Category: Politics

Yesterday was the day I realized that I can no longer associate myself with the so called “conservative majority” of Sacramento County Republicans. Three different threads have proved to me the futility of trying to work with these folks.

Sacramento County Sheriff
There are three candidates for this seat. Two are Republicans—Brett Daniels and Scott Jones—while the third is a Democrat. As a member of the California Republican Assembly here locally, I and some of my friends have been pushing for an endorsement for Scott Jones. The local CRA clubs are the only Republican body that has a practice of making pre-primary endorsements that has not taken a position in the race. The statewide CRA vice-president in charge of this area manipulated the process when a local endorsing convention was held to deny a vote for this race. Per statewide bylaws, the largest local chapter can call an endorsing convention within 50 days of an election if one has not been held. The SRA (Sacramento Republican Assembly) has refused to call an endorsing convention for this race. Whether my guy gets the necessary 2/3 vote needs for an endorsement, the fact that a vote is not even going to take place is an outrage.

What is SRA willing to do in this race? They are unwilling to do their job but have instead voted to go after any elected Republicans that endorsed the Democrat in the race. So instead of endorsing someone and then challenging local Republicans to back their guy, they are jumping to attack people that tend to support them on other issues. I previously covered this in my article about Chess and Checkers so I won’t rehash the particulars of the individuals that they targeted or what I think their motivations might be for endorsing as they did.

Support the Platform PAC (STP)
Support the Platform ran a slate last election cycle to elect people to the Sacramento County Republican Central Committee. This was an effort to elect conservatives to greater representation on the Central Committee. STP got much of their slate elected, whether thru their efforts or just because they ran so many candidates is a matter of some conjecture. STP’s governing board is composed of current and former SRA officers. At various points in time STP has been directed by votes of the board or membership of SRA. In addition, SRA has given money to STP. In some cases it was a loan to be repaid and in others it was not. At other points, STP has asserted that it is an independent Political Action Committee (PAC) and not subject to direction or control of SRA.

The incestuous nature of the relationship is such that the FPPC (Fair Political Practices Commission) could have a field day with this group if it ever amounted to anything. In addition to the money issues, they have jointly planned strategy and even coordinated with candidates running for office. If they maintain their independence as PAC they are in clear violation of many campaign laws. Below is a record of financial transactions between STP and SRA as of April 2009.

In the last election cycle, I was involved with STP. In the process of getting the Cosumnes Republican Assembly formed in the southern part of Sacramento County, I incurred the wrath of many in SRA including the STP board and was not invited to be on their slate this year. That was expected and OK with me because I don’t have any money to contribute this year and I’m disappointed in their leadership at SCRP but I’ll get to that at another time.

Anyway, I heard the new STP radio spot on KTKZ yesterday. I was not surprise to be called a RINO just because I was not with them. This is politics and us versus them is often used in such advertising; however, there are two claims that I believe are total crap that are in their advertisement.

Because of Support the Platform conservative leaders; the Sacramento County Republicans are adding one thousand new Republican registrations every week. Because of Support the Platform’s efforts, Placer County is a leading Republican County.

Thus STP claims credit for the voter bounty program that is running in Sacramento County. So how much did STP PAC and its members contribute to the bounty program? Zero. That’s right, not a single dollar. All money from the bounty program is coming from three sources: national and State party committees due to defending targeted races for State Assembly and Dan Lungren’s congressional seat and two local Assembly members that are contributing 50 cents each per registration. Why? Because State law prohibits the money from going directly to the effort. In effect it must be passed thru a third party (the county committee) in order to be spent. The fact that the current county chair is associated with STP is irrelevant to anything. Anybody between Tom Campbell and David Duke could be county chair and the money would still be there.

The second claim is just as much a pile of steaming hot excrement. “Because of STP, Placer County is a leading Republican County.” OK, so how long has STP been in Placer County? How much have they spent from their PAC? How many people has STP elected to the Republican Central Committee in Placer County?

In prior years, STP has never had a slate in Placer County. They have never spent a dime electing Republicans to the Central Committee. Until this year they had no presence in Placer County at all. The only reason they are in Placer at all this year is because Jeff Allan, the current head of STP, moved from Sacramento to Placer County. In Fact, the way I hear it, STP is running a slate not against the evil RINOs but against the Tea Party Patriots!

Sacramento County Republican Central Committee
I tried to bring up the STP ad at the Sacramento County Republican Central Committee last night and as expected the chair—who is also on the governing board of STP—shot it down as a non-issue. I mentioned that she had a conflict of interest in this situation and she dismissed it as something that she knew nothing about. She offered to bring it up at the next meeting if I could get a transcript of the ad by then.

All I asked was that STP drops the claim from the radio spot. I didn’t even bring up the Placer County claim. I simply asked that the Central Committee should not allow an outside group to take credit for the work of the Committee. A majority if not all STP board members were at the meeting. As with most things at such meetings, half the folks don’t know what is going on and the other half don’t want to deal with it.

Conclusion
Stay tuned for more on the continuing saga of how Republicans are determined to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

05-20-2010 Update
Local CRA chapters finally got together and voted on endorsing in the Sacramento County Sheriff race. Scott Jones was unanimously endorsed. Too bad we couldn’t do it when it mattered instead of being the last group to take a stand; afterall, voting only began ten days ago.

One thing I’ve noticed in politics is that there are two types of participants: those that play checkers and those that play chess. What’s funny and often tragic is the way that people are unable to read which their opponents are playing. Below are two examples.

Local talk show host—Eric Hogue—tries to “read the tea leaves” of political events. Sometimes Eric nails it and other times he’s so far off the mark that listening to him is as enjoyable as fingernails on the chalkboard.

Recently Hogue commented about Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger withdrawing his support of limited off-shore drilling in California. Arnold used the pretext of the environmental devastation caused by the oil well explosion and subsequent spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Hogue was perplexed with Arnold’s reasoning when none of the oil spill had even made landfall. Hogue was playing checkers.

As Paul Harvey used to say, “And now the rest of the story.” The history of this concession to drill offshore was a bone that Arnold threw critics of AB32 about two years ago. AB32 is California’s version of a carbon tax and trade scheme. Once implemented, the law is expected to cost over one million jobs in the State of California. Last week, critics of AB32 turned in enough signatures to place a measure on the November 2010 ballot to suspend AB32. Within 24 hours of turning in their signatures, Arnold had revoked his support of offshore oil drilling. That Mr. Hogue is chess.

Another example is currently playing-out at the Sacramento Republican Assembly (SRA). SRA has scheduled discussion and a vote on a resolution to go after fellow Republicans that are supporting Jim Cooper for Sacramento County Sheriff. They are targeting two Republican members of the Elk Grove City Council—Mayor Sophia Scherman and Steve Detrick. Cooper is also a member of the Elk Grove City Council and the only registered Democrat in the sheriff’s race. One thing SRA will never bother to do on its own is speak with these folks prior to taking a vote on the resolution. SRA is playing checkers.

I know both Scherman and Detrick. Scherman was at my wedding and has been a friend of my wife’s family for decades. My daughter is Detrick’s representative on the Elk Grove Youth Commission. If someone from SRA were to speak with either on them off the record they would learn that all three Republicans on the Council would rather see Scott Jones win the sheriff’s race. However, if Cooper looses, they will still have to work with him on the Elk Grove City Council for two more years (the balance of Cooper’s term). Scherman and Detrick decided that endorsing Cooper was a way to garner some good will with Cooper. If it helps Cooper win as sheriff then they don’t have to work with him any more on the Council and they like that prospect. If Cooper looses then they have tried to build some good will with him. Either way it strengthens their ability to get things done on the Council. Agree or not, they are playing chess.

The likely outcome of SRA’s motion demanding the immediate withdrawal of Cooper’s endorsement is that it will help Cooper to get elected. If Cooper’s campaign manager is any good, he can flip the condemnation of SRA into a positive for his candidate. Cooper can use SRA’s resolution to bolster the argument the he is the only candidate with strong bi-partisan support in his quest to be the next sheriff. SRA will be caught dumbfounded and flatfooted. Chess v Checkers.

If SRA wanted to do this right they would do what any good leadership manual tells you to do; namely, praise in public and discipline in private. Since Elk Grove is not even in the geographical area chartered to SRA, they should grant Cosumnes Republican Assembly at least the courtesy of a consultation before going after members of that Republican group.

Many Conservatives claim to be men and women of principle until those principles have more of a cost than they are willing to pay. Many of these Conservatives are running for the tall grass because Arizona passed a state law that mirrors existing Federal law on immigration. Pundits and candidates alike are denouncing the law because it is ill timed (so when is a good time?) and changes the national debate from overspending and Obamacare to the wedge issue of immigration. Hey we all knew months ago that Obama would be moving to immigration to try and divide Republicans.

Arizona pointed out that the emperor has no clothes and the Republicans panic. Why? Arizona is right. Yes immigration should be a federal issue but where does the national government get its power? From the States. Who has to bear the cost of illegal immigration? The States. When the national government fails to do its job, who gets to pick-up the slack? The States.

Michael Savage is right that it is borders, language and culture. Americans want secure borders. Neither political party has the will to do what needs to be done. Arizona is tired of people being murdered, criminals running roughshod over their people and the national government protecting the law breakers.

The irony is that California will be worse than Arizona in terms of lawlessness and crime due to the fiscal mismanagement of the state within the next couple of years. Under court order, releasing over 40,000 criminals into our society combined with counties abolishing law enforcement presence in unincorporated areas will create an explosion of crime that will rock the state to its core.

Radio talk show host and almost State Assembly candidate—Eric Hogue—finds the Arizona law ill advised and feels that such a move gives the Democrats a reason to energize their troops. He also sees immigration as a wedge issue to divide Republicans. “Just when we were focused on Obamacare, deficit spending, the economy and an ideology of socialistic intent, we are drug back into a wedge issue that has Democrats unified and Republicans stupidified.” http://hoguenews.com/?p=9886#comment-4783

Hogue’s three points outlining why the Arizona law is wrong can be summarized as:
• Immigration is a Federal issue
• Arizona is violating the 4th Amendment
“When they are forced to produce papers regarding their citizenship their rights are violated with an illegal search and seizure.”
• Illegal immigration is not a state crime
“The new law imposes criminal penalties for conduct – being in the state illegally – this is not a federal crime; being found to be in the country without proper documentation isn’t categorized as a criminal offense. It is a violation of immigration law and grounds for deportation.”
I agree with Hogue that the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals will overturn the law but that means little since the 9th Circuit is the most overturned court in the nation.

Let’s look at Hogue’s arguments in a different context. I can take every argument that Hogue made about opposing the Arizona law on immigration and apply the same three points to opposing the George Runner sponsored initiative that voters must show ID to vote in California.
• Voting is a Federal issue.
• Voters showing ID violates the 4th Amendment.
• Voting is not a crime, preventing voting is.

Why is illegals showing ID bad but voters showing ID good? Due to the way the Federal Courts have applied the Bill of Rights to the States via their interpretation of the Equal Protection Clause, what’s good for one is good for the other. Either showing ID is OK or it is not. The Liberals are consistent in their arguments but many Republicans are not.

Republicans should stand for what is right. They should not be ashamed of people wanting to have their families, homes and jobs protected from the burden of illegal immigration.

Will it really have to take an illegal bringing a suitcase nuke over the border and using it in a heavily populated Liberal area like Los Angeles or San Francisco to get the national government to take their job seriously?

Arizona may not be able to stop illegal immigration but that doesn’t mean the law abiding taxpayers that live there must pickup all the slack of the federal government.

I woke up this morning to this headline from Associated Press “American Taxes Lower, Despite Anti-Tax Rhetoric.” Thankfully I had not had breakfast yet or I would have barfed. My first thought is what planet are these guys living on but then I remembered that the media is in bed with President Obama. This headline is the biggest bunch of crap I have seen since Barry signed the nationalized healthcare bill. We are paying lower taxes? No “F”ing way!

Americans have never been taxed as much as they are right now. The best that most politicians can say is” Yeah but look what we let them keep.” I made 11K less than the previous year and paid MORE in income taxes by almost $1,000. AP thinks I should be grateful? “Kiss my grits you fascist pigs” And this does not include all the other taxes, fees, and mandated stuff I have to pay that is going up every year due to more government regulations and interference with private business. Then there are all the costs passed down from the government regulating other folks.

Here in California, my vehicle fees have doubled; the child deduction has been cut for $309 each to $99; the State pension fund is upside-down by 500 billion dollars and the city and county retirement funds are just as bad; businesses are dying; and unemployment is really closer to 25% not the 12.5% that is reported in the media.

Our economy is in worse shape than the Great Depression. The cause is not the businesses of America but the government of America. We used to think “taxation without representation” was bad but now we are worse off under taxation with bad representation. President Obama and likeminded politicians are cooking the books in ways that Enron could never have imagined. The difference is that they are the ones wielding the sword and they are so arrogant that they think no one is holding them accountable.

Every elected official take an oath to protect and defend the Constitution from all enemies foreign and domestic. Unfortunately for our people, the politicians in many cases are the domestic enemies of the nation. Thank God that many people are waking up to this threat. I’m happy to join with like minded people that love our country and want government restored to its rightful boundaries. We need to restore fiscal accountability, reduce the scope and reach of government and lower the regulatory and tax burden on our people. That is why I will see you at the Tea Party today to send a message that we have had enough.

The 2010 Tea Party in Sacramento was smaller than last year. The crowd seemed older and less enthusiastic. The worst aspect of the gathering was the sound system. The audio had so much echo that it was unintelligible from the sides and hard to understand when in front of the stage. In four hours of attending the program, I never heard a single speaker. Only fragments could be understood.

It was nice to see many political folks that I know both past and present.

Signs were varied and most were homemade. Several had spelling errors that were unintentional. Some signs were clever. I wrote down a few examples of signs at the event.

Please don’t tell Obama what comes after a trillion.

November Cometh.

You can’t fix stupid, but you can vote it out of office.

Taxed Enough Already.

2010 end of an error.

Term Limits: change we can believe in.

My biggest complaint about the Tea Party is the seeming lack of focus and direction. My imaginary conversation with the Tea Party would go like this:
Me: OK, we don’t like taxes but what will we do?
TP: Vote.
ME: Good, but what else?
TP: Organize.
ME: To do what?
TP (Awkward silence followed by clearing throat): …

At Tea Parties you will hear that incumbents are bad, Republicans aren’t any better, let’s get back to the Constitution; however, at the end of the day the Tea Party mandate gets fuzzy.

Two domestic enemies of the US Constitution threw in the towel today. Congressman Bart Stupak (above), a distant relative of Judas Iscariot, and US Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens announced they were retiring at the end of their respective terms.

There is real hope that Stupak will be replaced by someone of better principles. Justice Stevens will likely be replaced by someone with more disdain for our republic and way of life.  Hopefully, many more will follow Stupak “into that good night.”

The State Controller’s Office (SCO) is once again delaying cash reimbursements to State employees for travel expenses. Whether this is a software issue or a result of budget shortfalls is not known. This is in addition to the spending freeze that is in place in parts of the government.

The CalATERS (California Automated Travel Expense Reimbursement System) program used by the Dept of Corrections and Rehabilitation has been down frequently for over six weeks now. The amount of man-hours wasted by users trying to make use of this program is incredible. Its failure is approaching that of the DMV boondoggle of several years ago and thus far the media has not gotten wind of this problem.  SCO has responded with mass approvals and deletions of unaudited claims but the problems still persists.

I can’t wait until Meg Whitman or Steve Poizner gets their hands on the waste, fraud and abuse of systems like CalATERS. This system is so contrary to GAAP that it should never have gone live; let alone been rolled-out for use by agencies of State government.

Here are some shortcomings of the program.
• CalATERS cannot check for duplicate claims for the same trip or expenses.
• Approvers do not have to be immediate supervisors or even in the chain of command for employees.
• Receipts are not required for reimbursement of many transactions.
• There is no procedure to report waste, fraud or abuse of expenses charged directly to the State.
• Auditors have no written policies or uniform standards and training to audit claims.
• Due to system shortcomings, archive data further back than about three months cannot be pulled-up on the computers of auditors. Detailed claim history should be available for at least three fiscal years including the current one.
• Since multiple Regional Accounting Offices (RAOs) are pooled together, there are no clear cut delineations of which employee reports to a particular RAO.

Today, the powers that be decreed that any claims for travel reimbursement in the Department of Corrections—that were submitted within a certain period of time—will be approved with no verification.  Unless a CalATERS claim fails the “smell test” of an auditor the claim will be approved and any supporting documents will be audited at a later date. This is supposed to be implemented on a department-wide basis.

This initiative seems to originate from the State Controller’s Office as a way to fix the fact that the CalATERS program cannot handle the load or number of users from CDCR. The number of man-hours wasted on this program would likely pay for one that could do the job.

Meanwhile the “hard freeze” on travel is still in effect.

Update 02-24-2010 free pass period seems to be primarily for January 2010. Per email today goal is shedding 3,000 claims ASAP to reduce load on system.
This seems like a Band-Aid for systemic program design failure.

“Schwarzenegger says last year’s $862 billion stimulus plan is “terrific” and has created 150,000 jobs in his state…”—AP 2/21/2010

Hey Arnold, the stimulus bill has created no new jobs in the private sector in California and we all know it. If you really want to create jobs in California, turn on the water to the Central Valley farmers and tell the federal judge to go pound sand.