"A coalition of the state's most powerful public employee unions has
agreed to start an independent campaign opposing the re-election of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger that could cost as much as $25 million, according to several sources familiar with the plan," reports Tom Chorneau in the Chron.
"The effort, which could begin as soon as this weekend, comes at a critical time for Democrat
Phil Angelides, whose campaign has languished much of the summer largely because he's been unable to raise the money needed to effectively carry his message to a statewide audience."
"But representatives of the labor group said Tuesday that that their campaign against the governor's re-election
will be carried out regardless of its impact on Angelides -- mostly because unions do not want Schwarzenegger emerging from November believing he's received a mandate from voters."
"'If you go after Arnold and he wins, you're giving him more reason to go after you when the election is over,' said
Bruce Cain, political scientist at UC Berkeley. 'But if you don't go after Arnold now, you still have the risk that he will do another 180-degree turn on you after the election.'"
"'My guess is that labor probably doesn't think they have a choice -- they've got to go all out for Phil and not trust Arnold.'"
Angelides will be in Los Angeles today to "
unveil a major proposal to crack down on HMOs and cut health care costs for consumers on Wednesday in Los Angeles," according to a campaign press release.
"Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, vowing not to weaken the achievements of the 2004 overhaul of California's workers' compensation insurance system,
vetoed a bill Tuesday that would have hiked benefits for permanently disabled workers," reports the LAT's Mark Lifsher.
"The bill sought to restore the level of permanent disability benefits that were cut in half as part of the 2004 overhaul."
"'I will continue to defend the workers' compensation reforms to ensure the strength of California's economy,' Schwarzenegger said in a statement."
"The bill, SB 815, by Senate President Pro Tempore
Don Perata (D-Oakland), would have hit employers with higher workers' compensation premiums and threatened to impede job growth, the governor said."
To avoid being the Grinch, the governor signed bills
requiring newborn hearing testing and a bill to
raise voluntary tax money for sea otters.
The otter bill, "written by Assembly Democrats Dave Jones of Sacramento and
John Laird of Santa Cruz, was prompted by Jones' son, Will, who cried upon learning that the threatened California sea otter population is not thriving."
Who does the kid think he is,
Darrell Issa?
Greg Lucas takes a
look at the housing bond, Prop. 1C. "A smorgasbord of programs aimed at making housing more available and affordable for lower-income Californians would receive the lion's share of the $2.85 billion housing bond on the November ballot, with much of the rest intended to help along anti-sprawl developments in urban areas."
"Proposition 1C is part of a five-bond package approved earlier this year by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and directs $1.5 billion to existing programs that provide grants or low-interest loans for everything from down-payment assistance to shelters for the homeless and farmworkers. The development programs, which account for $1.35 billion, are new, and lawmakers have yet to work out the details of how the money would be spent."
As for the prisons, who needs a bond when you've got the courts? The Bee's Andy Furillo explains. "A federal court official signaled Tuesday that he's ready to sock the state with
hundreds of millions of dollars in new construction and operational costs as a down payment toward fixing its prison health care system.
Most of the money would be spent on providing 5,000 new medical care beds for the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation -- at least a
$600 million item, according to one legislator's estimate."
"Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, embarking on the first international forays of his year-old administration, will
pay a short visit to England next week followed by a 16-day trade mission to Asia in October," reports Duke Helfand in the Times.
I'm on top of the world!"With the back-to-back trips, Villaraigosa will spend much of the next month away from Los Angeles."
"The mayor travels first to London and Manchester, England, at the invitation of British Prime Minister
Tony Blair, who met Villaraigosa on a recent visit to California. He will talk about the city's efforts to address global climate change, anti-terrorism and Los Angeles' bid for the 2016 Olympics, according to information provided by his staff."
Meanwhile, Jim Hahn gets to go to Chinatown to have lunch with Steve Lopez. "Another diner came up and shook his hand, telling Hahn he looked great.
'Everybody says that,' Hahn responded. 'I must really have looked terrible.'
One of the great things about being an ex-mayor, he said, is that
everyone you meet claims to have been a fan.
Finally, from our
Who Are The Nazis In Your Neighborhood Files, "Those who knew San Francisco's
Elfriede Rinkel never found it remarkable that the German immigrant would marry a Jewish survivor of the Holocaust, or attend synagogue with him, or plan to be buried next to him at a cemetery run by a Chevra Kadisha, a Jewish burial society that performs ritual purification.
On Tuesday, though, came a jarring twist: The U.S. Justice Department said the 84-year-old Rinkel
had been deported to Germany, nearly half a century after she emigrated to the United States, because
she had been a guard at a Nazi concentration camp in World War II where an estimated 90,000 people, many of them Jews, were exterminated.
