Obama’s First 100 Days

When I worked at the California ISO during the California Energy Crisis of 2000-01, the skilled engineers there gave me a great education about how California’s and the nation’s electricity system works. But the more important lesson they taught me was about contingency planning. Contingency planning means that you must be prepared for any and all situations and have plans in place to resolve those situations.

With that in mind, it not unreasonable for Republicans to develop some contingency plans to deal with what would come under a Democratic President and an overwhelming Democratic majority in Congress.

And while never conceding defeat before the votes have been counted, prudence dictates that one must prepare for any and all possible contingencies.

Today’s piece will focus on what we might expect from and Obama Administration and the Reid-Pelosi Congress in the first 100 Days. Here are a few things to watch early next year.

Rehab for the Bush Haters

What seems like the longest election cycle in history will mercifully be over in three weeks. President Bush is down to his last three months in office and I am sure that after eight long and difficult years he is ready if not eager to go home to Crawford, Texas and let someone else see if they can govern this restless and divided country.

But what about the foam-at-the-mouth Bush-haters? What will they do with themselves? How will Keith Olberman, Bill Maher, Chris Matthews, Maureen Dowd, MSNBC, NBC, CNN, CBS and the New York Times cope with this situation? To say nothing about the late night comedians like David Letterman who will have no material.

And what about the insipid and vacuous Hollywood celebrities? Who will they trash from the safety of their mansions in Beverly Hills and the Cannes Film Festival? And the Democrats in Congress will have lost their favorite punching bag . The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and The Colbert Report with Steven Colbert will be dropped from the Comedy Central due to drastic ratings drops without Bush and the Republicans in power providing fodder.

Coming to your TV Screen in 2009 and Beyond

If you think this year has been one of great turmoil and uncertainty, just wait until next year.

With tongue firmly planted in cheek, the following is a preview about what might happen in 2009 and beyond in the aftermath of the Great Financial Debacle of 2008. The public will demand someone be held accountable and it will be ugly even by Washington standards. The media guillotine will have a sharp edge and be very busy.

My scenario assumes an Obama Administration. My apologies to Republicans but I think they will like the ending.

So take a trip in my handy time machine as we fast forward to the spring of 2009…

The Coming Age of Uncertainty

The election has taken a dramatic turn over the last few weeks that no one foresaw a year ago and no one knows how it will end. Any pundit, commentator or columnist who says they know who will be the next President is either a fool or a partisan.

And as Lincoln once said, “Better to be silent and be thought a fool, than open your mouth and remove all doubt.” So I will take his counsel and not make a prediction on who will win in November.

However there is one thing of which I am more certain. America is entering a new age—the Age of Uncertainty. This new era has been coming for a long time and its roots run deep.

The very cornerstones of the American system that have sustained this nation through good times and bad are being challenged as never before and some will disappear forever. Financial institutions that have been around for many years have already disappeared and more are likely to follow. The media giants of the last century, the newspapers, are in serious trouble challenged by the internet, theblogosphere and a rapidly changing media environment.

Proposition 11…Now More Than Ever

The first salvo has been fired in the looming battle over who controls redistricting in California. Is it CCPOA, their special interest allies and their chief water carrier Senate Pro Tem Don Perata and his loyal subjects in the Legislature or the people of California led by Governor Schwarzenegger?

A just released web ad by the Yes on Proposition 11 folks lays it out pretty clearly.

Is this the same Don Perata who told LA Times columnist George Skelton in 2005, “If voters would reject the governor’s ballot proposition, Perata told me, “Our commitment… is to fashion a bipartisan solution in a thoughtful way and put it on the ballot next year.” Ditto, said Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez (D-Los Angeles).”

Is this the same Don Perata who gathered Democratic leaders together a few months ago and in his invitation to the meeting said the purpose was, “to discuss campaign strategy and organization for the attempt to beat back the effort to take the decennial redistricting out of the hands of the Legislature and give it to a non-political citizens committee.”

Three Years Later and Nothing Has Changed

Three years ago, just before the special election of 2005, I wrote the following article for the Capitol Weekly, Sacramento’s excellent newspaper of California politics and government. Think of it as our version of Washington’s Roll Call.

Not much has changed since I wrote this piece. If anything, things have gotten worse.

When will the people of California wake up from their political slumber and take back their government?

Thomas Jefferson once said, “If once the people become inattentive to the public affairs, you and I, and Congress, Assemblies, judges and Governors shall all become wolves”.

Quo Vadis California?

It appears as of this writing that we now have a budget agreement. Pardon me if I don’t cheer this development, but I am in no mood to cheer because it is a cruel joke on the people of this great state.

What has happened to California over the last 50 years? I sure don’t recognize it.

I am a native Californian. I was born in San Francisco in 1952 and reared in Marin County when it was a Republican County. I always tell people that I am old enough to remember when the only place you could get a latte or cappuccino in those days was at an Italian restaurant in San Francisco’s North Beach. Now you can get one every street corner. To this day I can’t seem to understand why anyone would pay $5 for a cup of coffee with some hot milk added, but that is a story for another day.

Fifty years ago in 1958, the New York Giants left the Polo Grounds of New York bound for the West Coast where they would become the San Francisco Giants and the Brooklyn Dodgers left Ebbets Field arriving in Southern California where they would become the Los Angeles Dodgers. They had been bitter rivals in New York and in the years since they have moved here, the rivalry has been handed down from generation to generation to where no matter where they are in the standings a Giants-Dodgers series is still a blood feud.

Who is really Behind Proposition 2?

Sometimes when you look at a ballot proposition it is best to look not at the language of the proposed initiative, but who is behind it. Such is the case with Proposition 2 on the November ballot.

Proposition 2 would mandate new housing standards for egg laying chickens at great cost to California’s egg producers and potential health risks to the rest of us.

It is sponsored by the Humane Society of the United States. But this is not your mother’s or your aunt’s Humane Society. It is now led by seasoned political operatives whose agenda goes far beyond protecting animals.

And according to a UC Davis study, if they are successful, California’s egg industry and the $600 million in economic activity it generates annually as well as thousands of jobs would be wiped out. A whole industry that is a key for California agriculture lost in one fell swoop.

Why Democrats Fear Sarah Palin

No sooner had John McCain announced his pick of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, then the Obama campaign and other Democrats began their assault on her. While predictable, the fierceness of the initial assault was pretty strong. The Obama campaign’s first reaction was that she was an “inexperienced mayor of a town 9,000”. Realizing that they had just slandered the people in the small towns of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan and other states that will decide this election, they quickly issued a more gracious statement.

You would think that after calling denizens of small towns “bitter and clinging to their guns and religion,” Obama and his people would be more sensitive to these voters. But that is how they truly feel about these folks and they can’t hide it.

Our own Barbara Boxer called her a “dangerous choice”. Dangerous? Barbara Boxer sitting on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is dangerous.

Why the harsh reaction? They are scared.

Capitol Power: From Railroads to Unions

An item appeared in the Sacramento Bee yesterday that reminded me how far we have come from the days of Hiram Johnson and progressive reforms of the early 20th Century.

It was a story about how the all powerful prison guard’s union, CCPOA, just contributed $577,000 to Senate Pro Tem Don Perata’s political committee with the express purpose of defeating Proposition 11, the initiative on the November ballot to take control of legislative redistricting away from the Legislature. You can read all the gory details here.

Just by chance, CCPOA is trying to get a new contract with a pay increase from Perata and his allies in the Legislature. Last year they tried to ram through a pay increase at the last minute but the deal died as the session ended. To demonstrate their displeasure with the Democratic leadership, they then spent $2 million to defeat the February initiative to change term limits, a pet project of the Democrats. My guess is they get what they want this time or else they would have withheld the donation until after the legislative session. You don’t “invest” over a half a million dollars if you think you will not get the “return on investment” you desire.

Now I am certainly not accusing either party of doing something wrong. Perish the thought. But if you believe there is no connection between these two events, I have an international orange-colored bridge in San Francisco that I would like to sell you.