Category: Politics

The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation is implementing a hard freeze on spending as a temporary step to address a significant anticipated fiscal shortfall. The following areas are immediately frozen:
• Hiring
• Training
• Travel
• Contracts for discretionary services
• Purchases
• Overtime for Administration

“The hard freeze will remain in effect until such time as the Department is able to prioritize and then establish a system for authorizing expenditures.”

Union front groups have started running ads against Meg Whitman because she is being supported by big business and she opposes global warming.

The unions have 40 million to spend tampering with the Republican primary and their two biggest complaints about Meg are those! If that is their best shot, then Meg has little to fear from the Left. What a waste of money. Any business that supports a Democrat deserves to fail. Any rational person that supports AB 32 should not be allowed to vote because their IQ is negative.

The union motto should be Democrats: same old playbook, same old politicians, same old results.

Ok who is older? Jerry Brown or Robert Byrd

In other government news, I just got permission today to install Service Pack 3 on our Windows XP computers. This Service Pack was made available to the general public for download on May 6, 2008.

I work for an obscure part of the accounting department within the California Department of Corrections (CDCR). We have three computer systems used for various accounting functions. None of the computers can talk to each other. At best data from one system can be batch dumped into another system.

The mainframe system seems like it was state-of-the-art when Ronald Reagan was President. Much of accounting is done via a program from SAP. Travel expenses are done via a custom application designed for Windows XP. This program runs in a Java “sandbox.”

Recently, the “sandbox” has gotten filled. Hundreds of man-hours are wasted just trying to log-on to the system. This program is the primary application that people in my unit are supposed to be running. Lately, many in my office have gone a day or two at a time without being able to log-on or process travel claims.

The ultimate organization that controls this program is the State Controller’s Office (SCO). Unfortunately, SCO is caught with their cyber pants around their ankles and a look of bewilderment. Instead of being prepared for a department wide implementation of the program by CDCR, they have been caught unaware.

Now this program has been in its current form since 2001. Requiring all institutions to use the program was a deliberate decision and I’m confident that SCO said no problem when they heard CDCR would begin requiring the use of the program. Only about 26,000 people in the department are even registered users. That’s less than 1/3 of CDCR employees.

SCO supposedly upgraded their servers and maxed-out RAM in the system last week-end. It has resulted in no noticeable improvement in the functioning of the travel program. The bottom line is that there are too many users trying to connect simultaneously and the system—no doubt built with millions in tax dollars by the lowest bidder—is unable to handle the real world conditions.

It will be interesting to see how the long this situation persists.

Today the following email greeted me. If you want to know the history just Google Barbara’s name. This is too rich!

I kid you not.  The Republicans of River City (RRC) have endorsed, and I can hardly believe it myself, Barbara Alby for Board of Equalization.  Please see the forwarded press release below from none other than Carl Burton.
I have heard of politics making for strange bedfellows, but Carl Burton and the RRC endorsing Barbara Alby for anything is beyond belief.  This is either one of the greatest practical jokes of all time or I have entered the Twilight Zone.
UNBELIEVABLE!
Name Withheld

 

Barbara Ably endorsed by RRC for BOE

SACRAMENTO—- The members of Republicans of River City (RRC) unanimously endorsed Barbara Ably to replace Bill Leonard on the Board of Equalization (BOE)at their regular monthly meeting on Tuesday, October 20.

Bill Leonard currently represents BOE District 2 but is prevented from running for reelection due to term limits. Bill endorsed Barbara to replace him on the board. Barbara has served with distinction as Bill’s Chief of Staff for the past seven years.

The members of Republicans of River City recognize that there are four outstanding Republican candidates for Bill Leonard’s BOE office. However, because of her experience as Chief of Staff, Barbara is viewed by RRC members as the outstanding candidate for this office.

In addition to her experience as Bill Leonard’s Chief of Staff, Barbara served in the California State Assembly with distinction.  Finally, Barbara served as one two California representatives on the Republican National Committee. There she was elected to several positions and made California’s voice heard.

Carl Burton, President of Republicans of River City said “the volunteer club is one of the largest Republican clubs in Sacramento County and Northern California and has a long history of endorsing candidates who later win in the primary election and go on to win their office in the general election.”

For those that don’t know the history of the love between Barbara Alby and the Republicans of River City, this would be much like the Palestinians nominating Israel for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Teddy “The Swimmer” Kennedy finally passed away yesterday.

He was a symbol of all that is wrong in modern American politics. He was one of the more successful Machiavellian liberals. Kennedy often treated the US Constitution as a suicide pact. He never met a terrorist or a communist that didn’t occupy a warm place in his heart. He perverted the values of America to expand the welfare state and erode the rights to own private property. He worked to thwart a parents’ ability to pass their values to their children. He spent his whole career trying to destroy the values the made our country great. He was always a defender of murdering the unborn and in his later years he worked to establish a national framework for euthanizing the infirm and aged. Kennedy hated Truth and Justice and anyone that stood for those values. He made a mockery of his faith and his family. He was at least guilty of manslaughter and to many he was a murder that got away with it.

His legacy is one of moral failure both personally and in his legislation record. Any success touted by Kennedy was a diminishment of the American people. His gains were our losses. How a man who so totally embraced wickedness could be called a role model for anyone is a commentary for just how corrupt we have become as a people. The only sad part in all this is that I am sure the people of Massachusetts will give the rest of the country another Senator just as worthless as Kennedy.

I have a mental picture of Kennedy experiencing his eternal reward and begging Father Abraham to let Mary Jo give him one cup of water to ease his suffering. Enjoy reaping what you sewed Uncle Teddy ‘cause you worked hard for it!

While their buddies at the state capitol are dragging their feet on getting something resembling a balanced budget for California taxpayers, state workers are fretting about the economic hardship that three furlough days a month is inflicting on their lives.

Please note that despite any publicity to the contrary, not one state worker has lost their job! Local and county governments have been lightening their load but the state has yet to do anything meaningful to cut spending. As anyone in the private sector knows, payroll is the largest part of any large organization. Compared to the punishment inflicted on the private sector, the state still thinks it is fun and games as usual. In fact the state is still hiring new employees in July despite the fact that any solution will have to involve reducing payroll.

Now that a third furlough day is added, state workers are being offered courses during working hours on “Coping with the Stress of Economic Uncertainty.” This three hour seminar will “explore healthy strategies for managing stress and increasing resilience during tough economic times.”

What do state workers with cushy jobs and great retirement know about stress?
Try running a business in an environment designed by the state employee’s union and still make a profit; now that IS stress!

Meanwhile Karen Bass is whining like a little baby. Hey Karen, if you don’t like your job quit and give it someone who can get it done.

I realize that California is experiencing a fiscal meltdown. Layoff notices are flying all around the ranks of government workers. In the midst of all this drama would you believe that I got a job with the State of California? No I didn’t land a cushy appointment from the Governor. I started as a lowly paper pusher for the Department of Corrections. Yes the same department that just sent out over 1,500 layoff notices!

I interviewed and was hired a week before the notices were sent out in May. I did part of my pre-employment paperwork in May; most notably the Form I-9. I had to speak with four different people before I could convince them that a passport was the only document required, (I only spent 15 years doing HR and payroll and I know what documents you need to check to hire someone.) The third week after I reported to work, I finally got fingerprinted and filled out the IRS Form W-4.

Interestingly, I signed the form with the oath required by state employees to uphold the constitution twice but neither time did anyone actually administer the oath to me. The second time, the person helping me with the paperwork even signed the portion saying they were a witness to the oath being administered—even though they never administered the oath. Go figure!

The conditions in the office were surprisingly Spartan. There are virtually no office supplies in the supply room. Employees are cannibalizing empty cubicles for supplies. The supply cabinets consist of odd sized Post-it Notes, red pens, typewriter ribbons and tractor feed labels. After trying two calculators that were both broken, I ended-up bringing my calculator from home.

My four year old has a better computer than I was given at the government office. The HP that I run at work is a real dinosaur. It is slow. I’m sure the video memory is shared with RAM which makes it even slower. The user rights are fairly locked-down and I can’t install any programs or run Windows Update. My son’s computer is dual core with 640 MB of video memory. It is very fast running XP Professional.

Every copy machine in the office is either dead or on its last legs. I have difficulty getting my work done when I can’t make copies. I thought about bring in my flatbed scanner just to run copies but I don’t have rights to install any programs.

Contrary to what you would expect in government service, there are no procedure manuals for the work I am currently doing. I am processing paper forms that are then entered on a mainframe program that was probably new in the 1980s. It takes days to process the forms for payment. Partially this is because the people filling out the forms don’t follow directions. All the places they leave blank or incomplete I have to fix. I then have to check all math on the forms. I must then hand-code all entries and write them on the form. I have to check vendor setup in the mainframe and then check for advance payments prior to authorizing A/P entries into the system. After several more tedious steps, I have to do some more antiquated procedures. The copy of the paperwork that is sent to the State Controller for payment is literally held together with string. I had to salvage a three-hole punch and rig it as a two-hole punch to get holes in the paper for the string to go thru!

There is a system that employees can use to do this online and deliver folks like me from as much paperwork but the computerized system is only optional. This system is also obsolete but the new accounting program used by the rest of the state is not yet compatible with what I’m doing.

“And one of the points I want to make is, is that if you actually took the number of Muslim Americans, we’d be one of the largest Muslim countries in the world.” Barack Hussein Obama

Just for the record, I ran the numbers and the United States ranks 56th in the world and has a population of 0.78 percent Muslims. Yeah, less than ONE percent. Hey Barry WTF? Obama is not only lying, it’s a whopper that is reminiscent of Bill Clinton in his heyday.

Niccolò Machiavelli would be proud of Barry’s brazenness. Does this guy really believe this stuff or just think people with towels on their head will believe any BS that is said for their consumption. Obama probably thinks he is giving an olive branch to the Middle East but he is actually double-dog daring them to call his bluff. We will regret his stupidity and arrogance.

Sorry, but can we really afford four years of this fascist buffoon?

I finally was able to hear Steve Poizner speak at our much delayed Reagan-Lincoln Dinner here in Sacramento County. I was most impressed by his presentation and understanding that “it’s the spending stupid” to lift a phrase from another political campaign.

He fielded a number of questions on a variety of issues. The person next to me was anxious to ask Poizner about his position on abortion—a subject that many folks are passionate about. I suggested instead of asking him which label—prolife or prochoice—he wished to apply to himself that this person ask him specifics about issues that Poizner would likely face as governor. I suggested that he ask about taxpayer funding of abortion and conscientious objections by pharmacists and other healthcare providers to being forced to provide “morning after” pills and other such methods of abortion.

The person seated at my table got up after Poizner had completed his Q & A period and went looking for his. This person had stated previously that he would only vote for prolife candidates. He must have been successful with what he was told by Poizner because when he returned to the table, he was filling out an endorsement card.