"The elections are being held to fill vacancies created when Democrats Sen. Curren Price and Assemblyman Robert Blumenfield won election to the Los Angeles City Council."
"There are only two candidate’s for Price’s 26th Senate District, Assemblywoman Holly J. Mitchell (D-Los Angeles) and perennial candidate Mervin Evans, an author/management consultant who is also a Democrat. That election will increase to 28 the number of Democrats in the state Senate, one more than is needed for a supermajority capable of raising taxes and overriding vetoes."
The majority of Californians think Gov. Jerry Brown, that cranky, septuagenarian wordsmith, is doing a good job.
From the LAT's Anthony York: "The poll from the Public Policy Institute of California found 54% of the state’s likely voters give Brown positive marks for his work as the state’s chief executive."
"The assessment of Brown’s job approval is similar to that of a recent Field Poll, which found 51% of voters giving Brown positive reviews. But that survey also revealed just 43% of state voters said they would back Brown’s reelection."
"Brown has not publicly decided whether to seek an unprecedented fourth term as California governor. Campaign reports filed on Tuesday show Brown has more than $10 million in the bank for a campaign should he decide to run."
Speaking of the PPIC poll, the majority of Californians also oppose hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, an oil exploration method that has drawn fire from environmentalists.
From the Mercury-News' Paul Rogers: "A new poll shows that a majority of Golden State residents oppose both new offshore oil drilling and expanding hydraulic fracturing, commonly known as fracking, to produce oil and gas. Californians also overwhelmingly support programs to expand renewable energy such as solar and wind power. And more than half say they have seriously considered buying a hybrid or an electric car."
"Meanwhile, a record-high number of Californian residents -- 65 percent -- say the state should act immediately to cut greenhouse gas emissions, rather than waiting for jobs or the economy to improve, an increase of 9 percentage points from 2012."
"There's a huge consensus to do something about climate change and in support of renewable energy," said Mark Baldassare, president and CEO of the Public Policy Institute of California, the nonpartisan research foundation that conducted the poll."
U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer is making a move for more power in the Senate and she's using toxic chemicals as a lever. Good move, since who likes toxic chemicals?
From the Chronicle'a Carolyn Lochhead: "Sen. Barbara Boxer seized control of a major overhaul of chemical safety law Wednesday, putting Republicans and moderate Democrats on the defensive and demanding tougher regulation of thousands of industrial chemicals blamed for rising rates of cancer, asthma, early puberty and other maladies."
"The California Democrat rejected a deal brokered by the late Sen. Frank Lautenberg, a New Jersey Democrat who died in June, with ranking committee Republican David Vitter of Louisiana, whose state is home to more than 100 chemical plants."
"The two sought to reform a 1976 law that continues, largely unbeknownst to the public, to allow tens of thousands of chemicals used in everyday products to escape scrutiny for their effects on human health and the environment."
The sex-abuse scandals of the Catholic Church, which dominated the headlines for years, are getting another look, this time throughn the release of voluminous documents from church files.
From the AP's Gillian Flaccus: "Hundreds of pages of secret church files released Wednesday shed light on the troublesome careers of a dozen religious order priests, brothers and nuns accused of sexually abusing children while working in the nation's largest Roman Catholic archdiocese."
"The files include one case of a priest who later admitted to having sexual contact with more than 100 boys while serving in several Southern California parishes for years."
"The papers, which were released under the terms of a $660 million settlement agreement reached in 2007, are the first glimpse at what religious orders knew about the envoys they posted in Roman Catholic schools and parishes around the Los Angeles area. The archdiocese itself released thousands of pages under court order this year for its own priests who were accused of sexual abuse, but the full picture of sex abuse in Los Angeles remained elusive without the religious orders' records."
And from our bulging "Shootings in Florida" file comes the tale of an unarmed man who was gunned down in his own driveway. He survived and the deputies said they opened fire because they feared for their lives. Right.
"A Florida sheriff says an unarmed man -- mistaken for a car thief and shot by deputies in his own driveway -- is both. He refused to obey commands and lunged at the deputies who fired their weapons 15 times to subdue him, they say."
"Roy Middleton, 60, was hit by two of those rounds in his legs. He is in good condition at a Pensacola hospital after a metal rod was placed inside his shattered left leg..."
"But earlier this week, (Middleton) told the Pensacola News Journal that he first thought someone was joking when they yelled at him to, "Get your hands where I can see them."
He said that as he was turning around to face deputies with his hands raised, they opened fire."
"It was like a firing squad. Bullets were flying everywhere," he told the News Journal."
