The LA Times's Dan Morain has been reading the invitations, and reports "Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is
embarking on a whirlwind, 17-event fundraising tour from here to Boston, tapping donors who have a stake in bills soon to arrive at his desk for signature or veto."
"Early in his tenure,
Schwarzenegger had proposed a "black-out" period barring fundraising when the Legislature was in session. He and other Republicans criticized his predecessor, Davis, for holding fundraisers at the end of legislative sessions when governors decide what bills should become law."
"'We're in the middle of a campaign and we have to raise money,' said
Marty Wilson, one of the governor's top political aides."
"'I would like to think Arnold is smart enough to have learned from our mistakes,' [former
Gray Davis political consultant
Garry] South said. 'But nothing I've seen suggests he has.'"
The governor will be
down in Ontario today pimping money to help at-risk students to pass the high school exit exam and raising an estimated $250,000 for his warchest.
Meanwhile, the Bee's Andy Furillo writes that
Marty Wilson is making news of his own, as the governor's "chief fundraiser is
representing a local developer who, while working to block a bill [
AB 1747] at the Capitol, has agreed to help host a fundraising dinner on the governor's behalf."
"Now, with a bill to aid Yolo County's effort [to purchase the Conaway Ranch property through eminent domain] heading toward Schwarzenegger's desk, [developer
Steve] Gidaro is helping to host a fundraiser for the Republican governor's ballot measures at the Sutter Club on Thursday night.
Wilson said the Gidaro Group 'will contribute in the $25,000 range' but that he did not personally solicit the contribution."
"'I run a public relations firm that has seven employees and a number of clients,' Wilson said Tuesday. 'We do not lobby for those clients.
We are very explicit when we talk to a client or potential client that if they're hiring us to influence the administration, they're hiring the wrong organization and they should hire someone else.'"
"'Obviously, because of our location, the kinds of things we're going to get hired to do are many times going to have a legislative component,' Wilson added."
"A similar dynamic existed in the last administration, when a key fundraiser for Democratic Gov. Gray Davis,
Darius Anderson, built a multimillion-dollar lobbying business in Sacramento after Davis took office."
The governor also acknowledged Tuesday that a special election
compromise is unlikely. "The governor said Tuesday that compromise talks are continuing at the staff level but acknowledged that 'we also know that time is running out this week, and so
it could easily be that we will not come up with a compromise.' The deadline for changing the ballot is Thursday."
Under fire for fundraising, conflicts and Gigi, the governor went after everyone's favorite enemy--sex offenders. In a Capitol news conference, he
proposed requiring convicted sex offenders to wear a GPS tracking device for the rest of their lives. "'Of all the rights that we have, none is more precious than living without fear and the right not to become a victim,' Schwarzenegger said at a Capitol press conference. 'We want these criminals off the streets and we want them away from our schools and our children.'"
"If
Senate Bill 588 and
Assembly Bill 231 don't pass this year, Schwarzenegger said, he'll support a comparable
ballot initiative filed by the measures' sponsors, Sen.
George Runner and his wife, Assemblywoman
Sharon Runner, both Lancaster Republicans."
Speaking of strange bedfellows, the AP reports that
Democrats and Republicans in Congress are organizing against the governor's redistricting initiative, Proposition 77. "Reps.
Howard Berman, D-North Hollywood, and
John Doolittle, R-Rocklin, are seeking an advisory opinion from the Federal Election Commission that would allow them to collect "soft money" from unions, corporations and other donors to support or oppose ballot measures in the Nov. 8 special election.
That sound you hear are
the walls closing in on Rep. Duke Cunningham. "Federal agents seized documents yesterday from the Poway headquarters of a defense contractor with close ties to Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham and
raided the home of the company's president. Agents from the FBI, Internal Revenue Service and Department of Defense were
seeking documents and computer records pertaining to government contracts secured by ADCS Inc., said sources familiar with the investigation," the Union-Trib reports.
My Baby Just Wrote Me a Letter: Senator
Gloria Romero sent correspondence yesterday to LA Mayor
Antonio Villaraigosa asking him whether he supports
SB 767, a bill by the senator to allow the mayor to appoint board members to the Los Angeles Unified School District. "'
Mr. Mayor, I respectfully request an answer,' Romero (D-Los Angeles) wrote. 'Where do you stand on the bill? Time is of the essence.'"
Assemblymember
Wilma Chan has
dropped her attempt to reclaim her old seat on the Alameda County Board of Supervisors from her former chief of staff,
Alice Lai-Bitker. The Chron reports that "she decided to skip the June 2006 supervisorial election to devote herself to her legislative duties, instead of spending most of her last year in office campaigning." And by "legislative duties" she means running for Senate in 2008.
From our "One More Reason to Take Television Away From Stupid People" Files, the LA Times reports "[t]wo 19-year-old men, allegedly
inspired by the "Bumfights" video, roamed the streets of downtown Los Angeles early Tuesday
hitting sleeping homeless people with aluminum baseball bats, leaving an elderly man in critical condition with severe head wounds, police said."
Anybody who can be described as being "inspired" by Bumfights deserves serious jail time.
Housekeeping: Yesterday, we believed the hype and alleged that
SB 861 would allow local governments to ban certain breeds of dogs. Rather, the bill would allow local governments to create spay, neuter and breeding programs for specific breed types.