It’s $39 million and counting for Republican Meg Whitman.

And people thought Jerry Brown was exaggerating when he told a San Francisco radio show last week that the former eBay CEO was planning “the paid takeover of the airwaves of California.”

Whitman’s decision to drop another $20 million into her campaign for governor puts her in rarified company. Four years ago, state Controller Steve Westly, who also got rich at eBay, spent $35 million in the race for governor, while in 1998 airline tycoon Al Checchi wrote about $40 million in checks in an effort to become California’s governor.

Of course neither Westly nor Checchi made it out of the Democratic primary, which might be a warning to Whitman that money doesn’t always equal votes.

I grew up in Massachusetts and I live in California. Two pretty blue states on the political map. The Scott Brown election focused attention on a Republican winning a big race in a blue state. Many reasons have been given for this upset, but I wonder if something subtle was at work in this election. While both states are considered solidly blue with dominate Democratic legislatures for most of half-a-century, approximately two-thirds of that time each state has had Republican governors.

Do the voters in these two coastal states consciously want to restrict the power of a dominate party? Do the citizens vote their own check and balance system in place?

I once asked this question of Claremont McKenna College political science professor John Pitney. He said he was not aware of any studies to test the theory. Is it coincidence or is something at work here?

Our elected leaders have been back in session for just over
two weeks and once again it is clear that the majority of their time will be –
must be – dominated by the budget. Our recession still runs deep, scores of
Californians are still waiting in the unemployment line, and businesses –
mostly small businesses – from Del Norte to Del Mar are still shutting their
doors at a clip.  As we face
another crushing multibillion dollar state deficit, who can blame them?

Well, California voters can, and they’d be justified.

Voters actually have an opportunity to make a positive
change for the Golden State this November. We can make the bold decision to
remove those officials who continue to force us to bail them out for their
reckless partying, and instead we can support individuals who demonstrate that
they genuinely care about Main Street, jobs and the livelihood of our state.

Yesterday’s landmark decision by the U.S. Supreme Court in the Citizen’s United case has now opened the door for unlimited corporate and union general treasury spending on independent expenditures for express advocacy of the election or defeat of Federal candidates across the country. But here in California, the new rules aren’t going to be so much different from the rules that have governed state candidate and measure elections for some time. And because of gerrymandering as a result of the almost permanent hold the Democrats have had on the California Legislature, there are hardly any "competitive" Federal general elections in California for its 53 congressional seats, for the new rules to have much impact.

Even though California adopted a sweeping "Political Reform Act" in the 1970s, that law and subsequent amendments have always allowed direct corporate and union spending on state and local candidate elections, as long as the spending was independent of the candidate. Some cities, like Los Angeles and Long Beach, and San Diego County, have responded with their own local rules that attempt to restrict these independent expenditures, whether made by an individual, corporation, or union.

For anyone watching Tuesday night’s
Special Election in Massachusetts and still wondering what all the fuss is
about, let me break it down for you.

Americans are mad as hell and they’re not
going to take it anymore.

What’s with all the anger? A recent viral
e-mail I received illustrates that people have finally begun to see firsthand
that "big government" – and the big spending that comes with it – is not only
wasteful, but it simply doesn’t work.

Somebody should take California Gov. Arnold
Schwarzenegger aside and remind him that you never bite the hand that
feeds you – even if you’re still hungry after being fed.

Faced with a $20 billion-plus budget deficit, a
record-low approval rating and no prospect of garnering the two-thirds
legislative vote required to raise taxes, he released a draconian state budget earlier
this month and blamed everyone but himself for the fiscal mess that made it
necessary.

To help close the fiscal gap, Schwarzenegger is in
D.C. this week, along with state legislative leaders, with hat in hand to lobby
the California delegation for billions of dollars. But the welcome sign
probably won’t be hanging on the doors of the Washington lawmakers. This month
has been marked by rancor between the governor and the Democrat-dominated
delegation over what he claims Washington owes California.

The Onion recently ran a story under the headline:
"Democrats Hoping to Take Control of Congress From Minority Republicans in
2010."

If there were a California version
of the Onion, you could run a similar story here, simply by replacing
"Congress" with "The Legislature."

To
repeat briefly what we all know: Under California’s constitutional rules
requiring a 2/3 vote for spending bills and revenue increases, the legislative
minority, if it can stay together, is in charge. And California’s legislative
Republicans have been skilled at taking hostages each year, threatening to send
the state into fiscal chaos unless its demands are met. Democrats have been
unable to figure out how to win these battles, so they have the worst of both
worlds – they’re responsible for the legislature’s failings but don’t really
have the power to do anything about it.

Reading Daniel Borenstein’s article in the Contra Costa Times on pension spiking earlier in the week brought back a memory of a fight against pension spiking in a different part of the state.

Los Angeles County had a bout with pension spiking in the early 1990s. Top county officials – not the average employee – worked under a relatively new salary structure in which they received both bonuses that were not considered part of the salary, and lucrative benefits. The value of the benefits was then included in calculating retirement pensions.

This pension spiking scheme was roundly criticized from the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association to the editorial page of the Los Angeles Times. In fact, when the Jarvis Association called a press conference to announce a lawsuit against the pension spiking, the Times reporter assigned to the press conference told Jon Coupal, then Jarvis attorney, and me, then the association’s president, that his editor already set aside a portion of the front page for the article.

I like my job. Always have. There’s a lot of typing, sure, but I prefer working indoors because I sunburn easily. I don’t have to work midnight shifts or weekends. The pay is fine. Gee, I hope my bosses don’t read this.

Now that I think about it, I’ve liked all my jobs. Some of my employers took a chance on me, and I’m grateful to them. I’m particularly fond of the ones who didn’t fire me.

But last week it hit me: I have been one dumb, gullible employee all these years. I’m going to stop. From now on, I’m going to be more like Conan O’Brien. Now there’s a guy who’s playing it smart.

He may love his job. He may even be grateful to his bosses at NBC for taking a chance on him. But he sure isn’t showing it. He’s not dumb. By throwing such a diva fit at the prospect of having his “Tonight Show” delayed by a half-hour, O’Brien made it clear he’s not gullible.