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*  Sen. Steinberg appointed Sen. Pat Johnston (ret.) to the Delta Stewardship Council created under the new water legislation.  I (Brian) am not totally certain that this body will be all that effective, but I respect Sen. Johnston a lot.

*  The Prof. Engineers and Prof. Scientists are speaking against the legislative pay cuts, saying an additional pay cut would allow only the rich to become legislators.

*  The reporting period ended this week, so we got wind of some big contributions.

*  Some locals are suing the federal government over the Richmond San Pablo casino.

* Just as he’s almost fading from discussion, Steve Poizner is “just getting started”.

* Meg Whitman spoke to a Hispanic business group and didn’t mention immigration. Later told the SJ Merc that she was going to crack down. Funny how that didn’t come up during the discussion.

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*  Steve Poizner apparently decided that he had better credentials than Insurance Commish for his ballot designation. He went with the oh-so-descriptive “businessman.”

*  Apparently one debate was sufficient for Whitman. She declined a second debate with Poizner.

*  Chris Kelly dumped another $2 million into his campaign. Money can’t buy you love, but it buys lots of TV time.

*  Sen. Oropeza’s bill to ban smoking in state parks and beaches was defeated in the Assembly.

* John Wildermuth examines the argument before the FPPC concerning Gavin Newsom’s “double-dipping.”

* Speaker Perez named his leadership team and committee chairs. He included two Republicans as committee chairs for the local government and veterans committees.

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*  The State rejected all the bids for the OC Fairgrounds. The state had predicted they would get $180 million, but ended up with a max bid of $56 million.  Yay for unrealistic budgeting!

*  Jerry Brown tells unions to “attack” Whitman. Whitman calls that cynical, apparently thinking that attempting to buy the race is full of puppies and daffodils.

*  Speaking of cynical, Whitman had, in a previous bid of partisanship grandeur, pledged to only hire Republicans for the top 300 spots in her Administration. She’s now reconsidering that now that it appears she’s kicking Poizner’s butt.

*  President Obama is going to do a fundraiser for Sen. Boxer.

* Environmentalists are once again taking on Richard Pombo.

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*  Lots of chatter about the Republican debate.  The general consensus: it was a bit boring.  There weren’t any knockout blows and the event was basically a series of segments from their stump speeches. Dan Walters calls it an indirect win for Whitman, as Poizner wasn’t able to really change the game.

*  No Tea Party primary challenge for Jerry Lewis. Though, if the Tea Party stood for anything, this is where they would start.  That dude is an earmark and federal dollars sponge. Oh, and he’s wildly corrupt.

*  Yo, Arnold. Sen. Padilla wants to know what’s the deal with sending California stimulus funds to Oregon?

*  1 in 4 Californians are now uninsured.

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*  Judge rules that Pleasanton needs to build more housing within current city limits instead of adding jobs and forcing other cities to house them. Such policies contribute to urban sprawl, and while it shouldn’t take a judge to end them, this is a good ruling.

*  Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoes tax relief for homeowners in order to protect corporate tax cheats. In case anyone wasn’t clear on his priorities.

*  Even Tom McClintock is right every once in a while.

*  The city of Pacific Grove seeks to eliminate restrictive covenants that formalized racial segregation in housing there, as in many other California cities, for decades. These covenants were outlawed by the Supreme Court in 1948 but have lingered in property deeds since then. Of course, one shouldn’t assume this means PG is integrated – like many such cities, residential segregation has persisted, based this time on income and not deeds.

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*  The election to replace Mike Duvall with Chris Norby cost Orange County $1.635 million. Asm. Van Tran is trying to get the state to reimburse OC. Given the way this all was handled, somebody sent out this information.  Perhaps Chris Norby should pay the money to Orange County.

*  Meg Whitman will be dodging the media once again. This time, it’s at the CRP Convention. As a reminder, last time, she tried to explain her voting record.  That worked out well.

*  The reform ideas that Speaker Perez wants to pass? They’re pretty much DOA in the Legislature.

*  No word yet on whether Dean Florez will be running for Lt. Gov..

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*  Arnold vetoed spending cuts because they weren’t big and fast enough. Apparently, he’s never heard the ol’ bird in the hand cliche.

*  Another pay cut for legislators? The commission that reviews legislative salaries will take a look at another cut.  After the big cut last year, it would be something of a surprise.

*  The Chronicle gets some man-on-the-street reporting from Ashburn’s district, and frankly it is hard not to laugh. One guy says that he “is just prejudiced against gays.” Niiice.

* Bay Area train services are looking to get some of the HSR funding.

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*  California Watch looks at Roy Ashburn’s record and considers whether he’s been more anti-gay than his district. Meanwhile Bigot Randy Thomasson is calling for him to resign. Apparently Thomasson doesn’t believe anybody is “actually gay” and it’s all simply a matter of infidelity. Except, Ashburn has been divorced for several years, and won re-election after his divorce.

*  Randy Shaw thinks that there needs to be a plan for education activists beyond just protests.

*  Asm. Nathan Fletcher (R-San Diego) is pushing for a full review of our sex offender laws following the murder of Chelsea King.  Here’s hoping that we see a balanced approach that respects the rule of law while doing what is possible to make the community safe.  This time, let’s try to make sure that we get laws that work, not ones that just sound tough.

*  The National Organization for Marriage (NOM), the front group that hides where the money opposing marriage equality is coming from, kicked in $5000 to John Eastman’s campaign for AG.

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*  Teabaggers plan to visit the California Republican Party convention this weekend, proving once again that the “Tea Party” movement is nothing more than the same right-wing movement we’ve experienced for 50 years putting on new clothing.

*  CSEA filed suit to change the wording of Prop 14, the top-two primary. They’ve apparently succeeded, but proponents are resisting the settlement out of fear that taking out the bogus “give voters more choice” statements might make it harder to get voters to approve it.

*  Calbuzz sits down with Jerry Brown to talk about his “political evolution.”

*  A recently discovered fault near PG&E’s Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant in San Luis Obispo County is delaying renewal of the plant’s license. Building nuclear power plants in earthquake country never really was all that bright an idea to begin with.

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* The Capitol Notes Podcast features an extended interview with Jerry Brown.  It’s certainly not geared for progressives, as he’s hitting on Whitman’s turf.

*  And the Steve Poizner shift dramatically to the Right continues. He’s now reconsidered his support for changing the vote threshhold from 2/3 to 55% for school bonds. Apparently, the majority of the ELECTORATE cannot decide when to issue bonds, they need Howard Jarvis’ corpse to decide those decisions.

*  CalBuzz is annoyed that they went out and praised Poizner for his first stand on the the above bill, only to get the ol’ flipity-flopity. In other news, they are glad to see Jerry Brown’s eyebrow shaping.

*  Karen Bass took some heat for handing out pay raises to 20 Assembly staff members. But, honestly people, do legislative staff have to live under a situation where they can never be promoted?  What kind of job situation is that? Would you want to work where you had no chance of promotion? All but a handful of these staffers made under $50,000. This isn’t gold-plated toilet seats we’re talking about, it’s people striving for achievement, something conservatives claim to respect.

*  The LA Times did a profile of Speaker Perez, focusing not on his work for the downtrodden, but for some of the more deep-pocketed types around the state. Look, in today’s political world, there is no purity any more.