by Brian Leubitz [courtesy of Calitics - Front Page]

On June 3, I talked to Assembly womanNicole Parra in San Francisco. Nothing too important really, just a friendly, hi, I'm Brian, the evil blogger kind of thing. She was in town to support Asm. Mark Leno for Senate. It was all very cordial, despite the fact that she's made noises about thinking the Republican candidate for her seat, she's termed out, was better than the Democratic candidate, Fran Florez. By the way, I can't seem to find a website for Fran Florez...strange.

You see, the Florez family and the Parra family have something of a grudge match going on in the Central Valley. State Sen. Dean Florez campaigned against Parra's father for a county supervisor seat way back when, and Nicole is still smartin' from that.

Well, today we hear that Parra is having a presser with a "Republican party official." I honestly have no clue what this is about. Will she officially endorse Danny Gilmore, the Republican candidate? Will she switch parties? Vow to not vote for the budget?

Who knows? We'll let you know when we hear something.

by Brian Leubitz [courtesy of Calitics - Front Page]

by Calitics Editorial Board [courtesy of Calitics - Front Page]

Congressional Endorsements:

We are proud to be giving opinions on every race contested by more than one Democrat, and also every race with a Democrat facing a Republican incumbent (The Democratic incumbents facing no opposition don't much need our support or to raise their name recognition, though we will talk about the incumbents we like in a later post).  It's a big job, but having covered these Congressional races for well over a year now, we feel that we have the insight into what's happening throughout the state to offer this slate of endorsements. See the flip for explanations.

CA-01: no endorsement

CA-02: Morris

CA-03: Durston

CA-04: Brown

CA-08: Pelosi

CA-12: Speier

CA-21: Johnson

CA-24: Pallant

CA-25: Conaway

CA-26: Warner

CA-33: Watson

CA-37: no endorsement

CA-40: Avalos

CA-41: Dean

CA-42: Shepston

CA-43: Joanne Gilbert

CA-44: Hedrick

CA-45: Bornstein

CA-46: Cook

CA-48: Young

CA-49: Hamilton

CA-50: no endorsement

CA-51: Filner

CA-52: Lumpkin

CA-53: no endorsement

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Randy Bayne
The Bayne of Blog's California Notes

My sample ballot came in the mail the other day, and though I knew it would be light it was still a bit of a shock to see just how light. Couple this with a forum post I saw today and I feel like coining a new word — Junapathy.

On June 3, I will be responsible for two choices on my ballot. One on the two propositions, 98 and 99, and the other on an Assembly race. The other two items, a Senate seat and a County Supervisor, have a single candidate running, leaving no choice to make. It’s more like a ratification. Until I received my sample ballot, I didn’t even know there was anyone running for the Democratic nomination in the 1st Senate District. For the record, his name is Anselmo Chavez.

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Robert Cruickshank

That's the claim from the American Road & Transportation Builders Association, which has a study showing how the gas tax cut will affect jobs in each state.

The assumption the AR&BTA is using is that the tax cut would blow a $9 billion hole in the federal transportation budget. Based on FY 07-08 expenditures CA's share of that would be $664,406,924. The association then estimates that 23,107 jobs would be lost here in California - roughly equivalent to the proposed school layoffs - over the next three years.

No wonder then that local transportation agencies across the state are denouncing this foolish proposal. From Santa Cruz:

“"It would deplete an already oversubscribed highway trust fund, making a bad situation worse," commission Executive Director George Dondero said. "We're trying to get the government to generate more money for transportation, not less."

“Dondero said he didn't know how much the county could lose, just that "future projects would have to wait."

by Robert in Monterey [courtesy of Calitics - Front Page]

[courtesy of The California Majority Report]

Here's a new one that I noticed in the The Fresno Bee the other day. The Fresno Chamber of Commerce is asking candidates who want its support to reveal their Social Security and driver's license numbers for background checks.

"The idea basically is simple enough," Al Smith, the chamber's president and chief executive, told the Bee "If we're going to put our name behind a candidate, we want to make sure there's nothing in his background that we don't know about."

According to the Bee, two candidates had the kahunas to reject the chamber's request, and others who handed over the data said they were uncomfortable doing so.

"This has nothing to do with checking me out. I'm comfortable with that," said Fresno County supervisor candidate Debbie Poochigian, who sent a letter to the chamber outlining her reasons for not providing the information. "But you can't give up every privacy right in the world."

There's more...