by Brian Leubitz [courtesy of Calitics - Front Page]

Donald Lathbury of the CA Majority Report is liveblogging it. Check it out here.

by Brian Leubitz [courtesy of Calitics - Front Page]

Well, that didn't take long.  Yesterday, we pointed out a Capitol Weekly story indicating that Sen. Steinberg was planning to run to be the Senate Leader. Today, it appears to be a done deal.  The CA Majority Report is now citing "several legislative sources" that Senator Perata has "orchestrated" a smooth transition to Senator Steinberg, a fairly progressive Sacramentan. Sen. Steinberg will take over as leader on August 21, a few months before Perata is termed out of office.

Now, I guess we're left with watching the Assembly for all the "palace intrigue."

[courtesy of The California Majority Report]

When we last heard from my former antagonist, Karen Hanretty, she departed Sacramento for the bright lights and big time of Washington, D.C.  She's since landed a gig with GOP presidential hopeful Fred Thomson as his communications director, partnering with Todd Harris, the ex-Schwarzenegger campaign spokesperson.
 
This month, Hanretty got every girl's dream: a spread in the current issue of Glamour magazine. Also featured are other women in top positions in the Clinton, Obama, Edwards, and GOP campaigns.

[courtesy of The California Majority Report]

Cross-posted on Calitics. 

In yesterday's Fresno Bee, the editorial board takes a whack at Prop 93. Fair enough, I can handle a little criticism. But I'd like to go through this a little bit.

"Term limits should be changed. They haven't worked as well as voters once hoped. The net effect of term limits has been to reduce the experience level of those who serve in Sacramento, elevate the role of special interests and their lobbyists, and turn electoral cycles into an unending marathon on fundraising and focusing on the next job, rather than on California's increasingly serious problems."

Now that's something I can agree with, and something that I'm guessing most progressives would agree with. So, a reasonable start there. But then they get into their hang up: redistricting. Why are term limits and redistricting related? Why because the governor said so of course! Silly Californians. 

There's more...

[courtesy of The California Majority Report]

Experts warned members of the state Senate Education Committee that more school districts are heading into financial trouble as their enrollment and state funding decline.

Marilyn Dudley-Flores, CEO of OPS-Alaska, warns of the great American brain drain in the California Progress Report.

California's youth prisons are shrinking, but Alameda Superior Court Judge Jon S. Tigar hasworries about how the state is managing the remaining population. Tigarhas filed court papers indicating his intention to have a receivermanage the entire division.

There's more... 

[courtesy of The California Majority Report]

Secretary of State Deborah Bowen is sticking to her guns about the failure of electronic voting. The San Francisco Chronicle reported this weekend that touch-screen voting and other electronic systems still aren't up to snuff.

"When the government finds a car is unsafe, it orders a recall," she told the Chronicle. "Here we're talking about systems used to cast and tally votes, the most basic tool of democracy."

[courtesy of The California Majority Report]

Despite a much earlier primary of February 5, California has still missed out on a lot of the presidential action, the Sacramento Bee reports. Analysts are saying the Super Tuesdaystates, which includes New York, New Jersey, Texas, California andothers, may simply serve to validate a presumed nominee. But if theresults of the earliest states are mixed, things might get moreinteresting.

The Los Angeles Times editorializes with some straight talk on education reform this morning, calling for higher accountability, merit pay for teachersand more aggressive re-assignment of gifted teaches to troubledschools. These are not the only answers—funding is often what holdsback reform—but the problems facing California schools are more thanbudgetary.

Governor Schwarzenegger has been kind to the chiropractic industry, stacking the state's oversight board with appointees who a lax with therules and light on discipline, according to the Bee. Interestingly, theGovernor also slashed the oversight board's budget, making them lessable to regulate even if they wanted to.

There's more...