Our kids got the shakes

No really. Apparently, covering premarital sex, pot use, speed, coke, or whatever else is no longer scaring us enough about the future. Now, the kids are Rock-Star-ing themselves to death. No, with Rock Star. It's weird.

God Bless The USA, And SNL

Brilliant.

It's all just shades of Gray

Dan Walters asks if anyone else notices that Arnold is looking an awful lot like the man he replaced lately?

Just a bit:

A few days after winning re-election to the governorship in 2002, Gray Davis declared that the state faced a $35 billion budget deficit and proposed spending cuts and new taxes to close the gap.

Although Davis insisted that his plan contained "no gimmicks, no tricks, no evasions," it soon became apparent that it was one gigantic gimmick, that he had hyped the supposed deficit by many billions of dollars to make his supposed spending cuts look larger and his supposed $8.3 billion in new taxes look smaller. . . .

Five years later, Arnold Schwarzenegger, who succeeded Davis on a promise to end "crazy deficit spending," is dramatically increasing the budget deficit number again, jumping some $8 billion over the figure that the administration had been citing.

And wasn't there something quietly done to raise VLF fees again?

Any time you need your spokesman to insist your budget figure is "not hyperbole" - isn't it time to reevaluate your talking points?

Everything old is new again, it just the publicity that changes.

Next!

The line of succession to governor may get longer if a basically overlooked bill passes. Apparently, the line of succession currently contains some average joes. That's crazy ridiculous, though. Let's add more electeds to the list. After all, citizens and elected officials are different and of no relation at all.

There's nothing obscure about it

Pay and performance should not be tied when it comes to elected officials' salaries. For reals, y'all, let's not debate that.

If you tell elected officials they aren't worth their money anymore, they'll start voting with their own financial interests in mind. That's not good.

A push to cut the salaries of California's statewide elected officials shines a light on an obscure fact in the state constitution: Pay was not meant to be tied to performance.

Nor were the salaries of legislators or other top elected officials designed to be swayed by state budget crises, such as this year's projected $10 billion deficit.

The 1990 constitutional amendment that created California's independent, governor-appointed salary commission did not address the possibility of reducing pay.

We've had bigger deficits. Twice as big, as I recall.

But Roberti said he intended to limit the commission to narrow criteria, largely job duties and comparable salaries, rather than allow politics to creep into salary setting.

Guess what the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association thinks, though.

Anyway, at least one commissioner says, rightly, that the commission's job isn't to evaluate electeds' salaries. That's the voters' job.

Right! So stop cutting in on my turf!

Raises are good

I'm not going to run into a burning building. They deserve to be well paid.

Don't mess with the bull

I'm not sure who is more the bull in this story, but, rightfully, Jeff Denham is taking whatever shots he can at the man who's out for his head.

State Sen. Jeff Denham's campaign filed criminal complaints Thursday with state and local prosecutors, accusing Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata of illegally pressuring Senate aides into working to recall Denham.

Perata, D-Oakland, is trying to unseat Denham, R-Atwater, who angered Perata during last year's 53-day state budget stalemate when he joined his GOP colleagues in voting against the spending plan.

Thursday's complaints, filed with the California Attorney General's Office and Sacramento County District Attorney's Office, stem from a letter and an e-mail sent to Senate aides last week by Perata and a firm owned by his political consultant.

In the letter, sent by Perata to a handful of Democratic senators whose chiefs of staff did not attend a planning meeting for the June 3 legislative races, Perata made clear he expected the aides to work on political campaigns.

Well, honestly, Perata, we all know that staffers take vacation time and campaign, but don't write it down.

These squabbles really don't make anyone look good, do they?