[courtesy of The California Majority Report]

Lost in the Sturm und Drang surrounding the Migden-Leno-Nation showdown was the resounding success for Senate Democrats of a carefully-orchestrated series of political chess moves across Los Angeles County.
 
It’s probably the worst-kept secret in Sacramento that the Senate leadership, led by Senate President Don Perata, aggressively supported Rod Wright’s successful bid for Ed Vincent’s seat in SD-25. Less well known are the domino falls which preceded it.
 
First, it was hardly an accident that Mark Ridley-Thomas, who succeeded Rod Wright in the Assembly’s 48th District, was able to clear the field when he ran in 2006 for SD-25. Sure, MRT enjoyed a formidable reputation for community leadership after his high-profile founding of Empowerment Congress and head-to-head polls conducted in 2005 reflected that: he held a sizable double-digit lead in every prospective match-up against Wright. But fast forward and the same could be said of Wright’s prospective match-up against Dymally this year. To wit, early polling showed him running 30 points behind the venerable Dymally. And, yet, Wright agreed to withdraw from the race for his home Senate district in 2006 and instead focus on the even-tougher neighboring SD-26 in 2008.

There's more...

[courtesy of The California Majority Report]

If California voters don't like having the third highest unemployment rate in the country, endless war, nonsense issues at the forefront of the presidential discourse, an outrageous attempt to abolish rent control, and an unfortunate lack of universal health care due in large part to Repubublican obstructionism, they can show the pundits they are motivated by voting during this June 3rd's Assembly, Senate, Congressional, and local races primary.

Courtesy the Secretary of State Debra Bowen's Office:

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

[courtesy of The California Majority Report]

In case you missed it, Senate President Don Perata (D-Oakland), flanked by Senate President-designate Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento), other Senators and education leaders, launched a high-profile and highly-effective media offensive yesterday in a concerted effort to pressure the Governor and legislative Republicans to demonstrate some political courage and take meaningful steps to stave off devastating budget cuts in schools and children programs, which would effectively sacrifice a generation of schoolchildren on the altar of partisan meanspiritedness.
 
Well, it turns out yesterday’s high-energy Budget-palooza was just the beginning.
 
Today, Senate Democrats are announcing similar events tomorrow in San Anselmo (at Brookside Elementary School), Friday in Los Angeles and next Wednesday in Oakland.

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Don Perata
President pro Tem
California State Senate

Once again Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is talking about improving education without acknowledging that his budget cuts would devastate California’s classrooms and leave the state nearly last in the nation in educational support.

He balances his budget on the back of education taking $4 billion from a system that is already ranked 47th in the country in per-pupil spending.

Cutting $4 billion would mean:

• Laying off 57,000 teachers, or 20 percent of the state’s teaching workforce. Or,

• Eliminating four weeks of the school year. Or,

• Increasing class sizes by 23 percent, making them about one-quarter bigger.

Those are some of the awful choices we face, under the Governor’s budget plan.

But, rather than searching for solutions to his short-sighted, cuts-only approach, the Governor is holding press conferences on what federal funding might do for the state’s worst-performing schools.

It’s abominable that 97 California school districts failed to meet test score requirements set by the federal No Child Left Behind law. Unfortunately, the Governor’s budget cuts could very well send more school districts into the same territory.

by Ilya Sheyman [courtesy of Blog for America]

We just won an incredible last minute victory in the Senate. Senate Democrats stood up to the Bush administration and stopped telecom immunity. Here's a message Jim just sent out:

We just had a huge victory. Grassroots action forced the Senate to stop telecom immunity from passing.

Earlier today, DFA members made over 1,000 calls an hour to our Senators. And they heard our voices loud and clear.

Tonight I'll be watching President Bush give his final State of the Union. As usual, he will be fear-mongering and pushing his radical agenda on the American people.

Thanks to your work today, we flipped the vote and forced Senate Democrats to have a backbone.

Jim

Thanks for all your hard work today. Tonight we celebrate, tomorrow we keep up the fight!

by Lucas O'Connor [courtesy of Calitics - Front Page]

All sorts of interesting developments on the FISA debate over the weekend as we swing into the next phase of the showdown.  First, the New York Times blasted leading Senate Democrats in an editorial for even considering an extension of Bush's protections.  It also went ahead to say what so many of us know already: the notion that amnesty for telecom companies is anything but an attempt to cover up what this administration has been up to is...well...crazy.  The President contends that amnesty is necessary to get cooperation in the future, but it just doesn't pass the smell test.  If the law is followed, it's not a problem.  And if there's any question about legality, the time to sort it all out isn't well after the fact.  That's the whole point of having a FISA court in the first place.

Senator Feinstein holds one of the votes that could be vacillating this week as FISA winds through vote after vote.  Call her and speak your mind about the ugly notion of providing amnesty to the telecoms.  She has many phone numbers:

202-224-3841 (Washington, DC)

310-914-7300 (Los Angeles)

415-393-0707 (San Francisco)

619-231-9712 (San Diego)

559-485-7430 (Fresno)