According to a California-based think tank, politicians continue to skirt campaign finance laws to raise millions of dollars.  According to LA's Center for Governmental Studies, legal defense funds, inaugural and leadership committees, donations to favored charities, political party contributions and reimbursed travel expenses are among the "tricks of the trade" used to subvert campaign finance regulations.  

Governor Schwarzenegger is demanding $8 billion in federal aid, or else he promises to enact massive cuts to a $21 billion budget deficit. Both Schwarzenegger and Senate President Pro Tem, Darrell Steinberg, are lobbying the Federal Government for billions to plug yet another monolithic state budget gap.

Not your typical Republican, John Dennis is adopting an unorthodox strategy in his bid to unseat Speaker Nancy Pelosi in next year's congressional mid-terms.  Many political pundits would consider his campaign a long shot, especially in the more liberal domain of San Francisco, but rising voter discontent and a 27% congressional approval rating may set the stage for some potentially spectacular upsets.

While Schwarzenegger's cold shoulder to social causes is readily apparent, his ability to cut spending from appropriation bills using the line item veto may be at risk today. Lawsuits contesting the use of the veto early in his gubernatorial career (St. John's Well Child and Family Center et al. v. Schwarzenegger et al.) were heard in San Francisco by the state's court of appeals this week.

I’ve previously written that Schwarzenegger’s state failures on state parks, recycling, funding public education, opposing teachers, nurses and firefighters (not to mention his failures on abortion rights and early pandering to Big Pharma) indicated that he was a hard line Republican despite his periodic zags to the middle. Now, his defense of climate change against neo-crazy-con darling Sarah Palin has me scratching my head again.

A new poll and multiple op-eds are placing the 2010 Top Two Open Primary ballot initiative in the spotlight.  The latest Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) poll revealed that 47% of likely voters consider the Top Two Primary to be a very important issue on next year's ballot, outpacing marijuana legalization at 38%, a Constitutional Convention at 35%, and public funding for statewide elections at 32%.

In the quietly passed omnibus spending bill (say goodbye to billions and billions of your tax dollars!), more than a half million was dedicated to... research equipment for Los Angeles's very own Institute for Irritable Bowel Syndrome Research. FoxNews.com and a number of other voices quickly pointed to some of the outrageous projects being funded in the newest spending bill. It's almost as though lawmakers in Washington D.C.

Many in the GOP are calling for a return to the era of Reagan's fiscal conservatism, but do they have the right man?  Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity constantly tout themselves as "Reagan conservatives", and in the 2007-2008 primaries, the GOP presidential candidates frequently mentioned Reagan as the champion of conservatism.  Many Tea Party adherents mention Reagan as the paragon of fiscal conservatism, and Sarah Palin, a top figure in the Tea Party movement, prolifically touted Reagan's fiscally conservative record in her recent book, Going Rogue.

On Thursday, December 10, a California judge declared null a pact which would have allowed Imperial Valley water suppliers (such as the Imperial Irrigation District) to sell up to 100 billion gallons of water annually to San Diego, Coachella and Los Angeles water suppliers, such as the San Diego Water Authority and the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California.

During the late evening hours of Friday, December 11, somewhere between 40 and 70 protestors rallied outside of UC Berkeley Chancellor Robert Birgeneau’s home, leaving such damage in their wake as smashed planters and broken windows and outside lights, and even and threw what UC Berkeley officials described as “incendiary objects at the house, which could have cause a major fire.” The anarchists also were reportedly shouting “No justice, no peace,” likely trying to rouse the chan