An F/A-18 Hornet launches from the deck of USS Eisenhower, now conducting war games off the coast of Iran in advance of US-Iran negotiations on Iraq.
** UPDATE: Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama both voted no on the Iraq War funding bill, as it passed both the House and the Senate by overwhelming margins. Although they waited till the last minute to make their intentions known, this will not give former Senator John Edwards much more room to maneuver on the issue in the Democratic presidential primaries.
** REMAINING AMERICAN SOLDIERS CAPTURED BY AL QAEDA STILL NOT FOUND. After a 13th day of searching by thousands of US troops south of Baghdad, the two remaining American captives of Al Qaeda believed to be alive have still not been located. A third American soldier captured in the ambush on May 12th which killed the other five members of the unit turned up dead yesterday in the Euphrates River.
The number who feel the effort in Iraq is going badly jumped 10 points in the last month. 76% say the Iraq War goes badly. Only 23% think it’s going well. Only 20% say the surge strategy is having a positive impact. 60% want a timeline for the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq.
President George W. Bush’s job approval rating is 30%. The approval rating of Congress is only slightly higher, just 36%.
** PELOSI’S DEFEAT. There is a lot of gnashing of teeth and rending of garments in certain quarters about House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s inability to end the Iraq War. (Right now, that is. It’s going to end. But not now.) It’s a matter of arithmetic. They don’t have the votes to do what many Democratic activists want.
Look at the Senate. The Democrats have a one-vote majority. That currently relies on a senator, Tim Johnson, still too ill to appear in public, and a senator, Joe Lieberman, who is an independent defeated in the Democratic primary. While not as slender as the majority in the Senate, the House is something of a house of cards. Pelosi’s majority there depends on dozens of more conservative Democrats who aren’t bloody likely to vote to deny funding to “our boys in the field.”
So long as Republicans hold firm, which they probably will for a few more months, support isn’t there. By fall, however, it will probably be apparent that needed political changes which should already have occurred in Iraq are not happening. Or if they are, as the result of a political accommodation with other players in the region, such as Iran. And we’ll have established whether any areas of Iraq are actually being stabilized militarily, or if the problem is simply being shoved around to areas of the country which don’t have massive US military presences. As is the pattern, of course, in the history of unconventional warfare.
And while the American public clearly wants this war to end, there is no consensus on how to end it. Perhaps even among those who seek to lead the movement to end the war.
John Edwards, for example, and these silly attacks on him for his house and his haircut are just that, non-serious, gave a very interesting speech yesterday which I’m going to write about. But even as he tries to steal a march on Barack Obama in the primaries, it’s not clear that he is nearly as anti-war as his atmospherics suggest. I shot video footage of him a couple months ago in which he clearly contemplates future US military intervention in Iraq.
** CALIFORNIA LOTTERY: ASSEMBLY TO HIRE MILKEN INSTITUTE TO EVALUATE PRIVATIZATION OPTIONS. The California Assembly announced its plan to hire the Santa Monica-based Milken Institute — headed by convicted junk bond financier-turned-philanthropist Michael Milken — to evaluate Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s idea of leasing the underperforming California Lottery. “It’s critical to get an independent assessment of any possible sale or lease of the lottery,” says Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez. “Michael Milken and the Milken Institute have a sterling international reputation for their work, and the people of California will benefit greatly from their review of this project.”
** CALIFORNIA HEALTH CARE: THE COUNTER-ATTACK BEGINS. While Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has done a very good job of splitting the business community in what many had expected to be a solid front of opposition to his or any other comprehensive health care program — called in some quarters universal health care — some chatter this morning is on the coming counter-attack. It’s coming in the form of an advertising campaign by the insurer Blue Cross. Others, such as the Chamber of Commerce and, perhaps, the California Restaurant Association (with which Schwarzenegger had a lengthy private session), may join in the effort against Schwarzenegger’s proposal and the proposals of Democratic legislative leaders Fabian Nunez and Don Perata, which are readily combined, but the rumored millions are being ponied up by the insurance company. My read is that the effort will not succeed. I’ll explain why in a future column.
The California Nurses Association has already been attacking from the opposite end of the spectrum, pushing the so-called single-payer solution. Which even John Edwards rejected for his much praised on the left health care plan. Single-payer was wiped out at the polls in a California initiative campaign a few years ago. But the attacks from the left aren’t a real problem.
Obama’s edge is attributed to his charisma and his ability to appeal to independent voters. The poll was conducted by telephone between May 17th and May 20th. Here are the results for the top tier candidates, with Obama, Clinton, and Edwards matched sequentially against the Republicans:
** SABER RATTLING PRECEDES PEACE MEETING. The US Navy is again conducting aggressive exercises off the coast of Iran, with two aircraft carrier battle groups and thousands of Marines. Almost amusingly, the move comes just days before the US and Iran will engage in high-level talks in Baghdad on stabilizing the situation in Iraq. How credible is it to think the US is about to launch a strike against Iran in this situation? Not at all.
Al Qaeda forces on maneuver in Iraq. Thousands of US troops continue to search for the three American soldiers captured by Al Qaeda outside Baghdad on May 12th.
** AMERICAN SOLDIERS CAPTURED BY AL QAEDA STILL MISSING. Another day of search by thousands of American troops for the three soldiers captured by Al Qaeda south of Baghdad on May 12th has ended without success. There may be answer regarding one of the captives. As reported this morning, a body was pulled out of the Euphrates River that Iraqi police think is one of the three captured Americans. The US military has not yet identified the victim, who reportedly has two bullet wounds in the head. Standard procedure is to notify next of kin prior to any public announcement.
** BIG INSTITUTIONAL INVESTORS PUSH FOR BOSKIN’S REMOVAL FROM EXXON MOBIL BOARD. It turns out that California Controller John Chiang, mentioned this morning, is working with an even larger coalition. Two dozen leading institutional investors have targeted Stanford economist Michael Boskin for defeat at the Exxon Mobil annual corporate meeting in Dallas on May 30th. Why? Because he has refused to meet with them on the climate change issue. Boskin chairs the board’s Public Issues Committee.
The coalition announced its opposition to Boskin today. While they did not mention it, Boskin is the chief economic advisor to Republican Rudy Giuliani’s presidential campaign. So, should Giuliani emerge as the Republican nominee, Boskin will become a very large political football in the campaign.
Investors opposing Boskin include the California State Teachers Retirement System (CalSTRS), F&C Management Ltd., Illinois State Board of Investment, New York City Employees Retirement System, New York State Common Retirement Fund, the California, Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, North Carolina and Vermont State Treasurers, labor funds such as SEIU and AFSCME, and a dozen other investors.
Since late 2005, the coalition says, Boskin has refused five times to meet with large shareholders on the issue of climate change. The institutional investors will also sponsor shareholder resolutions calling on Exxon Mobil to set greenhouse gas reduction targets and invest more heavily in renewable energy technologies.
“By refusing to meet with shareholders, the firm and Boskin have disregarded their environmental responsibility and their financial obligation to shareholders,” said California State Treasurer Bill Lockyer.
** NUNEZ ON TODAY. Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, author of AB 32, last year’s landmark California legislation on climate change, will appear on The Today Show tomorrow morning, I believe in the 9 AM hour.
** OBAMA STRENGTH IN NEW NATIONAL POLL. There’s a new national poll by Zogby coming out tonight that has Barack Obama leading all Republicans and running the best of any Democrat.
** LOVEFEST FOR CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR AND LEGISLATIVE LEADERS. It was a lovefest with Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez and Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata as the three men received their Pat Brown Awards at lunch today for their work on climate change. The three leaders are clearly getting along well, the harsh words around the “May revise” of Schwarzenegger’s proposed state budget in the past.
Perata, for his part, described Schwarzenegger as “the best spokesperson for California that we’ve ever had.” Nunez praised Schwarzenegger for getting the ball rolling on climate change and for signing his landmark bill last fall. Schwarzenegger said the two Democrats “are great partners.” There was not, however, an impromptu round of singing nor any marshmallow roasting.
** THE CLINTON MEMO. There’s a lot of chatter about a leaked memo written by Hillary Clinton’s deputy campaign manager in which he advocates a de facto pullout of the campaign from Iowa. It’s hard to know how that got out, or what the internal dynamics are there, but you can bet she won’t be pulling out of Iowa.
As the frontrunner, she has to campaign everywhere. She doesn’t have to win everywhere. But she does have to be competitive. Which she is. In two polls last week, she was in a three-way statistical dead with John Edwards and Barack Obama. In a Des Moines Register poll, she ran third, with Edwards in the lead. The one who must win Iowa is Edwards, who has spent an enormous amount of time there since the 2004 elections. I believe Clinton is spending three of the next four weekends in Iowa.
** SCHWARZENEGGER ON THE TONIGHT SHOW TONIGHT. After his luncheon appearance to receive the Governor Pat Brown Award, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger flies down from Sacramento to Burbank, where this afternoon he will tape his latest appearance on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. That’s the venue, of course, on which he announced his candidacy for governor of California in August 2003.
** HILLARY STAFFS UP IN CALIFORNIA. Senator Hillary Clinton is staffing up in California, where she currently leads in the polls but faces a very stiff challenge from Barack Obama. Her California Director Ace Smith, former top aide to LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Attorney General Jerry Brown, is being joined by four new staffers. State political director Chris Lavery was a top aide to Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman and was Northeastern political director for the Democratic National Committee. Communications director Luis Vizcaino was press secretary for former Lieutenant Governor Cruz Bustamante when he ran for governor in the 2003 recall and had senior roles with Villaraigosa and the Kerry/Edwards campaign. Field director Michael Trujillo just ran a winning LA School Board campaign and before that was a top aide to Villaraigosa, and deputy field director Connie Lee has worked on a number of state legislative and school board campaigns..
** SCHWARZENEGGER, PERATA, AND NUNEZ RECEIVE GOVERNOR PAT BROWN AWARD IN LIVE WEBCAST TODAY. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, California Senate President Don Perata, and Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez all receive the Governor Pat Brown Award from the Council on Environmental and Economic Balance for their work on climate change at a luncheon today. Remarks will be webcast live starting at 12:25 PM.
** GIULIANI RIPS IMMIGRATION BILL AND MCCAIN. Rudy Giuliani is continuing his criticism of the immigration bill co-authored by his rival for the Republcian presidential nomination, John McCain. ”We need to know everyone who’s in the United States who comes here from a foreign country. That has to be the goal of our immigration law,” he said in a statement today. ”If you make that the objective of your law, you will clear up a lot of the confusion that presently exists both in our present immigration law and in what Congress is trying to do right now, which kind of goes in 10 different directions without any central focus.”
Giuliani says the bill might solve some problems, but would make things worse overall. A longtime supporter of immigration, Giuliani is taking a tougher stance in the wake of 9/11 and in the midst of his campaign. He says he’s willing to legalize illegal immigrants, but only if ID cards for all and a strong database are part of the package.
”It has to show when you came in. It also has to show when you leave, which I can’t find in the hodgepodge that’s being put together,” he said. ”I’ve gone over this thing about four times. I’m a lawyer. I’ve actually written laws, argued cases. I’m having a hard time understanding this law.”
The bill, under attack from seemingly all points on the ideological spectrum, appears stalled. Proponents had hoped to move it in the Senate this week, but it’s been delayed till next month.
** CALIFORNIA CONTROLLER OPPOSES BOSKIN’S RE-ELECTION TO EXXON MOBIL BOARD. California Controller John Chiang is joining forces today with the state treasurer of Connecticut and environmentalists to oppose the re-election of Stanford economist Michael Boskin to the board of oil giant Exxon Mobil. California pensions funds are major investors in the world’s largest privately-owned oil company. Chiang says he’s urging “a “no” vote on the reappointment of Michael Boskin to the Exxon Mobil Board of Directors because of Boskin’s unwillingness to meet with shareholders to discuss the company’s potential exposure from climate change and the company’s failure to take short-term actions to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions and expand its renewable energy investments.”
Boskin is the chief economic advisor to Rudy Giuliani’s presidential campaign.
** LOST SEASON FINALE TONIGHT. It’s the third season finale of Lost tonight. The show had slumped seriously early in the season, and I frankly didn’t know what was going on, but it’s rebounded terrifically since it started up again this year. I identify with the show, not just because it might be cool to start over on a beautiful mysterious island, but also because what I do is not unlike those guys down in “The Hatch,” typing a code into a computer every hour and 48 minutes to prevent the world from ending. Or something like that. Of course, the Hatch is no more. And the world did not end. So far as we know.
** Track global and national energy prices in near real time via Bloomberg. Crude oil prices are around $65 per barrel. Refineries in Nigeria, the world’s fifth largest oil producing nation, may be shut down tomorrow by a strike.
** PAT BROWN AWARDS. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, state Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata, and Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez will each receive the Governor Pat Brown Award from the California Council for Environmental and Economic Balance tomorrow in Sacramento for their leadership roles on climate change.
** RICHARDSON IN IOWA. New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, the former UN ambassador, energy secretary, and House intelligence subcommittee chairman, will pick up the pace of his Iowa campaign in the wake of multiple polls showing him moving up into a notable fourth place in the Democratic presidential race there. He will also increase the tempo of his much praised TV advertising campaign there, which he has just begun.
** HILLARY ON PRE-SCHOOL AND OUTSOURCING. I was on a conference call this morning with Senator Hillary Clinton, who declared the expansion of preschool one of her top priorities. How would she fund it? Through the elimination of “500 outsourcing contracts.”
“I have done a careful analysis of everything this administration has outsourced,” said the former first lady. Outside contracting, she said “has not been proven to save government money.” There are “not the usual safeguards” with outsourcing, and there are “many reasons to go after the outsourcing epidemic.”
I asked her to tell me what was wrong with the outsourcing contracts she would sacrifice to fund expanded preschool programs.
They are “throughout government,” said the Democratic presidential frontrunner. “There may well be better kinds of ways” to do those tasks. “I am certain we will find those ways to save money.”
** HILLARY CLINTON. I was just on a conference call with Senator Hillary Clinton. And, as is not infrequently the case these days, with information cascading from around the globe, pressed the “star 1″ combination to ask a question without having any idea of what I was about to ask the Democratic presidential frontrunner. Yet, we came up with something interesting. Nonetheless, it would not be inaccurate to say that I am looking forward to Memorial Day weekend.
** JERRY BROWN AND CALIFORNIA PREPARE TO SUE BUSH ADMINISTRATION. The Bush Administration is “acting in collusion with the auto and oil industries,” said California Attorney General and former Governor Jerry Brown. The two-time runner-up for the Democratic presidential nomination says California is preparing to sue the federal government if it blocks the state’s efforts to reduce greenhouse gas-causing emissions from motor vehicles. Sources around Arnold Schwarzenegger confirm this.
Addressing a U. S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) hearing this morning in Washington, Brown said federal law allows California to set vehicle emission standards tougher than federal regulations, and then allows other states to adopt the California standard.
“The California legislature passed a greenhouse law in 2002 requiring automakers to reduce vehicle global warming emissions 30 percent by 2016,” Brown explained. “There is no doubt that automobile manufacturers can meet that goal, and since the federal government does not want to seek such a reduction California intends to move forward.” Brown said that 11 other states — Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington — have since adopted the California standard.
“Together we represent one-third of the population of the United States, and the people of our 12 states want to act now to combat global warming. We are not willing to wait while President Bush offers only rhetoric, excuses and delays. Suing the federal government is not our first choice, but we will have no choice if our legitimate efforts to protect our planet are blocked because of partisan political games in Washington.”
Brown noted that inCalifornia and the other states, the fight against the greenhouse effect is a bipartisan effort.
“The California law was passed by a Democratic legislature and signed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican,” the former governor noted. “Governor Schwarzenegger supports our plans to sue EPA if we are not allowed to implement the California law. Protecting our planet is not a partisan issue, and the states now want to do what we can in the absence of federal action, and the EPA has no right to deny us the ability to move forward.”
Brown said the proposed California standards are the most comprehensive effort to combat global warming in U.S. history. The attorney general noted that California filed its request for an EPA waiver, which in the past has always been routinely granted, in December 2005. Under the Clean Air Act, California can adopt stricter standards by requesting a waiver from the US Environmental Protection Agency. Such requests have been approved more than 50 times in the past. Approval of California’s waiver means the other states would get approval automatically.
** GIULIANI OPPOSES CURRENT IMMIGRATION BILL. The former New York mayor and leading Republican presidential candidate opposes the “present version” of the immigration bill. Giuliani says he wants a database that will let the federal government “know everybody who is in the United States, who comes here from a foreign country.”
“If you make that your goal,” he says, “then everything follows from that or leads to that. There should be a tamper proof ID card, a biometric ID card that everyone who comes here from a foreign country should have. In order to make sure you identify everyone, in order to be secure.”
Giuliani, an advocate of immigrants rights in the past, holds out some hope for another version of the bill, which might emerge through further debate in Congress. But the reality is that momentum on the issue is stalled, and the planned for vote prior to Memorial Day is now delayed till sometime in June.
Arnold Schwarzenegger has an entertaining encounter with a constituent
who doesn’t like immigration and doesn’t believe in global warming, in
this NWN video.
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s greenhouse offensive continued yesterday, as he journeyed to Salt Lake City to sign red state Utah’s Republican Governor Jon Huntsman up for the Western states’ accord on climate change. Earlier in the day, he and Connecticut Governor Jodi Rell, also a Republican, authored a blistering column in the Washington Post demanding that the Bush Administration allow their states and others to cut tailpipe emissions of greenhouse gases.
Utah is joining the Western climate change accord, joining California, Oregon, Washington, Arizona, New Mexico, and the Canadian province of British Columbia in an agreement to fight climate change. What’s striking about the accord with Utah is that it is one of the most conservative states in the nation. While Arizona and New Mexico are swing states, and the West Coast states more blue than not, Utah, home to the Mormon Church, is crimson in its reliable Republicanism. In addition to being one of the most striking states in the country — for now, at least — it is also one of the nation’s biggest coal states.
If Utah cuts greenhouse gas emissions, that will have both political and technological significance. Of course, Utah is not going to eliminate coal-fired electricity production, as some critics are already pointing out. What it is more likely to do, as has not been pointed out, is further the development of “clean coal” electric power production, which is a misnomer, and to use what is called carbon sequestration to capture and sequester the resultant gases in abandoned mines and the like. Imperfect solutions for an imperfect world, in which China has been adding 40 coal-fired power plants a year for years.
California is weaning itself off coal-fired production — all of the electricity purchased from out of state, with liberal LA’s municipal utility, the Department of Water & Power, the biggest consumer — courtesy of a bill by Senate leader Don Perata signed by Schwarzenegger last year. But other states, more dependent on old technology — California began the shift to greater energy efficiency, renewable energy, and cleaner burning natural gas during Attorney General Jerry Brown’s governorship in the 1970s — begin in different places as they seek to cut their greenhouse gas emissions.
Schwarzenegger’s other big move of the day, the op-ed piece with a fellow Republican governor in the Washington Post, was what might be called aggressive diplomacy. California wants its tailpipe emissions law, authored by former LA Assemblywoman Fran Pavley in 2002, finally granted the necessary waiver by the US Environmental Protection Agency that previous moves against pollution have been accorded under California’s special status with the Clean Air Act. But the Bush Administration has dragged its heels for years, saying greenhouse gases couldn’t be regulated under the Clean Air Act. Until the US Supreme Court informed them otherwise.
Schwarzenegger didn’t mince words.
It’s bad enough that the federal government has yet to take the threat of global warming seriously, but it borders on malfeasance for it to block the efforts of states such as California and Connecticut that are trying to protect the public’s health and welfare. California, Connecticut and 10 other states are poised to enact tailpipe emissions standards — tougher than existing federal requirements — that would cut greenhouse gas emissions from cars, light trucks and sport-utility vehicles by 392 million metric tons by the year 2020, the equivalent to taking 74 million of today’s cars off the road for an entire year.
Since transportation accounts for one-third of America’s greenhouse gas emissions, enacting these standards would be a huge step forward in our efforts to clean the environment and would show the rest of the world that our nation is serious about fighting global warming. Yet for the past 16 months, the Environmental Protection Agency has refused to give us permission to do so. Even after the Supreme Court ruled in our favor last month, the federal government continues to stand in our way.
The EPA will hold the first of two public hearings this week on California’s tailpipe emissions law, which was enacted in 2002.
Following on the heels of Schwarzenegger’s Washington Post op-ed piece yesterday morning, Attorney General Jerry Brown went to Washington to further the push for the state’s tailpipe emissions law. The former two-term governor and two-time Democratic presidential runner-up is holding a number of meetings, testifying at an EPA hearing, holding a press conference, and appearing before the U.S. Senate Committee on the Environment and Public Works, chaired by Californian Barbara Boxer, to brief the committee and generate further pressure on the Bush Administration.
Brown has been through these fights before. When he was governor in the ’70s and early ’80s, California fought successfully to use its unique positioning under the Clean Air Act to cut air pollution, particularly in the form of nitrous oxides. The auto industry of Detroit insisted it couldn’t be done, that the technology didn’t exist, that the industry would be wrecked, a familiar stance at every stage of the advance of environmental and consumer protection.
Brown and California used regulation as what he calls “a forcing function” to spur the development and implementation of needed technologies. And of course the changes were accomplished without any of the extraordinary dislocation darkly warned of by the auto industry and its corps of lobbyists and operatives. History has a habit of repeating itself.
Al Qaeda operations chief Ayman al-Zawahiri, sought by US forces since
the attacks on New York and Washington of September 11, 2001,
in a recent speech. The search for US troops captured in Iraq by
Al Qaeda is in its 10th day.
** GINGRICH MAY ANNOUNCE PRESIDENTIAL BID IN NOVEMBER.Not to be left out with all the speculation now centering on Fred Thompson, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said this afternoon that he may announce his own Republican presidential candidacy on November 6th. Why then? Because the people can’t stand a campaign longer than a year. Gingrich, who has a new novel out that is an alternate history of World War II in the Pacific, is on a book tour. He had been the center of speculation about a new entrant into the Republican presidential race before Thompson announced his interest. In 1994, in the midst of a chaotic period in Bill Clinton’s first term as president, Gingrich led Republicans to a new majority in the US House of Representatives. But with a government shutdown move, he overreached, and the majority proved short-lived. At least for then. And Gingrich, with his private life opened up in much the same manner as Clinton’s, though no interns were involved, became one of the most controversial figures in American politics.
** FRED THOMPSON’S MOVES. With people associated with his circle saying that the former Tennessee senator and longtime Hollywood actor is likely to make an announcement in June or July, Fred Thompson has named Tom Collamore as his chief political aide. He’s a former aide to the first President Bush who then became the longtime vice president for public affairs of Philip Morris, the tobacco giant which was more recently renamed Altria. Thompson will also appear on The Tonight Show in June.
** SCHWARZENEGGER ANNOUNCES COLLAPSED BAY AREA FREEWAY TO OPEN BEFORE MEMORIAL DAY WEEKEND. “Thanks to hard, around-the-clock work of Caltrans and C.C. Myers, our local partners and businesses, Bay Area motorists can once again travel through this busy interchange,” said Governor Schwarzenegger in a statement. “Just in time for the holiday weekend, this roadway will be open in 26 days from when the accident occurred.” The repair of the collapsed I-580 connector just east of the Bay Bridge will be completed Thursday night and the freeway section open to traffic on Friday morning.
Early on the morning of Sunday, April 29th, a gasoline tanker overturned and caught fire just east of the Bay Bridge. The heat of the resulting fire reached thousands of degrees, causing the steel undergirding of the freeway to partially liquefy. The eastbound 580 connector, a major arterial for traffic heading east from San Francisco, collapsed onto the southbound 880 connector, a major arterial for traffic heading south to Oakland Airport and San Jose. This caused tremendous disruption in the already overburdened MacArthur Maze just east of the Bay Bridge spanning the Bay between Oakland and San Francisco.
The I-880 connector reopened on May 7th. Now the I-580 connector will reopen on May 25th. Many had feared the mess would drag on for months.
** CALI PRISONER TRANSFERS OKAYED FOR NOW. California’s Third District Court of Appeals okayed for now the transfer of prisoners to other states by issuing a stay in the prison guards union’s lawsuit against the Schwarzenegger Administration.
** DES MOINES REGISTER IOWA POLL.The Des Moines Register published its poll on Iowa over the weekend, and it has strikingly different results from others done over the same period of time. Rather than a three-way statistical tie, this poll has Mitt Romney with a big lead on the Republican side, with 30% to John McCain at 18% and Rudy Giuliani at 17%. On the Democratic, also rather than a statistical three-way tie, the newspaper has John Edwards at 29%, with Barack Obama at 23% and Hillary Clinton at 21%. It’s hard to account for the differences. Register chief political writer David Yepsen, who’s been in the job since I did Iowa for Gary Hart over 20 years ago, has written quite favorably of Mitt Romney’s performances in the debates and elsewhere. Which I think have been much more mixed, especially in the last debate. The poll was taken from May 12-16, so the great bulk of the polling was done prior to the impact of last week’s Republican debate.
** JERRY BROWN TO WASHINGTON. Following on the heels of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Washington Post op-ed piece this morning, California Attorney General Jerry Brown is en route to Washington to further the push for the state’s tailpipe emissions law. The former two-term governor and two-time Democratic presidential runner-up will hold a number of meetings, testify at an EPA hearing tomorrow, hold a press conference, and then appear before the U.S. Senate Committee on the Environment and Public Works, chaired by Californian Barbara Boxer, to brief the committee and generate further pressure on the Bush Administration.
It’s bad enough that the federal government has yet to take the threat of global warming seriously, but it borders on malfeasance for it to block the efforts of states such as California and Connecticut that are trying to protect the public’s health and welfare. California, Connecticut and 10 other states are poised to enact tailpipe emissions standards — tougher than existing federal requirements — that would cut greenhouse gas emissions from cars, light trucks and sport-utility vehicles by 392 million metric tons by the year 2020, the equivalent to taking 74 million of today’s cars off the road for an entire year.
Since transportation accounts for one-third of America’s greenhouse gas emissions, enacting these standards would be a huge step forward in our efforts to clean the environment and would show the rest of the world that our nation is serious about fighting global warming. Yet for the past 16 months, the Environmental Protection Agency has refused to give us permission to do so. Even after the Supreme Court ruled in our favor last month, the federal government continues to stand in our way.
Another discouraging sign came just last week, when President Bush issued an executive order to give federal agencies until the end of 2008 to continue studying the threat of greenhouse gas emissions and determine what can be done about them. To us, that again sounds like more of the same inaction and denial, and it is unconscionable.
The EPA will hold the first of two public hearings this week on California’s tailpipe emissions law, which was enacted in 2002.
** SCHWARZENEGGER TO UTAH TO SIGN NEW CLIMATE CHANGE ACCORD TODAY. The conservative Republican governor of Utah, Jon Huntsman, will sign an agreement with Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger at noon today in Salt Lake City to cut greenhouse gas emissions. Utah is joining the Western climate change accord, joining California, Oregon, Washington, Arizona, New Mexico, and British Columbia in an agreement to fight climate change.
** AMERICAN SOLDIERS CAPTURED BY AL QAEDA IN IRAQ STILL NOT LOCATED. The search by thousands of American soldiers for three of their colleagues captured south of Baghdad by Al Qaeda forces the weeekend before last is now in its 10th day. The American troops involved in the search, taken away from the difficult work of the “surge” strategy, are getting run down and seem no closer to their goal.
** RICHARDSON ANNOUNCES PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDACY IN LOS ANGELES THIS MORNING. As previously reported here, New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson formally announces his campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination this morning at 10 AM in LA. Originally slated for the LA Press Club, the event will now take place at the Biltmore Hotel in downtown LA. NWN has been covering Richardson’s campaign for months, of course, but this is the formal kick-off. He has recently moved into fourth place in Iowa, Nevada, and New Hampshire.
** 24 SEASON FINALE TONIGHT. The official NWN show, 24, ends what has been a decidedly up and down season tonight with a two-hour season finale. Will we recover the magical circuit board containing the key to Russia’s military systems from Jack Bauer’s evil father (played by the nice farmer from Babe who invented the warp drive on Star Trek)? Or will Russia attack our base in Kyrgyzstan first? What move will the Chinese make next? Aren’t there some Islamic jihadists still around? Will America’s second black president recover from the assassination attempt? Will Jack’s true love Audrey recover her mind? (Don’t count on it, she’s in a new series next season from the creator of Sex and the City.) Will Jack have to see his son, er, nephew traded for the circuit board in order to stop a war with Russia? All these questions, and more, might be answered tonight …
The Republican Party in California is in a very odd position. Even as it has a governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, who has won two landslide elections in a row and boasts a 62% job approval rating for his centrist approach, the party leadership has moved to the far right.
The most public face of the move is not an elected official, but a new kind of politician, a blogging politico exemplified by Jon Fleischman whose Flash Report web site has become an online mecca for state Republicans and who in February was elected Southern California vice chairman of the Republican Party. “I’m having the time of my life,” says Fleischman.
“He’s become a figure more important to the activists than most elected officials,” says Republican consultant and frequent Fox News commentator Karen Hanretty. “He’s a great quote for the mainstream media.” Which frequently acts as though Fleischman and the band of bloggers around him represent Republican thinking. Something which people around Schwarzenegger, who, after all, received 92% of the Republican vote, don’t exactly agree with.
The party has replaced Duf Sundheim, its moderately conservative Silicon Valley lawyer chairman and key Arnold ally with the very conservative Ron Nehring, a longtime employee and associate of controversial Washington right-wing fixture Grover Norquist, who runs a national anti-tax crusade and is a longtime associate of the neoconservative adventurers who brought you the Iraq War.
Nice guy Assembly Republican Leader George Plescia — his fate sealed by the damaging leak of surreptitiously obtained tapes of Schwarzenegger’s private conversations by the late Phil Angelides campaign and slipped to the Los Angeles Times — was replaced by more hardline conservative Fresnan Mike Villines, who conducts a prayer group in the capital and previously served as chief of staff to Chuck Poochigian, the hard right Republican who lost in a landslide to Jerry Brown in the state attorney general race.
Pragmatic conservative Senate Republican Leader Dick Ackerman barely held off a challenge from the right by Palm Springs area Senator Jim Battin, who works with and promotes the interests of the Indian casino tribes but otherwise wants to cut government spending, which makes him good enough for the hard right.
Beneath it all is the rise of new, very far right party leaders like Fleischman, new state party vice chairman Tom Del Beccaro from the Bay Area, and California Republican Assembly chairman Mike Spence of LA. They are prominent bloggers using the new power of the Internet to promote a political orthodoxy that in some very major respects is very much at odds with the views of actual Republican voters.
The far right slant of the Flash Report particularly affects Republicans in the Assembly, all elected from gerrymandered districts emphasizing conservative voters. As one source in the Schwarzenegger circle puts it: “Sometimes the Assembly caucus will seem fine. Then they’ll read something on the Flash Report and get all exercised about it.”
These new party leaders come out of the hard right — the California Republican Assembly (CRA) and the Young Americans for Freedom (YAF) — whose ranks are actually small in numbers, as the CRA draws a few hundred to its conventions. But they are very persistent.
Unlike most Republican voters, according to many polls, these new leaders not only oppose any increase in the minimum wage, but the existence of the minimum wage. “The minimum wage is socialism,” says Fleischman.
They oppose Schwarzenegger’s environmental programs, in particular his drive to curtail greenhouse gas emissions and, in most cases, deny that the greenhouse effect exists. Again, in stark contrast to the views of most Republican voters.
When vitriolic right-wing columnist Ann Coulter called Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards a “faggot” at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, these worthies did not join the chorus of criticism that included all the mainstream Republican presidential candidates.
Asked about that, Fleischman said: “That’s a national issue. We focus on state issues.” Yet his publication featured glowing reports from the conference and he and his bloggers regularly opine about all sorts of national issues.
When Schwarzenegger called Rush Limbaugh “irrelevant” during an appearance on the Today Show, prompting a brief war of words with the gasbag ideologue, the Flash Report sided with Limbaugh over the Republican governor, dubbing the right-wing radio talk show host “America’s Anchorman.”
After a period in which party leadership embraced appeals to independent voters, the fastest growing segment of voters in the state, key to Schwarzenegger’s two victories, the new party leadership wants to ignore them, banning them from participating in next year’s early presidential primary.
“I will order that the primary ballot go to independent voters,” vowed Nehring in a meeting with political reporters after taking over as state party chairman in February. But he didn’t have the authority to do that under party rules, and has not moved to change the rules.
“I don’t know how you function as a modern political party in California without reaching out to independent voters,” says former party chairman Sundheim. He has pushed for their inclusion in the presidential primary.
But the vicars of the far right will have none of it. The bloggers crusade relentlessly against it. As Fleischman puts it: “Only Republicans should decide who our candidates are. If they want to vote in our primary, they should become Republicans.”
It’s an attitude that Democrats adore. “We want independents to vote in our primary,” says strategist Roger Salazar. “Let those guys have their little conservative clubhouse if they want.”
For his part, Del Beccaro, operating in league with Poochigian’s campaign for state attorney general, pursued a fruitless but high profile law suit to disqualify former Governor Jerry Brown from serving as state attorney general. Brown, a Yale Law grad admitted to the Bar in 1965, paid reduced bar association membership fees for a time when he was not practicing law.
First Del Beccaro tried to stop the counting of any votes for Brown, a move which was swiftly dismissed by the court. After the election, on the central question of Brown’s eligibility, a Republican judge tossed the case after a short hearing. But the anti-Brown drumbeat continued throughout, even though more sophisticated Republican operatives laughed off the case from the beginning.
But no one wants to be quoted on that because they don’t want to be attacked by the bloggers.
A recent episode provided strong insight into the prevalent far right views. Mike Spence, a regular on the Flash Report and president of the right-wing California Republican Assembly, called Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez a “fellow traveler” of the Communist Party in an online column.
Spence, who had been so dismayed by Schwarzenegger’s centrism that he tried to draft Mel Gibson to run for governor last year, wrote this: “Next time you are in Sacramento and run into the Speaker, say these words ‘Kur-heiny’ and see what his answer is. Apparently that is part of a code exchange of the LA branch of the Communist Party USA. Disclaimer: Of course I don’t really want to imply that Nunez is a communist. That would be wrong. I don’t want to be accused of the horrible sin of “McCarthyism.” Communists are very upfront about controlling all aspects of our lives in order to serve their statist ideology. In no way do I imply that Nunez and his fellow travelers are upfront.”
Asked about this red-baiting, Fleischman and Spence were unrepentant. In fact, they did it some more. Said Fleischman: “Maybe I am missing something here. But why on earth would Mike Spence apologize to Fabian Nunez for calling him a ‘communist’? I mean I guess it would be more accurate to call him a socialist, rather than a commie. “To each according to their ability. From each according to their means.” - Karl Marx Seems to me that Nunez lives by this infamous quote.”
Spence defended his calling Nunez a Communist fellow traveler by quoting a Wikipedia definition. “According to Wikipedia, “A fellow traveler is a person who sympathizes with the beliefs of a particular organization, but does not belong to that organization. The phrase must be understood as referring to people who “walk part of the way” with an organization, without committing themselves to it.””
Of course, Nunez is neither a Communist nor a Marxist. Unless, perhaps, you believe that the minimum wage is socialism.
** NOW THAT. IS A LINE. Enjoy a series of one-liners from the weekly opening of the show that destroyed West Wing creator Aaron Sorkin’s just-cancelled Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip. Delivered via the sunglasses of justice. Are they awful? Or great? The verdict is in. But the jury. Is out.
** LOOKS LIKE DO OR DIE WEEK FOR COMPREHENSIVE IMMIGRATION LEGISLATION.On Monday, the US Senate takes up the immigration deal between the Bush White House and key senators involved with the issue. It would create a path to legalization for illegal immigrants already here, a new guest worker program to deal with putative shortages of labor in agriculture and other areas, change the system for granting of green cards from one focused more on family ties to one focused more on needed skills, and provide some tightening of border controls.
Do or die? The smart money bet would be: Die. Last year’s mass enthusiasm on the issue has largely evaporated and it’s a major political football in both parties. On the Republican side, only John McCain of the major contenders continues in clearcut support. Mitt Romney, once quite moderate on the issue, is what you can guess. On the Democratic side, there are problems for more conservative Dems, more populist Dems, and more liberal Dems. People like Jim Webb are concerned about the impact on the labor market. People like Nancy Pelosi want the family system — often abused, with fake marriages and so forth — to continue.
The problem is that immigration is a political football. And the president lacks the basic credibility, both with the country and his own party, to lead.
** AMERICAN TROOPS STILL MISSING IN IRAQ. The search for the three American soldiers from the 10th Mountain Division captured by Al Qaeda forces south of Baghdad is now in its ninth day, with thousands of American troops still engaged in the search. The only word out of the American high command in Baghdad is that they’re pretty sure that two of the three captured Americans are still alive. The early word of promising leads has disappeared. I’m waiting for all those folks who criticzed the Brits when their sailors and Marines were taken to start criticizing this.
** S.F. JUVENILIA. There’s something more than faintly juvenile about San Francisco politics. San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, who has had his own obvious, much-remarked on, problems of late, has acquired someone who is not an admirer. That would be city Supervisor Chris Daly. (San Fran is a city and a county, so the city council doubles as a county board of supervisors.) No one serious is running against Newsom, despite much agitation for an opponent, and Daley, who I’ve met and found quite youthful, shall we say, is holding a left-wing convention on June 2nd to try to drum an opponent up. Meanwhile, Daley is into some stunts. Like barging into Newsom’s meeting with the Venezuelan ambassador and plopping down for the discussion himself, wearing blue jeans and a t-shirt. Nice.
** SCHWARZWORLD. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger busts another move on Monday.
Pop artist Andy Warhol brought contemporary art into the realm
of Impressionism at this week’s New York art auctions, with one
of his works fetching an astounding $71.7 million.
One clue came on the Sotheby’s tote board, which added the Russian ruble to the euro, the American dollar, the British pound, and the Swiss franc as a principal transactional currency. While much of the ultra-big money is in the hands of Russian oligarchs seeking to acquire class, or at least cachet, much of it is also from Asia, the Middle East, and America. A Hong Kong billionaire is believed to be the buyer — bidding over the phone — of the Warhol “Green Car Crash,” which depicts the aftermath of a car wreck, driver impaled on a pole, with a green wash over it all. He spent $17.4 million, then a record for the Pop Art master who died in 1987 due to botched hospital care, late last year for one of Warhol’s iconic Mao portraits. Warhol, incidentally, wanted to do the official portrait of then Governor Jerry Brown — which hangs in the California State Capitol — but Brown turned him down.
** AMERICAN SOLDIERS STILL MISSING. The three American soldiers captured last Saturday south of Baghdad in an Al Qaeda ambush that killed the other five members of their patrol are still missing, despite a massive manhunt by US and Iraqi forces. The longer it takes, the more difficult it is to sustain the operational tempo of such a search. Some earlier predictions by some commentators that the search was closing in proved to be erroneous.
** SARKOZY’S CENTRISM. Although many on the American right had hailed the impending election of Nicholas Sarkozy as president of France, he is proving to be more the centrist than they had convinced themselves he was. “I will defend the independence of France. I will defend the identity of France,” said Sarkozy in his inaugural address earlier this week. “There is a need to unite the French people … and to meet commitments because never before has public confidence been so shaken and so fragile.”
In an address which sounded not unlike Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s post-partisanship, he then declared that he was placing the fight against climate change at the center of his agenda. Which is not exactly a priority of American conservatism, needless to say.
And now he has appointed his Cabinet. Half are women. His defense minister is a centrist. And his foreign minister is a famous Socialist, Bernard Kouchner, a co-founder of Doctors Without Borders and a former minister of health and UN governor of Kosovo.
** OBAMA DOES NEW HAMPSHIRE. Senator Barack Obama runs a full-court press on New Hampshire this weekend. He has a town hall, a speech to the state bar, a commencement address, and a statewide canvas by his legion of campaign volunteers. He will presssure Republican Senator John Sununu, who is vulnerable, to change his vote on the war. (Something he does with pro-war senators around the country, part of how he counters John Edwards’ attempt to corner the anti-war vote.) It’s all a great set-up for a candidate who is within striking distance of victory in the New Hampshire Democratic presidential primary.
** SCHWARZENEGGER REJECTS LIQUEFIED NATURAL GAS PROJECT OFF THE VENTURA/MALIBU COAST.“I have always said that California needs to diversify fuel sources for California consumers with cleaner alternatives such as LNG. We need a diverse, dependable and environmentally sound mix of energy supplies to meet the needs of our people and our economy. And as California continues to lead the nation in efforts to expand renewable energy resources, guaranteeing a steady source of clean-burning fuel takes on even greater significance.
“Liquefied Natural Gas can and must be an important addition to California’s energy portfolio. However, any LNG import facility must meet the strict environmental standards California demands to continue to improve our air quality, protect our coast, and preserve our marine environment. The Cabrillo Port LNG project, as designed, fails to meet that test.
“Therefore, I have disapproved BHP Billiton’s current proposal. As we look to the future, and the possibility of an LNG facility off the coast of California, it is important to understand that there are numerous approaches to offshore LNG and that there are many diverse projects currently being proposed by different companies that are pursuing state approval. I encourage companies to come forward with a plan that considers the objections raised by state agencies, local officials and communities so we can bring much needed diversity to California’s energy portfolio.”
The project had previously been turned down by the California Lands Commission and the California Coastal Commission. This ends the ability of the sponsor to appeal those decisions.
** PEGGY NOONAN ASKS: WHY NOT TRY LIBERALISM? COULD IT DO ANY WORSE?Famed Reagan speechwriter and conservative columnist Peggy Noonan puts it this way:Most importantly for him, and for all the Republican candidates for that matter, Mr. Thompson will have to answer this question: What is he running to do? Why should the Republicans get another eight years, or four years, after all the missteps they’ve made? Isn’t conservatism, or Republicanism, or whatever you call it, just tired? Isn’t it over? Isn’t America just waiting for whatever will take its place?
Why shouldn’t liberalism get a shot? Could they mess up more? Why should we trust Republicans with foreign affairs? If Fred Thompson can answer these questions, he’ll be showing he’s something new, and not just the newest candidate, or the latest face.
On the Democratic side, it’s Hillary Clinton 28%, John Edwards 26%, Barack Obama 22%, with Bill Richardson at 7%. On the Republican side, it’s John McCain 18%, Rudy Giuliani 17%, Mitt Romney 16%, with Fred Thompson at 9%.
** FURTHER UPDATE: I was evidently given incorrect information. Schwarzenegger has already given his speech, but is now there for a panel discussion.
** UPDATE: Schwarzenegger is running late and is now scheduled to begin his keynote address at the International Low Carbon Fuel Symposium at 11:45 AM.
** SCHWARZENEGGER WEBCAST AT 10:45 AM ON LOW CARBON FUEL STANDARD. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger will keynote the International Low Carbon Fuel Symposium at 10:45 AM this morning at University of California at Berkeley. He will lay out more specifics on his plan to reduce the carbon content of motor vehicle fuels in California. The speech will be webcast live. Also participating are Dr. Steve Chu, director of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Dr. Dorette Corbey, member of the European Parliament and EU’s spokesperson on “Fuels Quality Directive,” and General Chuck Wald, former Deputy Commander of the US European Command and member of the Energy Security Leadership Council.
** BLAIR AND BUSH. The political partnership between the two didn’t help British Prime Minister Tony Blair at home, but President George W. Bush offered fulsome praise to the outgoing PM yesterday at a Rose Garden press conference. Asked by a British reporter if he wasn’t meeting with the wrong man, given that Blair is stepping away from office on June 27th after an amazing ten years as prime minister, Bush said this: You don’t understand how effective Blair is. He happens to be your prime minister, but more importantly, he is a respected man in the international arena. It’s not just the American president who admires him…A lot of people admire him…And so he’s effective. There’s a lot of blowhards in the political process, a lot of hot-air artists, people who’ve got something fancy to say. Tony Blair makes things happen.
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger makes a pitch, in this NWN video,
for his expansive agenda at a Bay Area town hall meeting.
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is back this week to the town halls he’s done intermittently during his relatively brief but spectacular political career. Yesterday he conducted one in San Diego. On Tuesday, he was in the Bay Area town of Concord. It’s a way, in this week of swirling state budget numbers and inside-the Capitol calculations, to tell a broader swath of California that he has an expansive agenda for the state.
It’s an interesting time to be with Schwarzenegger outside the confines of the often very insular insider state political culture. With 200 attendees, high-propensity middle class voters, and a dozen TV camera crews on hand, there wasn’t much talk of the insider thrust-and-parry that dominated Sacramento the day after he unveiled the annual “May revise” of his proposed state budget.
Instead, Schwarzenegger, with much of his Cabinet in tow, talks of much of what he wants to do in the remaining 44 months of his governorship.
“We still have a lot of challenges ahead of us. There were a lot of things that were swept under the rug the past 10, 15 years and we want to now go and take those things out from under the rug and take those challenges on.” He cited infrastructure, a big first round of which was passed last year, and more of which he wants in his second term as governor, and the imperfect but significant prisons deal.
“We will also tackle a lot of other big problems, such as health care,” he said, noting that Teddy Roosevelt promised universal health care a hundred years ago and still nothing near it has been achieved.
“Environmental challenges” and “more water storage” and “new energy initiatives” were also cited by the former action movie superstar, noting that the Sierra snow pack is already dangerously low this year in this, an early stage of climate change. “Next year,” he says, will be “the Year of Education.” He didn’t mention redistricting reform and a few other things on his agenda, but there’s only so much time to talk.
“I’m a governor,” he said, “that always looks way ahead. I don’t look just two years ahead or three years ahead. My responsibility is to say, what is California going to look like in the year 2050? Do we have an economy, do we have a transportation system for the year 2050? Do we have enough clean water for the year 2050? Do we have a clean environment for the year 2050? All of those things are extremely important and decisions have to be made today.”
“This is why I wanted to go out and talk to the people. To just show that, yes, the state has been doing great but there are a lot of great challenges that are still ahead of us and we all have to work together to make this happen.”
State government has become, in many respects, a zero sum game, with most of the entrenched players heavily invested in what is essentially trench warfare over existing formulas and funding patterns. Much of the system — governmental, political, media — has become invested in particularist success and overall failure. In other words, particular interests are paramount and a pervasive cynicism reigns.
Schwarzenegger is not exactly a blushing idealist, but for a variety of reasons, including his own self-conception, he wants to get more accomplished than past governors since Pat Brown have accomplished.
From the reaction of the crowd, which is evident on the NWN video, his approach is appealing. Of course, as he pursues this expansive, future-oriented agenda, he has to deal with the overhang of the past. The state, in the midst of the unsustainable dot-com bubble, initiated big new spending and tax cut programs. It also took on major, and thus far, unfunded, benefit commitments to state workers and retirees.
These commitments, which then Governor Gray Davis vowed he would resist, but largely acceded to — under pressure from the Legislature, dominated by Democrats, with many Republicans joining in the party — have mortgaged the state’s future. Schwarzenegger is trying, with limited success, though the budget deficit now is a fraction of what it was projected to be when he took office, to work out the state’s finances even as he pushes for his future agenda.
This is why he is looking to things like the lease of the state Lottery, which could solve many problems, at least for the advance of his agenda. It’s a fascinating balancing act he has going.
