| Home Front: Politix |
| Democrats Allow Communists to Infiltrate Their Party Across the Nation |
| 2019-02-11 |
| [Epoch Times] The Communist Party USA (CPUSA) is infiltrating the Democratic Party across the country. Communists, some openly, some secretly, are working in Democratic campaigns, holding Democratic Party leadership positions, and even running for public office on the Democratic Party ballot line. The communists also are pushing their policies inside the Democratic Party, to the point that it’s almost impossible to distinguish between the CPUSA and Democratic Party programs. Many comrades also work closely with influential congressmembers or U.S. senators. The CPUSA supports China, Cuba, Venezuela, and the Russian Communist Party‐all enemies of the United States. The CPUSA still advocates for the "overthrow of the capitalist class" in this country, yet the Democrats do absolutely zilch to keep the communists out of their party. CPUSA infiltration of the Democratic Party is widespread‐it effects every region where the communists have a significant presence. SUPPORT AND INFILTRATION In the San Diego area, two CPUSA members, Carl Wood and Emiliana Sparaco, ran this month for the California Democratic Party Central Committee, from Assembly Districts 76 and 80, respectively. Wood, a lifelong communist, intended to push for the "Healthy California Act that provides improved Medicare for All, a Living Wage of at least $15/hour, the Green New Deal for a healthy environment with good new jobs in a peace economy, and legislation to promote strong Unions." In 1999, California’s then-Democratic Gov. Gray Davis appointed Wood to a six-year term on the California Public Utilities Commission, where he "played a significant role in protecting California from the consequences of its disastrous deregulation experiment." Sparaco, a former leader of the Young Communist League, traveled to Sochi, Russia, in October 2017, as part of a U.S. communist delegation to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution‐keynoted by Vladimir Putin himself. In 2018, Sparaco was a leading activist in Flip the 49th, which helped Democrat Mike Levin win California’s 49th Congressional District. In Northern California, Sacramento area Democratic Congressman Ami Bera, who serves on the House Foreign Relations Committee, has won several super-close elections with communist help. For example, in 2014, CPUSA members Juan Lopez, Cassie Lopez, Michelle Kern, Nell Ranta, and Mik Diddams canvassed and phone-banked out of Bera’s campaign headquarters. |
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| -Election 2012 |
| Sen. Feinstein explains decision not to debate |
| 2012-11-01 |
| [OC Register] U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein said Wednesday that she hasn't faced off in a debate against her Republican opponent because she's heard nothing from her challenger, Elizabeth Emken, that she needed to debate. "There's just nothing constructive coming out of their campaign," said the four-term Democratic senator following a meeting with the Register's editorial board. She added that she's been accessible to the public and the media. U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., sits down with the Orange County Register editorial board at the Register's Santa Ana headquarters Wednesday. Discussion ranged from the Iranian nuclear program response to the attacks in Benghazi and the state of the US economy. "We've been on the road five days last week, two days this week," she said. "I do regular constituent breakfasts, a couple hundred people a week." Emken front man Mark Standriff scoffed at the explanation and continued to criticize the incumbent's failure to debate. "That's unworthy of the office she's been holding for two decades and disrespectful of the people she claims to represent," Standriff said. Feinstein noted that she has debated in the past John van de Kamp and Pete Wilson when she ran for governor in 1990, and Tom Campbell and Gray Davis in two of her Senate races. Polls show Emken posing less of a challenge than those four. A September Field Poll put Feinstein at 57 percent and Emken at 31 percent, a 26-point margin that grew from a 19-point advantage in July. Feinstein has a huge financial advantage as well, having spent $12.4 million through Oct. 17 while Emken has spent $745,000, according to federal disclosures. |
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| Home Front: Politix | |
| Tycoon with more money than brains offers help to debt-laden California | |
| 2011-01-07 | |
 The state is in for a rough ride, with spending cuts and tax increases expected over Mr Brown's term. But help may be at hand from Nicolas Berggruen, the so-called "homeless billionaire", who has assembled a small group of I guess they may have another year before they have to learn Spanish.
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| September 11th in a 9/10 world | |||||||
| 2009-09-11 | |||||||
 I sometimes stop what I'm doing and wonder what Gary Condit's doing these days. I don't particularly care, mind you, but Gary Condit epitomized the 9/10 mentality, lo, those eight long years ago. Those were the days when The Gray Davis was running Caliphornia into the ground -- not quite as deeply as today, but continuing a process that had been under way for years and years. Caliphornia then was what Caliphornia looked like going under. Caliphornia today is what Caliphornia looks like when it's bankrupt. There had been a spate of shark attacks in the water, and on land Terry McAuliff was about to go on the offensive against the young administration of G.W. Bush. But The Case Of The Missing Mistress was kind of the synopsis of the first eight months of 2001. And Condit, despite his statement that his wife had no thumbs, turned out not to be the one that dunnit.  It's a "post-9/11" world now. The anger, the fury, the desire for the murderers' blood has long since subsided, not by that very November as Mickey Kaus had predicted, but by the next November in fact. The usual suspects rallied their forces with demonstrations and propaganda and charges of "permanent war." Iraq was invaded and Saddam Hussein ejected in an attempt to bring a stable democratic state to the heart of the Muddle East that may pay off years from now or never. Cindy Sheehan rose and fell. Abu Musab al-Zarqawi rose and fell. Shamil Basayev fell. Michael Moore remains, as large as ever.
The bravery of the men of Flight 93 has been forgotten. The gallantry of NYPD and FDNY have been misplaced. They were an aberration in a world where little boys are to be turned into little girls so they won't be threatening when they grow up.
 G.W. Bush has retired to Crawford. Karl Rove can sometimes be seen on Fox News and writes op-ed pieces for the Wall Street Journal. Dick Cheney keeps up the good fight even as the new president's minions try to find some way to run show trials with him playing the part of Louis XVI. Guantanamo is in the process of closing. The al-Qaeda prisoners have been dusted off and sent back to their countries of origin, a hefty percentage of them returning to the fight. Missile defense is being traded away for a mess of pottage.We haven't won the war on terror. The Obama administration tries to pretend it's not there anymore. His Excellency was against the Iraq war, wanting to shut it down, pointing to Afghanistan as "the good war" that he'd pursue to the bitter end, "going after" al-Qaeda. Now the calls are coming for withdrawal, since we've come up with some convoluted rules of engagement, a "surge" that's not
 Osama bin Laden's still there. He has a base, probably in scenic Chitral, that he goes to when he's not traveling to more civilized parts. Ayman al-Zawahiri's still there. He lives in North Wazoo. Mullah Omar's still there. He lives in Quetta and operates in Kandahar and adjacent areas. Jalaluddin Haqqani's still there. He lives in South Wazoo and operates in Paktika. Gulbuddin Hekmatyar's still there. He lives in the Pak tribal area in comfortable circumstances and every once in awhile he rockets Kabul, just like in the old days.A few days ago Binny promised a "gift to the Muslims." That sort of thing usually involves corpses in Islamic parlance. Today's 9/11. It's also the anniversary of 9/11/2001. It's the anniversary of the Battle of Vienna where the Grand Turk was sent packing in the wake of the largest cavalry charge in history. Jan Sobieski zhil, zhivet, budet zhit'.
 3000 died in the attack eight years ago, the combined casualties of New York, Pennsylvania, and the Pentagon. We've lost about 5000 dead in Iraq and Afghanistan: 4337 in Iraq, 716 in Afghanistan, the figures current as of about a week ago. In 1683 the Turks lost 15,000 dead and wounded at the Gates of Vienna, plus 5,000 captured, compared to 4,500 dead and wounded for the Habsburg-Polish forces. There are those who would tell us today that 4500 dead and wounded is too high a price to pay for freedom. They're the same ones who'll tell us that 5000 dead is too high a price.Al-Qaeda hasn't folded its tent. They want to kill as many of us as possible. There will be another attack. Probably Binny and Ayman will try to outdo their last attack. We'll see if those dead and wounded are a high enough price to pay for freedom.
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| Home Front: Politix |
| Schwarzenegger Shrinks California in Order to Save It |
| 2009-07-21 |
 Is this the deal to save California -- or shrivel it? Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and legislative leaders announced a budget deal on July 20 that closes the state's staggering $26.3 billion budget shortfall with just as staggering cuts that will profoundly reduce state government and a broad array of programs. "We have come to a basic agreement that, of course, has to be ratified by the legislature," said Schwarzenegger, a Republican, who volunteered that Monday's five-hour negotiations were "like a suspense movie." But Democratic senate leader Darrell Steinberg was mournful: "This is a sober time. We have cut and we have cut in many areas that matter to real people."Indeed, the cuts will be severe, and the Golden State that Governors Earl Warren and Pat Brown built in the middle of the past century will be further damaged. Local community governments, already hard-pressed by the recession and lower revenues, will now lose at least $2 billion to the state with the promise to repay when the fiscal situation improves. The higher-education system, including the University of California, is being hit by $2 billion in cuts. The public schools, already struggling with large class sizes and less technical and support services, must cut an additional $9.5 billion and will lose thousands of teachers and staff. Tens of thousands of seniors and children will lose access to health care at a time when the national government is debating universal health coverage. The entire state workforce, except forest-fire crews and the California Highway Patrol, is on a mandatory three-day furlough each month. "There is great concern about the magnitude of these reductions," says Jean Ross, executive director of the California Budget Project, a liberal think tank. "This budget does not reflect the priorities of a vast majority of California voters, and these cuts threaten California's most vulnerable children and families during the greatest economic downturn since the Great Depression." But Schwarzenegger had to act. He knows all about the political risks involved in budget crises: he rode to victory in a recall election when his predecessor, Governor Gray Davis, was hamstrung by a similar budget crisis in 2003. And this crisis has been a bad one: on July 2, as the talks stalemated, California began issuing IOUs to its creditors. Whether it was his intention or not, Schwarzenegger has used the fiscal crisis to give California a new social contract. While many of the details of the agreement have yet to be released, he and his fellow Republicans, who form a minority in the legislature, achieved their goal of standing firm against using tax increases to close the towering deficit, forcing Democrats to accept more-stringent requirements for a number of social programs, including welfare-to-work and in-home health care. Schwarzenegger and his Republican allies successfully resisted calls from Democrats to raise taxes by saying they had agreed to a $12 billion tax increase in February as part of the state's first budget crisis of 2009, and that in a severe economic downturn, businesses and individuals could not afford any more taxes. Democrats were able to block Schwarzenegger from using the budget crisis to eliminate California's safety net for its poorest and most vulnerable citizens. The governor had originally proposed eliminating the state's welfare-to-work program, the CalGrant program that helps thousands of low-income students attend college and a health-insurance program covering poor children. That is small comfort. The raid on local government finances has enraged many city and county leaders. Los Angeles County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky said, "For the state to balance its books on the backs of local government is bad public policy, morally bankrupt, and does not solve the state's problem. What happens next year? Will they come after local government again?" |
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| Economy |
| California's Budget Crisis: Is There a Way Out? |
| 2009-07-03 |
| With budget negotiations stalled, a cash crisis looming and its fiscal crisis deepening, California today will begin issuing IOUs formally called registered warrants to tens of thousands of businesses and individuals to whom the state owes money. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Wednesday declared a fiscal emergency and ordered a third unpaid furlough day each month for 235,000 state employees. California's fiscal crisis has been years in the making and will not be easy to fix. But is there a solution? In Sacramento, which rises like the city of Oz on the flat plains of the California's Central Valley, Schwarzenegger has not underplayed the gory details. "Our wallet is empty, our bank is closed. Our credit is dried up," he says. But the crisis has not helped bind up the gaping political divisions over what to do about it. Democratic lawmakers have proposed cutting billions of dollars from the state's safety net and educational system to balance the budget. Governor Schwarzenegger says the cuts must go even deeper and joins legislative Republicans in refusing to raise taxes. On Wednesday, Schwarzenegger said, "Haven't we promised too much the last couple of decades?" Conservatives view the budget crisis as an opportunity to slash California's spending back to the level it had reached 10 years ago. "Gross overspending and fiscal irresponsibility will not be tolerated by the people of California," says Senate Republican Leader Dennis Hollingsworth. Liberals, however, see this as an attack by the right on the public infrastructure that helped make California an economic giant, and an act of war against the poor and minority populations in particular. Conservatives claim California is a high tax state. In fact, California's taxes are similar to other high-tech, industrial states. According to the non-partisan Legislative Analyst Office and the Tax Foundation, California has comparatively high sales taxes and rates for corporate income, but very low property taxes. State income taxes are very progressive, with a large proportion of revenue comes from households earning more than $100,000, as well as from taxes on stock options and capital gains. Low-income households, meanwhile, face lower tax rates that in most other states. This tax system, says Steve Peace, director of finance under Gov. Gray Davis, "worked in a highly leveraged, supercharged economy. Those days are gone." The state's finances could be made more stable by raising income taxes on middle and low-income families which would reduce the state's dependency on volatile stock and capital gains income a big reason for the current catastrophic deficits. But that is all but politically impossible in California. Is there a solution to California's dilemma? A number of reforms are receiving attention. On the tax and budget side, these include eliminating the need for a two-thirds majority vote on budget and tax matters and instituting a split-roll for property taxes that would allow homeowners to continue to pay according to the low rates mandated by Proposition 13, but require commercial property to be assessed at market value. To relieve the logjam in California politics, momentum is growing for an open primary system, in which the two top vote getters in the primary, regardless of party, would face each other in the general election. Proponents believe it would loosen the grip of partisan ideologies and make it easier of moderates to win elections. In addition, a redistricting reform won narrow approval last November and proponents of good government keep trying to lengthen the state's term limits on legislators. |
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| Home Front: Politix |
| The Decline and Fall of the California Republic |
| 2009-05-21 |
| A generation ago, California exemplified its nickname, the Golden State. State spending was less than half per capita, inflation-adjusted, what it is today. Its debt-service ratio was less than a third. Yet Californians enjoyed one of the finest highway systems in the world and one of the finest public education systems in the country. Water and electricity were so cheap many communities didn't meter consumption. Only a few decades have passed, yet California is a dramatically altered place. The tax burden is one of the heaviest in the nation. State government consumes the largest portion of personal earnings of any time in its history and yet can no longer maintain its basic infrastructure. The once legendary California quality of life has declined precipitously and produced a historic first: More people are moving out of California than are moving in. One thing - and one thing only - has changed in those years: public policy. The political left gradually gained dominance over California's government and imposed a disastrous agenda of policy changes that now are being replicated at the federal level. Before the 1970s, California policy aimed at accommodating growth and encouraging prosperity. These priorities changed radically beginning with the "era of limits" announced by Gov. Jerry Brown. Conventional public works were branded "growth inducing," and it became state policy to discourage construction of highways, dams, power plants and housing. At the same time, public employee unions acquired unprecedented power to coerce public employee membership, automatically direct public employee earnings into union political coffers and strike against the public. Radical environmental restrictions have devastated the agricultural, timber and manufacturing industries, culminating in Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's hallmark bill to reduce carbon dioxide emissions 25 percent by 2020 - a goal that can't be reached even if every automobile in California is junked.  Meanwhile, the state has suffered a radical centralization of revenue collection and decision-making in Sacramento, usurping local prerogatives in every field from education to transportation. This trend has destroyed local accountability and annually causes the misspending of billions of dollars of public funds as Sacramento vainly attempts to force every community into rigid formulas and mandates. The recall of Gov. Gray Davis in 2003 offered California the last chance to avert the fiscal collapse that now appears imminent. Voters elected Mr. Schwarzenegger, who pledged to stop the "crazy deficit spending," reduce tax and regulatory burdens, "blow up" the "boxes" and "cut up the credit cards." Alas, he did exactly the opposite. He increased the rate of spending that had proved unsustainable under Mr. Davis, began an unprecedented borrowing binge that has tripled the state's debt-service ratio and has now imposed the biggest tax increase in the state's history. As predicted, that tax increase made the deficit worse. The recession had reduced the state's March sales-tax collections by 19 percent. After Mr. Schwarzenegger increased the sales tax a penny per dollar on April 1, April sales tax revenues plunged 44 percent. The Laffer curve is alive and well. What can California do? Its credit is stretched to the breaking point, and increasing tax rates now produces decreasing tax revenues. Its deficit vastly exceeds resolution by conventional budget reductions. There is no line item labeled "waste," and the state's deficit vastly exceeds the truly obsolete and overlapping programs strewn throughout its budget. The real savings are in how the state's money is spent. California pays $43,000 each year to house a prisoner, while many states get by with half that amount. An average classroom accounts for more than $300,000 of public resources but only a fraction actually reaches the students. Fortunately, California has service-delivery models that once delivered vastly higher levels of service at vastly lower costs before it centralized, bureaucratized, unionized and radicalized them. Tragically, it lacks both the political will and the time required to restore them.  The decline and fall of the California Republic is a morality play in the form of Greek tragedy. Before dismissing California's agony as the just price for its hubris and folly, though, heed this warning: Congress is well under way toward imposing the same policies on the rest of the nation. California is just a little further down that road. Send your campaign contributions to Nancy, Babs abd DiFi, and the other loonies. Rep. Tom McClintock is a California Republican. |
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| Here comes California's May 19 Rebellion |
| 2009-05-13 |
| California voters head to the polls next week with predictions of doom echoing in their ears if they decline to endorse the massive tax hikes prescribed for them by big Democratic majorities in the statehouse, Arnold and a handful of now ruined-politically Republican legislators. "Shrill" doesn't begin to describe the campaign designed to stampede the Golden State electorate. The latest ad has a weary, soot-covered fire-fighter urging a yes vote on the tax hike. The message is clear: Vote no and your homes will burn down. Not even this sort of fear-mongering is moving the needle towards "yes" on the massive tax surge on next week's ballot as poll after poll shows all the key measures put forward by the tax-and-spend-and tax-again crowd failing badly. Arnold is doing his best to summon up the old magic but his appeal long ago hit Gray Davis-levels. Arnold was elected to slash taxes and spending, and somehow he confused that mandate with orders to throw in with the public employee unions. Too bad. He could have been a contender. The GOP "leaders" who signed on to this roadmap to ruin have been dumped by their caucuses, and go down in California history as the biggest marks to have ever had a seat at the poker game known as the "Big Five" negotiations wherein the governor and the top Republicans and Democrats in the State Assembly and Senate hash out budget matters. Jerry Brown, Gavin Newsom and every other would be Democratic governor are watching their chances in '10 swirl down the drain as deep disgust with the tax-addicted grows. On the GOP side, Meg Whitman and Steve Poizner --the leading candidates to replace Arnold-- are against Prop 1A, the biggest of the tax hikes, and the deep revulsion at the refusal of the Sacramento elite to make even minor cuts in the bloated state budget is forcing a realignment that east coast political reporters ought to take note of. If the tax hikes are rejected by large margins next week, the country's political elite ought to study that result closely. Despite huge spending margins and despite a thin veneer of bipartisanship, the tax hike gang is getting thumped because the electorate is saying --no, shouting-- "Enough!" Everyone has a story of a state or county employee friend who is retiring at 55 with a guaranteed life pension of $75,000 or more plus gold-plated medical benefits. Almost everyone knows that massive amounts of money have flowed into Los Angeles public schools and still half of the kids drop out. Majorities realize that businesses don't have to operate here, and that places like Texas may lack the Rose Parade but let you grow a business and keep most of the profits. On social issues, the California is evenly split, as the narrow victory for traditional marriage this past fall demonstrated. But there is a sizeable majority in favor of a radical change in the way government operates. The anger directed at Arnold and his tax-raising, free-spending pals is fueled by the genuine hardships brought about by the panic in the fall and the drop in home prices. Every business and almost all families have had to make painful cuts and downsize or postpone dreams. But not the state government. And that has ignited the voter revolt underway that will culminate next week. |
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| Home Front: Culture Wars |
| Conservative talk radio on the wane in California |
| 2009-03-16 |
| Tune in to conservative talk radio in California, and the insults quickly fly. Capturing the angry mood of listeners the other day, a popular host in Los Angeles called Republican lawmakers who voted to raise state taxes "a bunch of weak slobs." With their trademark ferocity, radio stars who helped engineer Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's rise in the 2003 recall have turned on him over the new tax increases. On stations up and down the state, they are chattering away in hopes of igniting a taxpayers' revolt to kill his budget measures on the May 19 ballot. But for all the anti-tax swagger and the occasional stunts by personalities like KFI's John and Ken, the reality is that conservative talk radio in California is on the wane. The economy's downturn has depressed ad revenue at stations across the state, thinning the ranks of conservative broadcasters. For that and other reasons, stations have dropped the shows of at least half a dozen radio personalities and scaled back others, in some cases replacing them with cheaper nationally syndicated programs. Casualties include Mark Larson in San Diego, Larry Elder and John Ziegler in Los Angeles, Melanie Morgan in San Francisco, and Phil Cowen and Mark Williams in Sacramento. Two of the biggest in the business, Roger Hedgecock in San Diego and Tom Sullivan in Sacramento, have switched to national shows, elevating President Obama above Schwarzenegger on their target lists. Another influential Sacramento host, Eric Hogue, has lost the morning rush-hour show that served as a prime forum to gin up support for the recall of Gov. Gray Davis. Now he airs just an hour a day at lunchtime on KTKZ-AM (1380). "It's lonely, it's quiet, and it's a shame," Hogue said of California's shrinking conservative radio world. "I think this state has lost a lot of benefit. I don't know if we can grow it back any time soon." The immediate question facing the state's conservative radio hosts is whether they can wield enough clout to block Schwarzenegger's ballot measures in May. They portray them as reckless proposals that would hasten California's economic decline. The worst, they say, is Proposition 1A, which would extend billions of dollars in tax increases for an extra two years, even while it imposes a spending cap long sought by conservatives. In a special election likely to draw a dismal turnout, they hope that those most upset by the $12.5 billion in new taxes will be the ones most strongly motivated to cast ballots. Their inspiration is Proposition 13, the 1978 ballot measure that capped property-tax increases. "What we see is a significant parallel between what is happening now and what happened in 1977 and 1978, when established political elites, whether in the media or in Sacramento, pooh-poohed the idea of a taxpayer revolt," said Inga Barks, whose talk show airs in Bakersfield and Fresno. "People are very upset." Unless organized labor -- which is divided on the budget measures -- spends millions of dollars to get its supporters to vote, "the only other ones who are going to show up at the polls are the die-hard, true-blue American voters, and those are the ones who listen to talk radio," Barks said. Still, in a state that Obama won handily in November, a decisive conservative push-back against the tax-spend-and-borrow ballot measures is far from certain. The older white Republicans who tend to listen to conservative radio are a shrinking portion of the state's voters. It's also no sure bet that the radio shows are converting listeners who might disagree with their agenda. "All these people are going to vote the conservative line anyway, or they wouldn't be listening to those shows," said Jim Nygren, a Republican strategist. Conservative radio reached its peak in California in 2003, when stations prodded listeners to sign petitions for an election to recall Davis, then drummed up GOP support for Schwarzenegger as his replacement. Since then, it has been a favorite ad vehicle for Republican candidates and causes, such as Proposition 8, which banned same-sex marriage last November. Leading the charge against Proposition 1A are John Kobylt and Ken Chiampou, whose afternoon drive-time show on Los Angeles' KFI-AM (640) draws 670,000 listeners a week, according to the Arbitron ratings agency. That makes them the most popular conservative talk radio hosts in the state. Day after day, they pound Schwarzenegger and the Republican lawmakers who joined Democrats in approving the tax increases. They are encouraging recall drives against the legislators. Their website features pictures of the governor and the lawmakers -- with their severed heads on sticks. "They're all pretty shaken up by it," said Nygren, who counts some of the lawmakers as clients. Last week, John and Ken urged listeners to show up with tax-revolt signs "outside Octomom's house," taking advantage of the media presence surrounding Nadya Suleman, the Whittier mother of octuplets. "It's guerrilla warfare," one of the hosts said. Many of the others on California's conservative radio circuit are less belligerent. "It doesn't need to be ranting and raving all the time," Hedgecock said. And apart from KFI, whose morning show with Bill Handel draws 652,000 listeners a week, the California shows are far less popular. The only hosts of conservative programs with a weekly audience of more than 100,000 are Doug McIntyre of KABC (790) in Los Angeles, Lee Rodgers of KSFO (560) in San Francisco and Rick Roberts of KFMB (760) in San Diego. "The content is the same," said Hogue, "but it doesn't have the reach it once did. There are major players gone." |
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| -Signs, Portents, and the Weather- | ||||||
| California Fires will be Worse due to ... Global Warming! | ||||||
| 2007-10-24 | ||||||
Welcome to the future. Fires that charred nearly three-quarters of a million acres could presage increasingly severe fire danger as global warming weakens more forests through disease and drought, experts warn. "You're really going to increase the chances of and prevalence of fire," said Susan Ustin, a professor of environmental and resource science at the University of California, Davis. Warmer, windier weather and longer, drier summers would mean higher firefighting costs and greater loss of lives and property, according to researchers at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the U.S. Forest Service. Both the number of out-of-control fires and the acreage burned are likely to increase -- more than doubling losses in some regions, they say in a study set for publication in the scientific journal Climatic Change. While the study examined Northern California, "the concern for Southern California would be much higher," because that region is drier for longer periods, said researcher Evan Mills of the Lawrence Berkeley lab.
The researchers project at least a 50 percent increase in out-of-control fires in the south San Francisco Bay area and a 125 percent increase in the Sierra Nevada foothills, with a more than 40 percent increase in the area burned.
The researchers say the projections use conservative forecasts that don't take into account expected factors like increased lightning strikes and the spread of volatile grasslands into areas now dominated by less flammable fuel. Even potentially wetter winters simply mean more growth, providing additional fuel for summer fires.
Where fires once burned without doing much damage to property, Californians have now built homes and entire subdivisions -- a problem starkly illustrated by the Southern California blazes. There are plenty of lessons to be learned, said California Resources Secretary Mary Nichols, who will leave office after this week as Gov. Gray Davis' administration gives way to that of Gov.-elect Arnold Schwarzenegger. "Certainly in the future we cannot allow construction quite so close to the (fire) zone, and we should create larger buffers" such as the irrigated greenbelt that helped keep fire from Los Angeles County's Stevenson Ranch while other communities were in flames, Nichols said. Forests need to be cleared of the undergrowth that fed the flames, and the remaining dead, standing trees that still dot the San Bernardino Mountains must be removed, she said.
State lawmakers are requiring the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection to begin charging rural homeowners for the cost of fire protection, as the state battles its massive budget deficit. Nichols suggested the state should consider additional "user fees" on development in fire-prone areas. As it is, taxpayers across the nation pay to fight California's wildfires and to reimburse homeowners for their losses. "If the true cost of fire protection were built into the cost of construction, it would not be as easy or as cheap as it has been to build in the foothills," Nichols said. "I think that would be a good thing." While I heard this reported last night as "news", this particular article Google found first is almost four years old. Maybe they didn't say "new study".
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| VDH : Mexifornia, Five Years Later |
| 2007-02-08 |
| The flood of illegal immigrants into California has made things worse than I foresaw. In the Spring 2002 issue of City Journal, I wrote an essay about growing up in the central San Joaquin Valley and witnessing firsthand, especially over the last 20 years, the ill effects of illegal immigration (City Journals editors chose the title of the piece: Do We Want Mexifornia?). Controversy over my blunt assessment of the disaster of illegal immigration from Mexico led to an expanded memoir, Mexifornia, published the following year by Encounter Press. Mexifornia came out during the ultimately successful campaign to recall California governor Gray Davis in autumn 2003. A popular public gripe was that the embattled governor had appeased both employers and the more radical Hispanic politicians of the California legislature on illegal immigration. And indeed Davis had signed legislation allowing drivers licenses for illegal aliens that both houses of state government had passed. So it was no wonder that the book sometimes found its way into both the low and high forms of the political debate. On the Internet, a close facsimile of a California drivers license circulated, with a picture of a Mexican bandit (the gifted actor Alfonso Bedoya of The Treasure of the Sierra Madre), together with a demeaning height (54), weight (too much), and sex (mucho) given. Mexifornia was emblazoned across the top where California usually is stamped on the license. In such a polarized climate, heated debates and several radio interviews followed, often with the query, Why did you have to write this book? The Left saw the books arguments and its titleMexifornia was originally a term of approbation used by activists buoyed by Californias changing demographyas unduly harsh to newcomers from Mexico. The Right saw the book as long-overdue attention to a scandal ignored by the mainstream Republican Party. |
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| The Way We Are |
| 2006-09-10 |
Tomorrow will be five years since the Twin Towers were attacked. A day after the attack, Mickey Kaus opined that terrorism would be off the front pages by that November.  He was wrong, but only by a few months. The public doesn't have a long attention span, and the Bush administration has been remiss in not reminding us, over and over again. Gradually, inexorably, the headlines turned to other things. Politics became politix as usual. The doings of Hollywood regained their former prominence. The fifth column spoke with more confidence, if less coherence.How different are we today from the way we were on September 10th, 2001? Jon Benet is still dead, and now we know at least one person who didn't kill her. So are the victims in a long series of mini-Jon Benet stories in the past five years. Gary Condit hasn't been heard from lately. Chandra Levy's body was found in a park in D.C. and it was a small paragraph in the metro section of the Post. There have been enough other seedy politicians to take his place, however. We never seem to run out. The Gray Davis is gone and California's going through another hyperbolic election campaign, starring Arnold. No one's been chewed up by a shark yet this year, at least that we've heard of, though Steve Erwin was killed in a freak stingray accident and we've had goofy animal stories involving every kind of critter you can think of, to include giant squid. The price of a gallon of gas has peaked and now seems to be slowly receding, though it'll go back up. The Democrats are making noises about taking back Congress this year, though it's probable they won't quite do it. Britney's preggers with her second baby, and posed nekkid on the front cover of Harper's to prove it. Tom Cruise and his beloved had their baby's first poop bronzed. By the measure of the content of our news, 9-11 five years later never happened. The public hasn't forgotten about it, but those who regard themselves as the public's handlers don't let them dwell on it. Images are rare, stories even moreso, usually tearjerkers about those left behind. The Clinton administration, past and in waiting, are busily and blatantly trying to kill an ABC docudrama on the subject. Two movies have been made on the WTC, one by Oliver Stone. The WTC memorial bogged down in political correctitude, with the Opinion Police demanding that the image of three firefighters raising the flag in the ruins be modified to show an approved racial and gender mix. The brief (and incomplete) political unity of the immediate aftermath has been replaced by grandstanders, party hacks, Cindy Sheehan, MoveOn.org, and a busy conspiracy theory industry. And then there's Keith Olberman... We won't even dwell on that syndrome. We've done lots, accomplished lots, since 9-11-01. This isn't it. Today's 9-10. All over again. Rantburg's ace reporter, D.J. Wu, contributed to this article. |
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