Governor
Arnold Schwarzenegger hit the campaign trail yesterday, holding a town hall-style meeting at a Riverside air filter warehouse. "'Through the recall, what we have done is change the governor, but don't think for a minute we have changed the system,' Schwarzenegger said. 'The same union bosses are there, the same legislators are still there, the same special interests, the corporations, all of those forces are still there.'"
"'Of course I am bloodied, yes, but I am unbowed. I will not move,' Schwarzenegger said. 'It makes no difference how many attacks they have on me. Remember one thing: This, what we are doing here, is much bigger than me.'"
"'This is not a battle of Democrats versus Republicans,' Schwarzenegger told the crowd at K&N Engineering Inc., the air filter maker in Riverside. '
This is a battle of the governor of the state of California against the status quo and the public employee unions.'"
"A member of a local teachers union, on hand to protest the governor yesterday, said Schwarzenegger has done what
Gray Davis could not."
"'A lot of members, right or wrong, were not very fond of Gov. Gray Davis,' Hedrick said. '
This is much more unifying for everyone. I don't think there was a groundswell of support for Davis.'"
The Merc News'
Kate Folmar reports "The governor will hold two more town halls -- in the Fresno and San Diego areas -- before stopping at the California Republican Party's convention Saturday in Anaheim.
It is widely expected that Schwarzenegger will announce later this week he's seeking re-election."
"Schwarzenegger's chief political consultant,
Mike Murphy, said the governor has been significantly outspent by special election opponents so far this year. But he will have enough cash for an advertising blitz."
"'How many times does this governor need to kick off his special election campaign?' asked [
Gale] Kaufman, who works with the union-backed Alliance for a Better California. '
The only reason he needs to kick off this campaign again is because no one was paying attention the first 15 times he did it.'"
True, the official campaign kick-off may have been the State of the State address. But let the record show that the Alliance had its official campaign kick-off this weekend.
The governor's office issued a press release yesterday from "acting communications director
Margita Thompson, who will give her weekly briefing to the press about the governor's schedule. This release was the office's official announcement that
Rob Stutzman has formally joined the governor's campaign team.
Traffic school: Now that the first year of the legislative session is over, legislators are rolling up their sleeves to tackle the real issues through interim hearings. The Bee previews
Tom Torlakson and
Carol Liu's
upcoming hearings on teen driving.
"'The current system of driver education and behind-the-wheel training 'is not making the kind of dent in accident statistics we would like to see,' said Sen. Tom Torlakson, D-Antioch, chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee. 'Let's find the state of the art, the most effective curriculum.'"
And then there were two: Judge
Morrison England said "thanks but no thanks" to Governor Schwarzenegger yesterday,
withdrawing his name from consideration to fill the vacancy created by
Janice Rogers Brown when she moved to the DC Circuit Court of Appeals, aka the Supreme Court on-deck circle. England has a lifetime appointment on the bench of the Eastern District, whereas Supreme Court judges have the pleasure of standing for voter reconfirmation.
Speaking of Brown, President Bush is rumored to be looking for a minority woman with judicial experience to fill the second vacancy, and there aren't a lot of candidates who are palatable to Republicans...
In the
Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria News, investigators have
linked Rep. Duke Cunningham to a third boat that he was allegedly given access to by "business executives whose companies won millions of dollars in government contracts with Cunningham's support."
"
Brent Wilkes, the Poway defense contractor whose home and offices were raided last month by federal agents, allowed Cunningham use of a 14.5-foot, 170-horsepower fiberglass boat several years ago when it was docked near Cunningham's yacht in Washington, D.C."
The City of Angels had a scare yesterday, one day after an Al Qaeda warning of an impending attack, as a
massive power outage darkened most of the city. The LA Times reports "A mistake on a single bundle of wires Monday cascaded into a major blackout in and around Los Angeles, inconveniencing millions of people and renewing questions about the vulnerability of the region's power system."
Bob Finkelstein of the Utility Reform Network chimes in with the quote of the day, " 'One DWP worker is going to feel really, really bad for a long time.'"
Another terror threat was averted with
the capture of Reggie, the seven-foot-long alligator on the loose for months in Machado Lake.
Jay "Young, 47, said his crew spotted the 180-pound reptile resting on land near the shore of Machado Lake in South Los Angeles. His brother,
Noah Young, then walked up and slipped a rope around the gator's neck, he said.
Now that L.A.'s lakes are free of reptiles, there are reports of
sea lions attacking swimmers off Santa Barbara.
