Sales tax holiday bill killed in leg committee

April 15, 2013 By Katy Grimes Assemblywoman Melissa Melendez has been leading the cause aggressively for a few weeks to give California taxpayers a  sales tax holiday, every tax day. Under Assembly Bill 718 by Melendez, R-Lake Elsinore, taxpayers would enjoy

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Newsom explains CA govt. for you

April 15, 2013 By John Seiler Promoting his new book, “Citizenville,” Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom spoke to Fortune magazine. His last line was the best, explaining how he’s eager to write articles, “I’m available, and I’m cheap because I’m in government,

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State schools chief: President Obama is a corporate stooge

April 15, 2013 By Chris Reed UC Berkeley linguistics professor George Lakoff’s blueprint for Democrats from a decade ago continues to reverberate. Lakoff stressed the emphasis of framing issues with the proper language and spoke of the power of metaphors.

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Now media notice: Obamacare worsens CA physician shortage

April 14, 2013 By Chris Reed Among the many severe problems with Obamacare that a cheerleading media chose to ignore in the run-up to its March 2010 enactment, perhaps the most obvious was the fact that it would be impossible

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Donors lavish gifts on key aides in CA Legislature

April 14, 2013 By Chris Reed The term limits that shuffle lawmakers in and out of office in Sacramento vest considerable power in the staff members who remain in powerful posts, whether working for individual lawmakers or in key assignments

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Jerry Brown, faux foe of regulation

April 13, 2013 By Chris Reed Jerry Brown has talked such a good game on regulations that he often gets credit for being a stalwart on the issue — even when all he ever does is offer lip service. That’s

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CEQA chases awesome Google project to Missouri, Texas

April 13, 2013 By Chris Reed A really cool project conceived of and developed by Google in Silicon Valley isn’t going to do Californians any good in the short term. It is Google Fiber — the search giant’s experimental Internet

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House GOP whip: Folly to expect fed $ for bullet train

April 12, 2013 By Chris Reed There’s a double-whammy targeting the bullet train on the op-ed page of Friday’s U-T San Diego newspaper. First House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy, R-Bakersfield, tees off on the state’s assumption that federal dollars will

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Not just in China: The corrupt act that got CA bullet train passed

April 12, 2013 By Chris Reed The news that the former head of China’s bullet-train program is facing corruption charges probably prompts some Californians to wonder if any of the people who aggressively lied Proposition 1A to passage in 2008

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CA bullet train: Parade of bad news continues

April 11, 2013 By Chris Reed On Wednesday, there was yet another negative headline coming out of Sacramento about the bullet-train fiasco: “A State Assembly budget committee voted Wednesday to approve a loan for the High-Speed Rail Authority. “The $26.2

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