Author: Joel Fox

The Republican gubernatorial debate tonight in Orange County is all about Meg Whitman. Of course, Steve Poizner will be on the stage with her and he will be a big part of the story. He can benefit tremendously if Whitman falls on her face. But, Whitman is the frontrunner and all eyes will be on her. Can she deliver?

Whitman calmed Republican nerves with her impromptu press conferences at the state Republican convention this weekend. She handled herself well with reporters seeming to put to rest the questions about her confidence and preparedness in unscripted situations. The debate will answer whether she can perform under pressure in the give and take of political discourse. She has to be knowledgeable, and tough but not defensive. How she handles attacks will be important.

If Whitman rises to the occasion, doubts about her will be washed away and her position as frontrunner for the nomination will be solidified. However, if she comes off stilted and uncertain or makes a glaring mistake, Poizner can begin closing the gap between them.

There are some good features in the Democratic reform proposals borrowed from California Forward and announced yesterday, but the focus on the package will be the effort to lower the two-thirds vote requirement to pass the budget. And in the California legislature, dealing with the two-thirds vote requirement faces the classic paradox of an irresistible force meets an immovable object.

The Democrats insist the road to better governance and accountability flows through a simple majority budget vote. Republicans say no way will they give up leverage in the budget negotiations and abandon their constituents by turning the budget dealings completely over to the majority Democrats.

One important piece in trying to resolve this deadlock is the issue of raising fees with a simple majority vote, as is now the law. Republicans are concerned that with majority vote power to pass the budget Democrats will simply turn to raising majority vote fees to balance the budget.

In pushing a bill to prevent furloughs for nearly 80,000 state workers, Senate Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg argued a number of furloughs were counter productive. He pointed particularly to the tax collectors under the Board of Equalization and the Franchise Tax Board. According to a report, Steinberg argued that the furlough savings of $65 million in salary paid to these employees was more than offset by the loss of $465 million in unpaid taxes these workers would collect if they were on the job.

I don’t know how this calculation was made. Seems odd, though. When these workers were working full time was all that uncollected tax revenue accounted for? With rates of return described by Steinberg, we should offer overtime to the tax collectors. At that rate, they could probably collect enough revenue to solve the budget deficit in no time.

But let’s be less cynical. Let’s accept Senator Steinberg’s assertion that furloughs limit productive workers from doing the jobs they are supposed to do in improving the difficult condition of the state.

Word out of Los Angeles on Friday was that the Los Angeles City Council voted to cut business taxes for Internet based firms. In the middle of a catastrophic city budget shortfall? How could that be?

The City Council was not reckless as it might appear. In fact, the tax cut measure will benefit the city’s treasury over time.

The City of Los Angeles taxes business according to the type of business carried out, with different categories paying different tax rates. For example, businesses that fall into the category of “multimedia businesses” pay a gross receipts tax based on a rate of $1.01 per $1,000 of gross receipts. A business that falls in the “business and professions” category pays a rate of $5.07 per $1,000 of gross receipts.

While I have problems with the Los Angeles business gross receipts tax, let’s put that aside for the moment and see why, despite the big budget shortfall in the city, council members chose to lower the tax on Internet firms.

In support of student protests yesterday there were calls to add revenues to education budgets by taxing oil production. Building continuing programs on the foundation of diminishing resources is faulty architecture.

Both Assemblyman Alberto Torrico in the Huffington Post and Joe Mathews in Fox and Hounds Daily called for an oil severance tax to fund education.

But, such a move would have threatening consequences to the economy and to financially strapped Californians. As I wrote a couple of months ago on this page, the tax expense will likely be passed on to consumers at the pump. The cost of production may slow or eliminate some wells. That means Californians will have to import more oil. Jobs would be cut so the oil companies have the revenue to pay their tax bills.

Does it feel like 1978 to you, too?

Consider.

In 1978, Jerry Brown was running for governor. In 2010, he’s running for governor again.

In 1978, Proposition 13 shook the political world beyond the borders of California and garnered many news reports. In 2010, numerous headlines and news stories attest to the continuing influence of Prop 13, such as the L.A. Times’ recent Sunday headline: “Prop 13 flexes its Political Muscle.”

In 1978, Roman Polanski skipped the country to avoid sentencing by a Los Angeles court on charges he had sex with an under-aged girl. In 2010, Polanski is fighting the L.A. authorities’ attempt to carry out a sentence in that case.

California’s new Assembly Speaker, John Perez, attempted to set a tone of inclusiveness at his swearing in yesterday, not only with minority party Republicans, but also with the people of California on the difficult budget dealings.

Perez declared a couple of committee chairmanships would go to Republicans. He also stated he would open the budget process for all by holding budget meetings around the state before the eyes of the public. Further, he said the budget would not be the product of Big 5 meetings between legislative leaders and the governor.

The key to Perez’s effectiveness will be his ability to deal with his roots in the labor movement. Perez points out his history with the United Food and Commercial Workers involved him with a private labor union. However, his close ties to public labor are undeniable.

And, it is labor’s dominance under the capitol dome that has greatly influenced the difficult budget problems that Perez hopes to ameliorate.

One of the more bizarre conspiracy theories I heard recently was that Attorney General Jerry Brown persuaded San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom to drop out of the governor’s race by offering to support him later for the Lieutenant Governor’s office. In turn, Brown would declare he would serve only one-term paving the road for Newsom to move up.

All this without a threatening email from Mike Murphy! Sorry, I’m rejecting this one out-of-hand and I don’t even have to consult Garry South to see if such an arrangement was ever discussed.

But the one-term piece of the arrangement struck a chord. Could that be a device the soon to be 72 year-old Brown would employee to convince California voters that this turn through the governor’s office would be dedicated to cleaning up the mess before he rides into the sunset?

Tom Campbell has opened up a lead over Carly Fiorina and Chuck DeVore in the U.S. Senate race according to the M4Strategies poll for the Small Business Action Committee.

In a survey of 427 high-propensity Republican voters conducted last week, Campbell received 32% of the vote to Fiorina’s 18.5% and DeVore’s 11%.

Campbell jumped from the gubernatorial race to the senate race only two months ago, but has held the top spot in every poll since his entry into the race with the gap widening over time.

Of course, unlike the governor’s campaign, there have been no widespread campaign ads or independent expenditure campaigns launched either for or against any of the candidates. Once the ads start, these poll numbers can change quickly.