• Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: May 7, 2012

    These are my links for May 4th through May 7th:

  • Pinboard Links

    Flap’s Links and Comments for March 29th on 18:25

    These are my links for March 29th from 18:25 to 18:34:

    • California’s Red Lining – The San Diego GOP – The Sacramento Bee reports that only 31 percent of residents are registered Republicans and 44 percent Democrats.  
      No Republican holds a statewide office.
      In 2010, Gov. Jerry Brown won 53.1 percent of the vote, while Sen. Barbara Boxer was reelected with 52.1 percent.
      California has 34 Democrats in the House, compared with only 19 Republicans. Both of its senators are Democrats.
      The California State Assembly roster has 52 Democrats out of 80 representatives, and the Senate roster lists 25 Democrats out of 40 State senators. 
      Conservative victories in San Diego also include passing, by nearly 75 percent, Proposition A, which is a countywide ban of project labor agreements. Nearby Oceanside and Chula Vista passed similar bans. The old rules allowed unions were to control municipal construction projects and avoid competition.

      Republicans lead in voter registration, too. According to a February 10 report, Republicans have 3,053 more registered voters in San Diego.

      So what can the California Republican party learn from these victories?

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      Read it all

    • Shocker: Organized labor mulling its own California ballot measure on taxes – The California Labor Federation is considering a ballot initiative on taxes after budget talks between Gov. Jerry Brown and Republican lawmakers broke down this afternoon.

      Art Pulaski, the federation's executive secretary-treasurer, said his organization has made no decision on an initiative but that, "We're certainly not going to sit back and watch the state fall apart."

      He said, "We are going to move forward."

      A voter initiative is one alternative Brown is considering to put tax extensions on a ballot without Republican support in the Legislature. The Democratic governor has not said how he might proceed.

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      But, the unions and Democrats, particularly Jerry Brown wanted political cover from the GOP.

      They could have done this from the beginning.

    • Maher, Palin and Arianna – Hey, Arianna! Andrew Breitbart called Van Jones a “punk.” Bill Maher called Sarah Palin a “cunt.” Which one did you ban again?

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      Yeah Arianna….is Maher off the front page?

  • Pinboard Links

    Flap’s Links and Comments for March 15th on 10:28

    These are my links for March 15th from 10:28 to 10:43:

    • Process issue will define CA GOP or NOT – The passage last year of Proposition 14, which replaced part primaries with an "open" primary and run-off in California, has set off a bitter fight inside the California Republican Party, which heads into a convention this weekend in Sacramento girding for a procedural battle that will shape its identity.

      The conservative party leadership, led by outgoing party Chairman Ron Nehring, has proposed that the party choose and designate a candidate despite the changed system, and that only the party choice be able to benefit from — among other things — crucial state party financial support.

      Members of Congress and state legislators, meanwhile, are pushing back quite hard, as in an email earlier this month signed by House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy and others:

       

      [Nehring's proposed] system forces endorsements – even when there are good Republicans running against good Republicans. Worse, should the "endorsed" candidate lose the June election, the actual winner is still not the official nominee of the GOP and could be denied any Republican resources. This is a disaster in the making!

      The second option is an alternative bylaw amendment supported by a vast majority of the Congressional delegation as well as overwhelming majorities in the Senate and Assembly Caucuses that allows the Republican Party to endorse when special circumstances arise – when a Republican otherwise might not make it onto the November ballot or when liberal interest groups or labor unions are trying to elect a sham "Republican" candidate who will not vote for Republican principles. 

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      The real problem is that in California with the open primary and top two system of elections, there is really NO reason to be a registered member of a political party.

      GOP Insiders want to preserve their power of the purse (for what it is worth since the Cal GOP is broke)and endorsements. Exisiting office holders don't want the smoke-filled room full of conservative activists calling the shots – as they routinely stack the County GOP Central Committees.

      If the Ron Nehring proposal passes, there will be a flood of Republicans re-registering to Decline to State.

      And, why not?

    • Dan Walters: Brown-GOP budget talks hit a wall – Confusion reigned in the Capitol Monday over whether Gov. Jerry Brown's overtures to five Republican senators to support his budget plan had utterly failed, or whether suspension of their talks is merely a temporary setback.

      Whatever the case, it appeared that Brown's hopes of placing $10 billion-plus a year in tax extensions on a June 7 special-election ballot had been dashed. Even if a budget agreement eventually emerges, the election will almost certainly be delayed.

      That would seem to be a minor hiccup, but having an election on June 7 – before the summer doldrums set in – has been one of several conditions Brown hoped would give his plan its best chance of winning voter support.

      He also wants at least a veneer of bipartisan support, no active business opposition, a simple yes or no on a single measure, and perhaps an all-mail election to create an optimal climate for what would be, under any circumstances, an iffy situation – asking voters to raise taxes by about $1,000 per family per year in the midst of the worst recession in 80 years.

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      I doubt the tax extensions would pass in any case. The California economy sucks and unemployment is too high.

      The Democrat welfare state has caught up with the taxpayer funders and the cuts will not be pretty.

      But, hey Jerry Brown wanted this job.