[courtesy of The California Majority Report]

The OC Register's Steven Greenhut doesn't often agree with CMR, but when he does, excuse us if we flaunt it. In a post on OC Register's blog, Orange Punch, Greenhut writes:

Assemblyman Todd Spitzer, R-Orange, was moved to the "The Doghouse," a tiny office in the Capitol after he engaged in some of the nastiest rhetoric I've seen in a while. Check out these columns he wrote depicting his Democratic colleagues as being "pro-criminal." It really was a shameless way to shut down serious debate about the crime bill by depicting the other party as filled with members who want nothing more than to let murderers and rapists out on the street. ...

To combat its irrelevancy, the GOP is reduced to championing itself as the law-and-order party. Now, we're all in favor of keeping the killers, molesters and rapists behind bars for the rest of their lives. But ... when does this ratcheting up of crime laws end? When does support for police secrecy end?

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[courtesy of The California Majority Report]

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee launched a new video over the weekend, and it stars a handful of California's Republican congressmen.
 
Dubbed "Law and Disorder," the video is a spoof on the all-too-familar intro of NBC's popular "Law and Order" series. Check out the credits too.

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Frank D. Russo

There are studies after studies of academics, a Committee headed by a former law and order Republican Governor, and bipartisan groups such as the state's Little Hoover Commission decrying the ceaseless ratcheting up of the years of punishment for crime in this state since we adopted a "determinate" sentencing law in 1976. You can see a stack of them in the picture to the left. California's newspapers have recognized this problem and there have been a number of editorials on this of late.

Republicans have been the main culprits in the thirty years war in this state to prove they are the toughest on crime. Their behavior reminds me of George Wallace, the segregationist Governor of Alabama, a Democrat, who after losing an election early on vowed to never be "outsegged" again.

Whether it is through ballot propositions or the dozens of bills to increase sentences they introduce every year, they try to intimidate Democrats in marginal districts into this game of one-upmanship. They complain of bills being held up in committee if they don't get that way. When sentences are increased one year, they are back next year trying to up the ante. To quote a phrase, "There ain't enough red meat to feed that alligator."