Inside Government

CalSTRS hearing underscores Mac Taylor’s destructive happy talk

An Assembly committee hearing Wednesday on the immense underfunding problems facing the California State Teachers’ Retirement System also illuminated another strange problem in Sacramento: the emergence of Legislative Analyst Mac Taylor as a civic arsonist. As John Myers reported, one

‘We are destined to live with a growing and permanent underclass’

Chris Reed February 19, 2014

It may be building very slowly, and years later than it should have first appeared. But there is beginning to be a groundswell of a broad understanding in California that there is a link between job creation and what the

CA Dems own state of the economy: Right, journos? Right?

Chris Reed February 17, 2014

Whenever President Barack Obama gets blamed for the still-mediocre condition of the national economy, his defenders in the Democratic Party, the punditocracy and in the allegedly neutral newsrooms of America immediately say things like, “He can’t get anything through Congress!

Oregon has become the new California

Joseph Perkins February 7, 2014

Imagine if a grizzly bear and a beaver squared off in a cage match. It would be a decided mismatch in the bear’s favor. That’s how interstate competition used to be between California – which prominently features a bear on

Is John Chiang a CTA-spiting kamikaze? Or a slick posturer?

Chris Reed February 7, 2014

California politics tend only to surprise with the extremes to which unions will go in flexing their power. Protect classroom sexual predators? No problem. Openly subvert direct democracy? Sure. Argue that only union nurses should be allowed to administer life-saving

Same-day voter registration law delayed until 2016

John February 5, 2014

Californians can expect to wait at least two more years for the state’s same-day voter registration law to take effect. Secretary of State Debra Bowen, the state’s chief elections officer, says that the state won’t meet the legal requirements to implement

Latest scandal: Why you would be nuts to believe CalPERS

Chris Reed February 4, 2014

The Sacramento Bee has the basic details on a new CalPERS contretemps: “A former CalPERS employee who alleged she was fired for challenging a cover up of insider trades by fund staff settled her wrongful termination case this morning. “Jeannine

Will appeals court notice AG’s flip-flop on bullet train?

Chris Reed January 30, 2014

It took the California Supreme Court five days to unanimously reject Gov. Jerry Brown’s request that justices immediately consider a Superior Court ruling that the state’s bullet train project had an illegal business plan and lacked proper environmental reviews to

State Sen. Rod Wright convicted of perjury, voter fraud

John January 29, 2014

State Senator Rod Wright, D-Inglewood, has been found guilty on eight counts of felony voter fraud, perjury and filing a false declaration of candidacy. The jury of nine women and three men, which began deliberating last Friday, sided with prosecutors who had

AG’s bullet-train appeal: Judges should know their place. LOL!

Chris Reed January 28, 2014

After rereading Attorney General Kamala Harris’ court filings from October and last week regarding the bullet train, I’m more convinced than ever that what we’re seeing from Harris and Gov. Jerry Brown is an elaborate charade to mask the fact