(Cross posted to DailyKos and MyDD. – promoted by SFBrianCL)

A message from Congressman Pombo (well, kinda)

From: Congressman Richard A. Pombo([email protected])
Sent: Friday, July 14, 2006 2:01 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Reply from Congressman Pombo
 

July 14, 2006

Mr. R. Legged Frog
35 Swampy Marsh Ln
Tracy, CA 95304

Dear. Mr. Frog:

Thank you for contacting me regarding some of your concerns about the Endangered Species Act. I appreciate hearing from you and welcome your input. I apologize for the long delay.  I see that you sent your email last month but you know how those internets can be. My friend, Sen. Ted Stevens, tells me that they are a series of tubes.  Thank Heavens that AT&T will fix all that hooey.

You first mentioned your general opposition to my revisions to the Endangered Species Act, suggesting that its success for hundreds of species is something more than a mere coincidence.  Yes, I know that the population of bald eagles has risen from 417 in 1963 to 9,250 in 2006 and that the number of breeding pairs of Kirtland’s warblers has risen from 210 to 1,415 pairs between 1971 and 2005.  But, just because some “scientists” say that 93% of species on the endangered species list are stabilizing and moving toward recovery: 93% doesn’t make it so.  Let me give you some of my good ol’ fashioned rancher studyin’:

That’s not accurate. Less than 6 percent of the species listed by the Fish and Wildlife Service will even qualify as recovering, as moving in the right direction. Nearly 40 percent of the species on the list, they don’t even know what their status is. It’s over 70 percent of the population that is either declining in population or they have no idea. (Modesto Bee 7/17/06)

Now, I feel no compulsion to either back that up with actual evidence, as those “scientists” did, or tell you where I found that information.  You see, as a rancher, I know how these things go.  You see, I had some terrible experiences with the kit fox back in the ‘90s.  I may have exaggerated and smudged the truth a bit, but the basic story of government interference is delivered in my pearls of wisdom that I “stretched.”

The next issue you brought up was the loss of habitat for you and your family.  While I am saddened by the loss of 819 of your 823 children, it is merely a statistical blip.  I’m sure there will be water in your creek beds in no time!  And as I’ve always said ranchers shouldn’t be overburdened with governmental regulation.  Let me show you something I said in an interview from the Modesto Bee:

I didn’t like the way [The ESA] treated private property owners. It was heavy-handed. It didn’t really matter what the facts were on the ground or what the science was. It was decisions being driven by somebody in Washington who had never even been to the area being regulated.
I felt it was wrong for them to come in and tell someone who had been farming for a hundred years that you can no longer farm it any more because it was endangered species habitat.(Modesto Bee 7/17/06)

It’s not that I really don’t feel or understand your plight; it’s just that I don’t care.

Mr. R.L. Frog, I understand that your species may not survive the upcoming winter, but if by chance it does, please feel free to contact me. Please know that you can always reach me at (202) 225-1947 or via the website at www.house.gov/pombo which includes further information about me.  Again, thank you for your input. If I can be of any additional assistance, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Sincerely,
Congressman Richard W. Pombo

Arnold vetoed $1.5 million for additional safety inspectors:

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger used his line-item veto to strike funding for 15 new workplace safety inspectors, a move the union representing the inspectors says is based on the same type of injury reporting that was exposed as faulty on the $1 billion Bay Bridge skyway project.
In his veto message that accompanied his June 28 signing of the $131.4 billion state budget, Schwarzenegger said he was deleting the $1.5 million for 15 new positions based on a report showing that “workplace injuries and fatalities in California are well below the national average.”

The decision to wipe out such a small sum was seen by labor representatives as a further erosion of an agency that has long been understaffed and overburdened.

The situation is especially grave, they say, in light of the boom in public works projects that would result from the November passage of four infrastructure bonds totaling $37 billion.

“There are going to be a lot more workplaces and risk of injury,” said Chris Voight, spokesman for the California Association of Professional Scientists. “With so few inspectors now, what’s the likelihood that this situation’s going to improve?” (Oakland Tribune 7/15/06)

Why are we vetoing $1.5 million when we will soon be building all these big road projects.  It just doesn’t seem to make any sense.

Jerry McNerney held a fundraiser in D.C. on Wednesday night.  Nancy Pelosi was among those in attendance. Other California Congressmen, including George Miller (CA-7) and Lynn Wollsey(CA-6), also attended the event on a rainy night in DC.

But you know who’s really paying attention to Dem fundraisers? Jon Fleischman.  He was very excited to see that Jerry wasn’t on the DCCC’s Red to Blue Page.  Well, how about the DFA endorsement he netted? Or Feingold’s Progressive Patriot PAC?  Nope, those don’t much matter to Jonny.  Jon is just so effusive that he sends his props out:

Of course, credit for this has to be split three ways. Pombo gets credit for running hard. Then there is the unlucky Dems whose ideal candidate lost the primary. Finally you can’t leave out the smart people who created a Congressional District boundary that was made to elect and keep electing a Republican.(FlashReport 7/14/06)

Personally, I think our ideal candidate won the primary, but I suppose Rahm would disagree.  No matter, Jerry was the better candidate.  I like the part about thanking the gerrymanderers.  Arnold would not like that one bit Jonny! In fact, I jost posted today about Arnold’s support for Sen. Lowenthal’s redistricting proposal.  I suppose it’s sarcasm, but you have to love him reveling in it.

The fact remains that the only polling done so far in the district shows McNerney ahead. If I was Ricky Pombo, I would hardly be dancing in the streets.  McNerney will win this seat, not because of some terrible gerrymandering or anything like that, but because he is the best candidate.  He will restore integrity to the position and end the corrupt influence of Pombo.

Dan Walters doesn’t dig on “mandating propaganda.” Alright then, well, I assume Mr. Walters was in an outrage when Sec 51204.5, which mandates the study of various ethnic groups, first became law and was studiously pursuing the revision of the entire law. I’m sure he was also up in arms about the provision of law which requires that, “No teacher shall give instruction nor shall a school district sponsor any activity that reflects adversely upon persons because of their race…”  Well, no you say?  He only began criticizing the law when Sheila Kuehl introduced legislation to include the LGBT community in its provisions?  Well, isn’t that convenient.

Sure, Dan will point out that he was livid, livid I tell you, about the Hindu American Foundation suing the state.  Back in April Dan summarized the case as: “Implicitly, the suit is telling state officials that the textbooks must be altered to reflect the Hindu American Foundation’s version of the ethnic group’s history – regardless of what that history may truly be.”

Well, let’s go look what remedy the complaint actually sought…an educated, balanced perspective rather than an ill-informed and biased one. Amongst other things, some of which are shall we say, a bit more propagandist, the complaint seeks a fair description of Hindu beliefs as Hindus beleive. (The exact language: “description of Hindu theology and its understanding of divinity be consistent with the understanding of practicing Hindus”) gasp!! These people want to descibe their religion accurately! How terrible that would be.

But the more intersting part of Walters’ argument regards Lloyd Levine’s AB 606.  After describing the provisions, Walters goes on to inform the reader of Levine’s thoughts. Wow, who knew the Bee had a columnist with ESP?!

Assemblyman Lloyd Levine, D-Los Angeles, is carrying Assembly Bill 606, which has moved through the Assembly and the Senate Education Committee on party-line votes. Ostensibly, it would require school districts to be more proactive in preventing discrimination and harassment of those with non-heterosexual orientations, building on a 1999 Kuehl-written law that made such discrimination and harassment illegal.

A few passages in the bill, however, are generating political heat from conservative “pro-family” groups. One would give the state schools superintendent enforcement powers, including the ability to withhold state funds for any school district deemed to be insufficiently diligent, and suggests that classroom instruction would be a factor. Another provision, just eight words long, would repeal a provision of Kuehl’s 1999 legislation, added to gain its enactment, that exempted curriculum from scrutiny in harassment and discrimination allegations.

Together, those sections of the Levine bill, opponents say, are a backdoor way of requiring pro-gay instruction similar to what Kuehl’s current bill mandates. They’re calling on Schwarzenegger to reject it as well. The criticism about the bill’s true intent is probably accurate.

Treating all people, regardless of sexual orientation, with absolute equality is one thing. In seeking such equality in marriages and other fields, gay rights advocates, it could be said, are occupying the moral high ground. There’s nothing moral about legally mandating propaganda of any kind in the classroom.  (SacBee 7/14/06)

Levine’s AB 606 seeks to deter “discrimination and harassment.”  The 1999 bill excepted the curriculum.  Why? Well, ask the Right.  But why should we accept harassment and discrimination in the curriculum? AB 606 doesn’t request a whitewashing of say…the AIDS epidemic. It merely empowers the State Superintendent to ensure that students of California are receiving a fair curriculum, not propaganda.  AB 606 helps to ensure a hospitable environment for all of California’s students, and that’s a goal we all should share.

Schwarzenegger has waded into the fray on Sen. Alan Lowenthal’s redistricting bill.

Hoping to resurrect an idea voters rejected in last year’s special election, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger plans to offer lawmakers a deal: He’ll support an easing of term limits if they’ll agree to change the way California draws voting districts.

Schwarzenegger said in an interview Thursday he does not believe term limits have improved Sacramento’s political culture. Allowing legislators to stay in office longer would be worthwhile, he said, if it induced them to put a proposal on the ballot that would strip them of the power to carve political boundaries.

  The governor reasons that lawmakers may not want to change voting districts, most of which favor incumbents, but they dislike term limits even more. One idea already under consideration in the Legislature would double the number of years members could serve in the Assembly — to 12 from six — provided they not run for the Senate when their term is up. Senators’ maximum service could be extended to 12 years from eight.

Schwarzenegger says that he wants to make California elections more competitive, and that a new method of redistricting would help. He is backing a measure by Sen. Alan Lowenthal (D-Long Beach) that would transfer political map-making powers to a panel of 11 citizens, chosen by a bipartisan group of lawmakers and judges, and take effect after the 2010 census. [(LA Times
7/14/06) http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-arnold14jul14,1,4608230.story?coll=la-headlines-california]

The law will have to be passed in two separate initiatives to pass constitutional muster, but I think both are good ideas.  The hopping back and forth of Senators and Assemblymen doesn’t allow them to fully learn the pace of each body.  And redistricting done right could be a good thing for both the Democrats and the State.

Getting people to vote to extend term limits might not be such an easy task though. A redistricting initiative without all the baggage of a mid-decade redraw and Tom Delay will do far better than last year’s ill-fated Prop 77.

I wasn’t going to wade into the whole Abel Maldonado story when it broke a couple of days ago with Maldonado saying this:

Hours after Schwarzenegger’s appearance with Latino supporters, the state’s highest-ranking Latino Republican, Sen. Abel Maldonado of Santa Maria, questioned the governor’s loyalty to Latinos.

“Our governor cares about one thing only, and that’s Arnold Schwarzenegger,” Maldonado said in a telephone interview requested by his staff.

Maldonado, who lost the Republican primary for state controller last month, said he was disappointed that the governor declined to support his candidacy.

At Schwarzenegger’s request, Maldonado had sponsored a bill to raise the minimum wage, a move that irked conservatives in the primary. “I kind of felt like I got left holding the bag,” Maldonado said.

The senator also said many Latinos thought Schwarzenegger had shown “a lack of respect” with the Latino community by spending too little time in Mexico. Schwarzenegger has visited Mexico twice as governor and plans to visit again before the election.

“When he needs Latinos, Latinos are always there for him,” Maldonado said. “When Latinos need him, the answer’s been no.” (LA Times 7/12/06)

Sure, I thought it was funny on a number of levels, the biggest part being the fact that it was all true. But to me it was just a bitter pol who lost a primary election and just venting because he never got Arnold’s endorsement. It is a bit humorous in the long run as well for the GOP, in a macabre sort of way.  Maldonado would have fared far better in the general election against John Chiang than Tony Strickland will.  Strickland is just too conservative and the fact that Maldonado was a Latino would have drawn indentity voters, especially on a down-ballot race that few voters care about.

But apparently now somebody has gotten to Maldonado to get him to eat his words.

“The governor and I have worked together for the past three years on important issues beneficial to California’s Latinos,” state Sen. Abel Maldonado of Santa Maria said in a statement released by his office. “I will continue to support the governor in his efforts to strengthen California.”
***
Katie Levinson, communications director for the Schwarzenegger campaign, said: “The senator’s apology is accepted.”

Roger Salazar, a spokesman for the state Democratic Party, said Maldonado’s “original sentiments are more in line with where most California Latinos are. They feel abandoned and rejected by this governor.” (LA Times 7/14/06)

It’s almost like the mafia.  You better not get off message, or you gets some strong suggestions to change your mind.  Or you get Jon Fleischman calling you a baby, complete with crying baby clipart:

In the meantime, I guess we’ll just have to roll our eyes and wait this out.  Like parents who hear their child crying in the room next door, but know that the right thing to do is let their baby cry themselves to sleep.

Maldonado was right. Or as Bob Mulholland pointed out in Peter Schrag’s book: “The four most insecure professions in the world are bodybuliders, psyciatrists, politicians, and actors, and Arnold is three of them.” Indeed, Arnold cares about Arnold, and that’s about it.

Well, Gavin Newsom sure has been talkative recently.  First, he said that Democrats need to rally around Phil Angelides, in a sly dig at Antonio Villairagosa and, more overtly, Steve Westly.

And today a Rolling Stone interview was released where Gavin provides some insight on the Democrats position on gay marriage.

We’ve never run the 90-yard dash on equality — ever. The history of this party is civil rights, women’s rights, human rights, labor rights, gay and lesbian rights. And for us to hold up civil unions and say that separate is somehow now equal — when just a-year-and-a-half we ago celebrated the 50th anniversary of Brown v. Board – is transparent to the people. They see through the Democrats.

That’s why this issue was not seen by the Kerry campaign in 2004 in a positive light. Because people saw through John Kerry. They didn’t believe that he was only supportive of civil unions. Because here he was, running as a Democrat on all those proud traditions where we never fell short on equality. And so — even though his position was exactly the same as Dick Cheney’s — the American people questioned that. I don’t think the American people believe us. And that’s a big problem. (Rolling Stone 7/13/06)

Personally, I’m with the Gav on this one.  Democrats need to be honest about their position on marriage equality.  We don’t gain from our equivocation.  The people who vote solely against gay marriage are not likely Dem voters anyway, and the equivocation hinders GOTV efforts by the failure to motivate the grassroots.  Amen, Mayor!

(Check out the Poll HQ – promoted by SFBrianCL)

Rasmussen has Phil Angelides running ever so slightly ahead of Arnold Schwarzenegger. (h/t to Kate Fulmar and Julia).  The media, and the right wing blogs had begun to say that this was Arnold’s race to lose.  Not so fast there:

Our first election poll here since California’s June 6 primaries shows the Democratic gubernatorial nominee, Phil Angelides, with a narrow lead of 46% to 44% over the incumbent.

Our April survey had shown Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger opening up a substantial lead over the Democratic contenders, but by May the race had tightened once again.(Rasmussen July 13, 2006))

As Julia pointed out, Arnold is spending a ton of money on ads already.  Phil…not so much.  Even considering that Rasmussen had the race tight before, it’s got to be disconcerting for the governor to have spent all that money for nothing.  I think those ads featuring Westly quotes just aren’t as effective as the GOP thought they would be.  For one thing, the turnout in the Dem primary indicated that Westly wasn’t a huge draw.

As always, this new poll will be reflected in the Calitics Poll HQ.