Lance Williams looks at Meg Whitman's record with Goldman Sachs.
"Candidate Meg Whitman touts her experience at eBay,
the online
auction house that made her rich, but her career and
personal fortune
are entwined with another company: the Goldman Sachs investment bank, a
major player in public finance in the state she wants
to lead.
"Whitman’s relationship with the giant Wall Street firm — as investor,
corporate director and recipient of both insider stock
deals and
campaign donations — could pose conflicts of interest if the Republican
front-runner is elected governor of California, critics say.
"In 2001, Goldman put Whitman on its corporate board, paying
her an
estimated $475,000 for little more than a year of part-time service. The
company also gave her insider access to the initial
public offerings of
hot stocks worth millions, according to the records.
"Whitman left the board in 2002 after she was targeted in a
congressional probe of bond underwriters and “spinning”
— a financial
maneuver, now banned, in which Goldman and other firms
allegedly traded
access to hot IPOs for bond business. Whitman later
settled a
shareholder lawsuit related to profits she and other
execs made from
buying the IPOs."
The California Chamber of Commerce has taken down a website that accused Jerry Brown of being a big spender during
his time as governor and mayor of Oakland.
"The site, EnoughSpending.com, housed the ad, which
urged readers to
"let Jerry Brown know Californians believe that 'enough
is enough' when
it comes to his 35 year record of higher taxes and increased government
spending."
"The chamber had said that both the website and television
ad were not
anti-Jerry Brown. Rather, they were part of an issue-advocacy campaign
aimed at educating voters on key issues. That distinction,
strongly
refuted by Brown and his campaign team, allowed the
chamber to bypass
campaign disclosure requirements."
George Skelton looks into Brown's record and refutes any notion that he is a tax-and-spender.
"Brown never raised general taxes. In fact, he reduced
the income tax. If
anything, Brown didn't spend enough.
"Ask anyone who was paying
attention during that 1975-1983 period and you'll probably hear a
complaint that the young governor allowed the state's
infrastructure to
begin decaying. He especially didn't invest enough
in highways
and universities. That was a mistake, he now concedes.
But back then, he
was preaching an "era of limits."
"The other factor that made the spot seem dopey was
that it was so
out of character and unbecoming of its sponsor, the
normally esteemed
state chamber. This is a respected organization with
a prestigious board
that lobbies for business interests, but until last
week had stayed
above mud-wallowing. That was the shocker. It was as if some
nice church-going family man had gotten drunk and was barking
obscenities while chasing a bar wench in front of stunned
friends."
Carla Marinucci looks at the campaigns Whitman is modeling hers after. Here's a hint: Al Checchi and Noel Irwin Hentschel didn't make the
list.
"The former eBay CEO's veteran strategy team has dissected the
experiences of the late Michigan Gov. George Romney,
who had headed
American Motors Corp., and media mogul and current
New York City Mayor
Michael Bloomberg.
"But Bloomberg made the jump to elected office after
a decadeslong
history of political involvement and fundraising, along
with a copious
record on community philanthropy, Connelly noted. Whitman
has no such
lengthy record. She has acknowledged an "atrocious"
voting history and
had no involvement in politics or philanthropy until
relatively
recently."
Cathleen Decker looks at Latino power in California in the wake of the announcement that a Latino will
replace Cardinal Roger Mahony.
"Now the power positions held by Latinos in the Los
Angeles area are
multiple and manifest. Besides the Mexico-born archbishop, who is in
line to become the first U.S. prelate of Latino heritage
to become a
cardinal, there is the mayor. The speaker of the Assembly.
The sheriff. A
county supervisor. Several members of the City Council,
of Congress, of
the Legislature, of the Los Angeles school board.
The head of the most
influential civic entity, organized labor.
"It is coming full
circle," said UC Berkeley associate professor Lisa García Bedolla, the
author of two books on Latino politics. "That's what
Los Angeles looked
like before becoming part of the United States."
Sam Stanton looks at the state's new parole policy. "The "Notification of Non-Revocable Parole Requirements" spelled out
the rules for the 37-year-old Clements, who had been on parole for
identity theft and has a history of arrests or citations
for drug, theft
and other crimes.
"You do not have a parole agent," the document
states. "You do not have a requirement to report to
a parole office."
"The new parole policies are being blamed for early
release of
county jail inmates and other releases of potentially
violent prison
inmates without supervision."
And finally, from our Illegal Alien Files, "A motorist blamed spotting a UFO for his failure to
pay a parking fine, a south London council has revealed.
The
driver was so shocked by what he saw, he drove into
a bus lane,
according to parking appeals made to Southwark Council.
"Another
motorist declared they were colour blind and thought
the yellow line was
green.
"Gill Davies, director of environment and housing at
Southwark
Council, said: "The imagination of some of these drivers is quite
impressive, but UFOs and colour blindness unfortunately
do not count as
legitimate reasons to overturn a ticket."
