the swallows return to San Juan Capistrano, the 2008 presidential contenders are flocking to California in search of money and support -- and there will be plenty of sightings around these parts in the next couple of weeks. Former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani will speak to a nonpartisan business luncheon crowd at Santa Clara's Hyatt Regency today, following his weekend splashdown at the state Republican Party convention in Sacramento. And the Democrats are right behind. Former Democratic Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack will be in San Francisco on Tuesday...

A Southern California fence-building company and two executives pleaded guilty in federal court Thursday to knowingly hiring illegal immigrants and agreed to pay a combined penalty of $5 million, marking a rare victory for the federal government in prosecuting employers for immigration crimes. Golden State Fence Co. pleaded guilty to the charge as a misdemeanor and agreed to pay $4.7 million to the federal government. It admitted hiring illegal workers between January 1999 and November 2005. Mel Kay, 64, the company's founder, chairman and president, and Michael McLaughlin, 42, manager of the company's Oceanside office, pleaded guilty to the charge...

Wayne Brown gave up $40,000 in income to move from the Bay Area to Kansas. And he feels great. It got to be too much last year for the college information-technology officer: the commute to downtown San Francisco that sometimes took two hours, the housing-price spiral and the high-wire borrowing that paid for it. ``I would find myself sitting in traffic,'' Brown recalled, ``screaming at people.'' When the Kansas job came up in early 2005, Brown and his wife, Teresa, sold two Bay Area homes and happily settled in a suburb of Kansas City. They have never looked back. The...

In the wake of Governor Schwarzenegger’s efforts to do exactly what the populace of the Golden State theoretically elected him to do when they voted him into Sacramento to replace Gov. Gray Davis a while back—that is, to initiate practical reform in California—I’d like to suggest that the power-hungry, Democratic Party-controlled unions in this state use whatever money they have left in their war chests and call attention to the need for just one more special election. This time around, let’s see if they (the unions) might be successful in passing a proposition that officially lists the state motto as...

Senator Tom McClintock The Debate for California’s Soul Remarks at the California Club for Growth PAC Annual Conference June 4, 2005 Thank you for that kind reception. Cardinal Spellman once said that public speaking brings out the best of Christian virtues in an audience. If you applaud, as you just did, at the beginning of a speech, it is an act of faith. If you applaud in the middle of a speech, it is an act of hope. And if you applaud at the end of a speech, it is an act of charity. So thank you for that act...

SoCal's report card not golden By Kerry Cavanaugh, Staff Writer With soaring housing costs, bad schools, horrendous traffic jams and a dearth of well-paying jobs, Southern California's once-golden lifestyle continues to dim, a scorecard released Thursday by the regional planning agency shows. The seventh annual State of the Region report by the Southern California Association of Governments ranks the quality of life in the region as a D-plus --potentially failing. Housing and air quality worsened in 2003, while the grades for traffic, education, household income and public safety remained static. And while the number of jobs in the six-county region...

It costs $58,000 a year for the average family of four with two working adults to pay the basic bills in Los Angeles County, according to a study released Tuesday on the cost of living in California. Many working families live from check to check, juggling mortgages or soaring rents, in addition to paying for utilities, food, child care, health care, taxes, transportation costs _ such as car payments, gasoline, insurance or bus fares _ and other basic expenses, researchers for the California Budget Project found. “It's expensive. Why do you think I'm waiting for the bus?'' said Maria Chavez,...

<p>With Gov. Gray Davis facing recall, a budget $38 billion in deficit, and a bond rating dropped three notches by Standard & Poor's to near junk-bond status, the lowest of all 50 states, the Golden State is no more.</p> <p>Who killed the goose that laid the golden eggs?</p>

Well, despite the cynical prophecies of doomsayers, doubters and darlings of political punditry, the “little recall movement that could” has placed the Golden State, once again, on the threshold of making political history. After thirty previous attempts to do so, a frustrated California body electorate recently gathered enough petition signatures to qualify a recall measure that was initially adopted as state law at the outset of the twentieth century. Between now and Tuesday, Oct. 6, Gov. Joseph “Gray” Davis will be fighting for his political life and, appropriately so--with all the splendor of a Hollywood suspense thriller--all eyes of a...