The Merc's Denis Theriault looks at the impact of lawsuits on the state budget.
"If the state were to lose
the most costly of those fights — challenges to furloughs, a new grab
of redevelopment money, the line-item vetoes and a partial sale of the
state's workers' compensation insurance fund —officials could be on the hook for at least $4.7 billion.
"While legal battles are
common in every budget cycle, the unusually high number
this year — and
their potential to wreak exceptional fiscal havoc — is a testament to
the drastic, even risky, measures employed to solve
deficits amounting
to some $60 billion.
"This year's bevy of lawsuits also is the
legacy of an annual budgeting process in which tax
increases have
become anathema and in which certain spending obligations,
such as
money for education, are set in stone during boom years,
without any
provision to pay them when revenues slip."
The Wall St. Journal's Ryan Knutson looks at how the state has blunted earlier budget cuts.
"Through a combination of new legislation, funding shifts
and other
cuts, the state has so far mitigated the potential
effects of three
significant budget reductions.
"The most recent move came two weeks ago, when Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger announced he wouldn't close 100 state parks as part of a $14.2 million cut to the Parks Department's budget. That followed new legislation passed last month that restored $196 million to California's Healthy Families insurance program. And in August, a planned cut of $7 million for an airplane used to fight wildfires was also restored through emergency funds.
"When the budget was passed in July, critics decried the deal as "catastrophic" and "devastating." But some of the grim impacts that many prognosticated haven't come to pass because cuts can change after a budget is passed, said Daniel J.B. Mitchell, professor emeritus in the UCLA School of Public Affairs. Sometimes, threats at the time of a budget's passing are "kind of a negotiating thing," he added.
George Skelton contemplates the arrogance of Meg Whitman.
"Who is Whitman to be calling civil servants arrogant?
What's her
credibility? How many times has she even stepped inside
a state office
except to schmooze a governor?
"Bureaucrats" have always been easy political targets. But so is
Whitman.
"I
don't know her and have no idea whether she comes across
as arrogant in
person. She can be charming on TV. Some of her ideas
sound good.But
some people might consider it arrogant to think you're qualified to be
governor of the nation's most populous, most complex state despite
never having served in any government position. Not
on a school board
or even a local commission."
Carla Marinucci looks at Meg Whitman's 2004 endorsement of Barbara Boxer.Whitman not only endorsed Boxer and donated the maximum $4,000 to the junior California senator's 2004 re-election campaign, but the former eBay CEO also served on an exclusive committee of Technology Leaders for Boxer in her re-election battle against Republican California Secretary of State Bill Jones, according to election records obtained by The Chronicle.
"The perception is that folks like Rep. George Miller, D-Martinez, and environmental activists are orchestrating a policy out of Washington that says "yes" to water for the delta smelt and "no" to water for crops. Anger over putting fish before jobs in these lean times is running as strong as any anti-war, anti-Enron feeling we had up here in the Bay Area during the Bush years.
Not only could the fish fight lead to a split within the Democratic Party, it could also be just the issue Republicans are looking for when the environmentalists' best friend in the Senate, Barbara Boxer, faces re-election in 2010."
And finally from our Blind Date Gone Wrong Files , "A Detroit man has been sentenced to at least two years in prison for stealing a woman's car after skipping out on the check during their first date. Twenty-four-year-old Terrance McCoy was sentenced Friday to two to 10 years in prison."
We're guessing a second date is out of the question...