The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation today released its proposed revisions to the lethal injection procedures, a first step toward resuming executions in the state after a four-year halt.

The proposals kick off a new 15-day period for public comment, after which the revised procedures can be adopted and submitted for what is expected to be months of judicial review in state and federal courts to assess the execution method's conformance with state law and the Constitution.

Executions have been on hold since early 2006, when concerns about the state's three-drug method prompted U.S. District Judge Jeremy Fogel of San Jose to deem the process a potentially unconstitutional infliction of cruel and unusual punishment.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger tasked a special panel with rewriting the lethal injection procedures in 2007, but the revisions were decided behind closed doors and later ruled illegal by a Marin County judge
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Executions should resume ASAP

I heard from an intriguingly well-placed source that there are growing signs Tom Campbell is near a decision to quit the gov's race and instead compete with Assemblyman Chuck DeVore and former H-P exec Carly Fiorina for the Republican nomination to run against the reliably aggravating Sen. Barbara Boxer.

I heard very similar stuff last week from a well-connected journalist covering state politics.

This would appear to be bad news for Fiorina. DeVore is the conservative pin-up in the race, Fiorina the pro-business moderate with skeltons in her closet that may make rank-and-file GOPers reluctant to accept the narrative that holds she would be more electable. Campbell is very much in the latter category.

The day Campbell switches, DeVore's road to the nomination gets much easier.
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Actually, Fiorina will be able to beat both of them. Tom Campbell has run twice before for the Senate and been beaten. He has NO money to campaign just like DeVore.

Larry Kudlow and Melissa Francis have been encouraging me to run for Governor of California. They're joking. Sort of. After all, could I be any worse? Hey, there's a campaign motto!

"Vote for Jane! She can't be any worse!"

Sure, there are serious issues facing California. As I head this evening to Sacramento to cover the Governor's final State of the State address tomorrow, it's obvious to all that to say this state is in a catatonic state is an understatement.

One year ago, California faced a gaping $42 billion projected budget gap over 18 months. It was only partially solved with cuts, furloughs (now being successfully challenged in court), tax and fee hikes, one-time federal stimulus money, and accounting maneuvers that collected some income taxes early to frontload the budget, while others moved money from the next fiscal year into this one.
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Flap used to live down the street from Jane. A good neighbor except that damn TV truck on the street – :o)

Married couples in France could end up with criminal records for insulting each other during arguments.

Under a new law, France is to become the first country in the world to ban ' psychological violence' within marriage.

The law would apply to cohabiting couples and to both men and women.
It would cover men who shout at their wives and women who hurl abuse at their husbands – although it was not clear last night if nagging would be viewed as breaking the law.

The law is expected to cover every kind of insult including repeated rude remarks about a partner's appearance, false allegations of infidelity and threats of physical violence.

Police are being urged to issue a caution in the first instance, but repeat offenders could face a fine, a restraining order or even jail.
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Only in France…..

Guess they will have to build quite a few more jails…….

I can't say it any better, so I'll steal Talking Points Memo's reaction: Oh, snap!

From an afternoon press conference:

…Pelosi did toss a jab President Obama's way

Referring to one of Obama's campaign pledges, a reporter asked Pelosi whether C-SPAN cameras would be allowed to film the House-Senate negotiations.

"There are a number of things he was for on the campaign trail," said a bemused Pelosi.
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Say it isn't so that Obama would actually LIE on the campaign trail.

North Dakota Democratic Sen. Byron Dorgan will not run for re-election later this year, creating a major pickup opportunity for Republicans.

"After a lot of thought I have made the very difficult decision that I will not be seeking reelection in 2010, " Dorgan wrote in a memo to staff distributed this afternoon. "This decision is not a reflection of any dissatisfaction with my work in the Senate, nor is it connected to a potential election contest next fall (frankly, I believe if I were to run for another term I would be reelected)."

Dorgan was facing a potentially serious re-election race against Gov. John Hoeven (R) in November. He was first elected to the Senate in 1992 and, despite the clear GOP lean of the state, hadn't faced a serious re-election challenge since then.

Dorgan is the first Democratic Senator to announce his retirement this cycle.

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Likely GOP pick-up

The 2010 election year appears challenging for many elected Democratic senators from politically competitive states, with President Obama and the congressional Democratic majority challenged to persuade the public to back their expansive policy agenda.
Bennet — who was plucked from relative political obscurity and is still not well-known throughout the state — has mediocre poll numbers and some determined would-be Republican challengers. These factors have prompted CQ Politics to change its rating on the Colorado Senate race to Tossup. That rating means there is no clear favorite in the race.

The previous rating was Leans Democratic, which denoted a slight advantage for Bennet in a highly competitive race.
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A real opportunity for the GOP to pickup a seat. Nevada too.

And you can add an extra degree of difficulty for Colorado’s Michael Bennet , who will face voters less than two years after he was appointed to fill a Senate vacancy.

When I heard that Redstate Chief Editor Erick Erickson was going to be on The Colbert Report (4 minutes before the show), I tuned in expecting to see copious nailage. The mixture of master satirist Stephen Colbert and hard-right loose cannon Erickson is a match made in nail heaven.
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Sorry Conservatives, if Erick Erickson is the state of conservative thought we are in a whole bunch of trouble. A WFB or Mark Steyn, Erickson is not and the goat-fucking comment leaves me cold.

Erickson is becoming a useful tool and caricature for the LEFT – just like Meghan McCain.

Just minutes after Republican gubernatorial candidate Steve Poizner released his fundraising figures for the last half of 2009, rival Meg Whitman's campaign said today that it had raised $3.5 million in that period and $10 million over 2009.

Poizner's campaign said it had raised $1.2 million in the second half of 2009 and $2.4 million since 2008.

Both Whitman and Poizner are former Silicon Valley CEOs who have each given their own campaigns about $19 million of their own money. The third Republican gubernatorial candidate Tom Campbell has not yet released fundraising figures for the last six months of 2009 but has been trailing both Whitman and Poizner.

The secretary of state's office will release official campaign finance data for the last reporting period at the end of this month.

Say what? Johnson was one of the major drafters of Proposition 34 as a Republican state senator and was fully aware, as critics were pointing out at the time, that the measure would facilitate money-laundering through political parties and the polite fiction of "independent expenditures."

As the measure was making its way to the ballot, Capitol politicians and lobbyists were already figuring out how they could continue their commerce without any material hindrance – with the bonus of being able to hide the source of money from voters and the media.

Despite its lack of context, the California Watch report does drive home not only the ineffective hypocrisy of Proposition 34 but the utter futility of attempting to regulate campaign contributions. There is simply no way, without repealing the Bill of Rights, to dictate who can give what to whom and under what circumstances or with what motives.
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Ross Johnson is a hypocrite. Eliminate limits with strict/timely disclosure on internet

The Obama administration has transferred dozens of names from a broad terrorism database to watch lists that are more closely monitored in an effort to plug security holes revealed by the Christmas Day airline-bombing attempt.
White House spokesman Bill Burton said counterterrorism officials have examined "thousands upon thousands" of names from the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment list, to which Mr. Abdulmutallab was added in November. Dozens of names were shifted to the Transportation Security Administration's no-fly list, or to the Secondary Security Screening Selection list, also known as the selectee list.

Lawmakers who want to extend health coverage to illegal immigrants will not block the passage of the final health care reform bill so long as the White House offers a substantive promise to start pushing comprehensive immigration legislation this year.

Democrats who want a comprehensive bill that reforms immigration law but also offers a pathway to citizenship have threatened to vote against health care if illegals aren't included in the new system, making immigration one of the sticking points as Democratic leaders negotiate the final details.

Democratic leadership aides believe that a firm White House promise of a comprehensive immigration bill will be enough to quell any House dissent.

As they seek to retain control of Congress, Democrats are finding that voter sentiments that gave the party its victory margins here and in other swing states in 2008 could turn against them for 2010.

Voters as a whole, rattled by continuing economic problems, tell pollsters they are disillusioned with incumbents — including Obama and congressional Democrats.

Meanwhile, tensions within the Democratic coalition, muted during the presidential campaign, are sharpening as Obama's broad campaign promises morph into specific proposals.

And most ominous of all for Democratic prospects, the highly motivated swarms of young voters, Latinos and independents who made the difference between victory and defeat in 2008 now seem dispirited, while conservatives seem reinvigorated.

In this challenging climate, the Obama administration is setting a policy agenda that could make the Democrats' problems even tougher
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Voters are not happy with the hope and change mantra of Obama