A California Republican

The thoughts and prayers of all people are with the families and soldiers at Fort Hood.

They suffered a brutal attack today. One of their own, a Major, attacked soldiers at a graduation ceremony. Regardless of the reasons, this is a brutal attack. On their homebase, where the soldiers come to be “home” to be safe after being in a tough war situation where there is no safety. A base is where soldiers place their families to be safe while they are gone. A base is a family. For one of their own to attack them, is a tragedy and a huge psychological blow.

It doesn’t help that the person who attacked is a convert to Islam. This just makes it worse for the soldiers. There are soldiers who are in training - basic training an advanced training- at Fort Hood. For them, this is a first lesson in how tragedy hits home. It is a lesson they didn’t think they would learn before they were fully trained.

Our thoughts and prayers are with them.

These are some of the bills the Senate passed on Wednesday. After they go to the Assembly for concurrence on minor changes, they go to the Governor for his signature or veto.

* AB 1017 (Law enforcement): A measure requiring law enforcement agencies to report to the state annually how many rape kits they collect, process and destroy each year. AB 1017 is in response to reports that Los Angeles city and county had about 10,000 rape kits containing evidence of sexual assault that had not been fully processed so criminals could be identified.
* AB 951 (Charter buses): This would increase, from $1,000 to $5,000, the civil fines that can be charged against charter bus companies that violate laws and regulations. The measure is meant to persuade “bad actors” to pay closer attention to safety regulations.

* AB 1319 (Talent scouts): This would prohibit talent scouts from demanding an advance fee for arranging a job or audition. The Los Angeles city attorney’s office said complaints about acting and modeling scams have - in an era of “American Idol” — doubled every year since 2006 and now total 1,000.

* AB 110 (Nature): This would allow the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy to expand the Rim of the Valley Trail to include an area near Santa Clarita including Elsmere Canyon. AB 110 could set the stage for filling a gap in the trail if the new owner of the canyon decides to sell or dedicate land.

It is good to know, in a time when water issues, budget issues and the economy are in crisis, that California lawmakers have the time to tend to the little things. To the really little things  - or so it seems. These bills are not worth the paper they are going to be printed on so they can be signed.

Did you know that California is auctioning off stuff on eBay? And is posting it on Craig’s List?

Today begins the great California garage sale. In order to raise more money, the Governor has signed things - like cars - in the hopes that they bring in more money. Good luck.

Even if the auction brings in $100 million dollars; it is a one time windfall that immediately spends 48% on education and the rest goes to what? Paying the fees of the auction? Getting new furniture to replaced the furniture that was acutioned off?

This”garage sale event” makes it seem like the Governor is interested in getting rid of the fluff in California, but it is simply not so. Getting rid of stuff will not make a dent in the budget. Instead the Governor needs to decide what is important, what services must be provided. The services that do not need to be provided should be cut, and the state workers providing those services will be laid-off.

The only real way to bring money into the state is to lower taxes, be more business-friendly (so that business want to stay here and operate here) and lose services that are not meeting goals. Those steps will bring in money. The garage sale is a joke, and simply makes the state look like it is a bumbling fool.

I need to apologize to the readers of this blog for the lack of posts. There was a death in my family, and it took until today to get everything attended to and straightened out.

 Coming up later today: a discussion of the vetoes the Governor is threatening. Also, a discussion of the budget plan.

 Thanks for continuing to read this blog.

The Governor is showing his true roots - he doesn’t like the workers he has to deal with. What other, possible, reason could there be for making state workers take another cut? The Governor’s newest budget proposal has state workers taking three furlough days (15% cut) plus another 5% cut. That means state workers are going to take a 20% pay cut.

These are the same state workers who help local businesses by eating out and spending money downtown where they work, or in whatever location they work. These are the same state workers who have mortgages and car payments that they have been making because state workers used to have a steady paycheck. These are the same state workers who don’t have any control over the amount of work they have to do - regardless of the furlough days. State workers have to get their work done. The added furlough days means more overtime pay, it is not simply a 20% pay cut, but it is a 20% pay cut in the base salary and then overtime.

A Republican legislative staffer has been quoted saying that the Democrats won’t go for the pay cut because the state workers “are their (the Democrats) constituents.” The staffer probably means that the state workers are in unions, which fund the Democrats - so in order to keep the funding the Democrats won’t cut the state worker pay.

Ok. So there won’t be a 5% pay cut. The Governor will just add a fourth furlough day.

How can he simply add furlough days? He declares a fiscal emergency. A state court has ruled that when the Governor declares a fiscal emergency he has broad executive power - which includes the right to furlough workers. The same state court found that the Governor could order furloughs to the civil service employees of constitutional officers (the Lt. Governor, Controller, and Secretary of State to name a few).  The state workers for teh cosntitutional officers still have not had to deal with furlough days becuase their bosses say they don’t want to furlough them.  This means the savings levels are even lower because of the lack of furloughs for workers at the constitutional officers offices.

In the meantime, everyone else is going to have to take another hit when the Governor orders a 4th furlough day. This is simply bullying. The Governor is pushing around those who are politically expedient. He’s not solving the budget problem. In fact, he’s creating another one because these are the same state workers who won’t spend money.

Maybe, instead of putting time and effort into determining savings from furloughs and fighting court battles, the Governor should put the energy into solving the mess that got him into this predicament - the budget hole.

“When a leader is in the Democratic party he’s a boss; when he’s in the Republican party he’s a leader” Harry S Truman

The Governor is leaving town on Tuesday - the day of his special election. He won’t be in California - he’s going to be back east. Why?

Someone from the Governor’s office let it slip that President Obama is going to announce, tommorow, that the federal government is adopting the same clean air standards that California is using. Of course, the Governor of California wants to be there for that. Why not? It is media attention for California, for the Governor, and it is media attention with the President.

Never mind that California is having huge problems complying with their own standards. Or that every state in the nation might not have the same ability to function as California, when these standards are in place. Instead, avoid the hard work of having to decide a national policy, and simply adopt California’s. Not a bad solution for the Presidential workload, but a horrible one for the nation.

I have been an advocate of making Army, or any military, service a path to citizenship for a while. I don’t think that college should be the path, because you are not demonstrating anything for the country in college, but you are in the military.

It turns out there is a small pilot program the Army has been running out of New York, and will now run out of L.A. Before this program, only citizens or permanent residents with green cards were eligible to apply. Now the Army is also taking people with temporary visas and those who have been granted assylum. In return for 5 years of honorable service, the person is given an expidited path to citizenship - about 6 months from the first dya of active duty. If the person doesn’t complete 5 years of honorable service, then they loose their citizenship.

This is a great deal for those who are here legally and want to become citizens. Naturalization fees are waived, and the path is much quicker than the standard 5-15 years. The FBI and Homeland Security still do background check, which they do on most military applicants. These applicants will not be given waivers for criminal offenses.

The bonus is that these foriegn-born applicants have higher scores on the testing, tend to be better educated, and provide much needed man power to the military. In fact, some of these people bring language skills to the military that, otherwise, they would have to send someone to mothers or years of training to learn. This means that the military’s ability to help out and be effective in areas where they need language expertise will increase.

Incerasing the effectiveness of the military is a good thing. Having people that know the local language and culture, and may be able to help prevent some mis-steps, is also a good thing. The U.S. mlitary often gets a bad reputation as an employer, but it is not. It provides job training, skills, and experience. It also pays you, instead of you paying, while you are in job training. It provides health care, dental care and vision care. In most cases, it provides housing or a housing stipend. These are all things that people need in down economic times, and they are provided for you.

This is a good program, and I hope it continues. It shouldn’t stop others from applying to the military, but it serves a good purpose.

Justice Souter is retiring from the Supreme Court.

It means that President Obama’s next task is to choose a new Justice. He is going to have to navigate a ton of interest groups, not to mention Congress, in whomever his pick is. The sad thing is, the pick is going to be ideologically oriented. No one gets to the Supreme Court because they are the best legal thinker and reasoner of their generation. They get to the highest court in the land by being a politically oriented judge. A judge must wait out until a President of the right party comes into office. A judge must have consistent opinions, even if the cases demand different opinions. This is the type of judge that gets to be a Supreme Court Justice.

Undoubtedly the new Justice is going to be a liberal leaning person, at least from the confirmation hearings and information the public will know. It won’t alter the make-up of the bench because Justice Souter is a liberal-leaning Justice.  What this Justice will do once they are on the bench is a different question. The Justices have tenure for life once they are appointed, and so they can change their political views if they wish.

Will it be a woman? An African American? A Hispanic? Who knows. Interst groups want all of that in one person. They would also like the person to be a practicing member of the Islamic and Jewish faiths, someone who stands by abortion, and stands against it. Not all the interest groups are going to be satisfied.

If the person is a good legal thinker, and is fair, then that is all the public can ask for. It is better to have a good thinker on the bench than someone who matches your ideology. The Supreme Court deals with issues that most people don’t want to touch with a ten-foot pole. In order to do that, they need to be able to think. So, hoepfully, this man or woman will be a good thinker.

This is a political nightmare for President Obama. He gets to nominate someone to the Court, which is great, but the backlash from interest groups who don’t get what they want is going to create a nightmare scenario.

Standardized tests prove nothing. All they show is how a student tests. Retention of knowledge, effectiveness of teachers, and ability to think are not shown on standardized tests.

However, there is a standardized test that English language learners take in California - the California English Language Development Test. This year, 39%  of the students taking it scored advanced or early advanced on the test. This is compared to 36% of the takers who scored in those categories last year.

What does this mean? Does it mean that teachers are more effective in teching English language learners? Certainly not. In order to show that there would have to be a test that shows the level of each child entering the classroom, and a level when they end with the teacher. The difference would be how motivated the student is to learn, how quickly the student learns, and how well the teacher can communicate ideas to the children. Nothing would measure simply the effectiveness of the teacher.

But regardless, for the moment, children have to take the standardized tests. Showing an improvement means that the teachers are doing a better job preparing the students for a standardized test - which isn’t something that should be applauded. Teaching means teaching children logical thinking, some basic facts, and instilling a drive and love of learning in children so that they want to learn. Good teachers are hard to come by, and have a hard time doing what they want to do - teach - because of all these standardized tests.

However, at the moment, it is a good sign that more English language learners are doing well on the test.