Dec. 19, 2012

By Katy Grimes

Immediately after the horrific and tragic school shooting in Connecticut Friday, opportunistic politicians all across the country jumped on the anti-gun bandwagon.

My CalWatchdog colleague John Seiler, thankfully also jumped on the politicians yesterday. “…it didn’t take long for gun-control advocates to take a bead on our Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms,” Seiler said. “It’s also shameful that politicians use such tragedies to advance their tyrannical agendas.”

Lt. Gov. jumps on bandwagon

Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom wasted no time putting forth his next political campaign agenda. “For those calling for the postponement of any discussion of gun and mental health policy in America, you are wrong,” Newsom said, reported the Sacramento Bee, ”Today is a clarion call to all leaders, regardless of political party.”

Newsom, one of the biggest opportunists in California politics, has clearly seen this tragedy as an opportunity to push forth another of his nutty ideas.

In 2007, when he was Mayor of San Francisco, the San Francisco Chronicle reported, ”Mayor Gavin Newsom quietly introduced a package of gun control measures on Tuesday that would make it illegal to possess guns on city-owned property and require residents to store handguns in locked containers.”

“We should continue our efforts to restrict the use of legal guns and we will continue our efforts to stem the tide of illegal guns,” Newsom said.

Guns don’t kill people

Guns don’t kill people. Crazy people kill people. We should stem the tide of crazy people, not guns. This big social experiment to let crazy people live among us has failed. Crazy people are like a time bomb or a loaded gun, walking down the street; we never know when they are going to go off.

SUV’s don’t run over people in a crosswalk. The idiot driver behind the wheel is responsible. We are a society run by liberals who want everyone to live together, freely – except those of us who are responsible, law-abiding citizens. The controlling laws are directed at us.

Gun control and anti-gun laws only serve to weaken citizens, while gangs and crazy people collect illegal arms. But a liberal, tyrannical government wants its citizenry to live in fear. What better way than preventing citizens from protecting themselves?

“The strongest reason for the people to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to
protect themselves against tyranny in government,” Thomas Jefferson’s famous quote means more today than ever.

Criminals fear armed citizens more than they fear police. Because criminals go after the lowest point of resistance, citizens bearing arms are unpredictable.

Data from the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation show that America has been on a firearms buying spree since the end of 2005, PJ media reported. In 2009, the FBI released preliminary 2009 crime data indicating that violent crime has been dropping at an accelerating rate since the end of 2006.

In 1982, Kennesaw, GA passed a law requiring heads of households to keep at least one weapon in the house. The residential burglary rate subsequently dropped 89 percent in Kennesaw, compared to the modest 10.4 percent drop in Georgia as a whole. Ten years later, in 1991, it was reported that the residential burglary rate in Kennesaw was still 72 percent lower than it had been in 1981, before the law was passed.

In Vermont, citizens can carry a firearm without getting permission, without paying a fee, and without going through any kind of government-imposed waiting period. For ten years in a row, Vermont remained one of the top-five, safest states in the union, and three times received the “Safest State Award,” which was ended in 2007.

Fifteen years following the passage of Florida’s concealed carry law in 1987, over 800,000 permits to carry firearms were issued to people in the state. FBI reports show that the homicide rate in Florida, which in 1987 was much higher than the national average, fell 52 percent during that 15-year period — thus putting the Florida rate below the national average.

The Center for Disease Control has admitted that there is no evidence that gun control reduces crime. The CDC has long been criticized for propagating questionable studies which gun control organizations have used in defense of their cause. But after analyzing 51 studies in 2003, the CDC concluded that the “evidence was insufficient to determine the effectiveness of any of these [firearms] laws.”

Some other gun statistics:

* Guns are used 2.5 million times annually or 6,860 times a day. This means that each year, firearms are used more than 80 times more often to protect the lives of honest citizens than they are to take lives.

* Less than 8 percent of the time, a citizen will kill or wound his/her attacker.

* 200,000 women use a gun every year to defend themselves against sexual abuse

* Citizens shoot and kill at least twice as many criminals as police do every year.

* Only 2 percent of civilian shootings involved an innocent person mistakenly identified as a criminal. The ‘error rate’ for the police, however, was 11 percent, more than five times as high.

God help any thug who breaks into my house… and it’s not just my German Shepherd and marshmallow gun to worry about.

April 22, 2012

By Katy Grimes

State employee discounts are getting ridiculous. Despite the fact that California state and local government employees are among the highest-paid in the country according the latest U.S. Census Bureau, they receive all kinds of crazy discounts.

I was shoe shopping over the weekend at DSW, a huge shoe retailer. As I was making my purchase, the clerk made a comment about me working for the state. It seemed like a strange comment, but then I realized that my wallet was sitting open on the counter and my Capitol press credentials were visible.

I don’t work for the state, but I support the state through excessive taxes.

I asked her why DSW was offering state employees a discount. The clerk said that they offer the discount as a promotion, and had recently offered a discount for school district employees.

It’s Good To Be the King

State employees receive all kinds of discounts–free and discounted bus and light rail passes, travel discounts, health club membership discounts, cell phones discounts, business discounts during the furlough, Apple computer discounts, Disneyland discounts, and even See’s Candies discounts.

April 20, 2012

By Katy Grimes

The unwavering fundamental of being American is individual freedom. Man is constitutionally free in America. And the only legitimate purpose of government is to preserve individual freedom. A government whose purpose has become coercive cannot be one based on the premise of the sanctity of individual freedom.

This is where we’ve been in America, and where we currently are. We went from inherent freedom, to living under coercive authoritarianism.

California is arguably the worst state in the country for violating individual liberties. Several things happened in the Legislature this week proving that California’s state government is out of control, and lawmakers disregard the rights of its citizens, as well as the state and U.S. constitutions.

Loss of liberties this week

On Tuesday, the Assembly Health Committee heard AB 2109 by Richard Pan, D-Sacramento, which would make it exceedingly difficult for parents to opt out of immunizations and vaccinations for their school-aged children. Parents were outraged and testified in droves at the hearing. But public health doctors, medical students, healthcare employees and their labor unions supported AB 2109.

Despite the violation of parental rights, or the 30,000 reported adverse reactions to vaccinations that the Centers for Disease Control admits, the bill was passed anyway.

The following day, the Senate Health Committee was presented with SB 1318 by Sen. Lois Wolk, D-Davis, which would require health care workers to receive mandatory vaccinations or wear facemasks.

What a change in attitude one day can make.

Labor unions for nurses and medical employees were outraged, and questioned the legality of the requirement. The Service Employees International Union, Califoria State Employees Association, the California Labor Federation and myriad other labor unions subtly threatened legal action.

The Senate analysis reported on the bill, “The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, AFL-CIO (AFSCME) and the United Nurses Associations of California/Union Health Care Professionals write that it is unreasonable to mandate a questionably effective vaccine on onsite health care workers and that it is more sensible to work on educating workers on better infection control and improve screening and triaging of patients, families, and visitors who enter health care facilities”

What’s good for the goose apparently is not good for the gander. The unions even stated that the vaccines were “questionably effective.”

The day before, legislators, unions and public health doctors were fine with forcing parents into an untenable position where they would have to vaccinate their school-aged children, or forgo school. But these same groups were up in arms over a similar requirement for health care employees.

Both bills were passed. But many are saying that Wolk’s bill will be killed because the unions will not tolerate such a requirement.

Government jobs over products and services

If there was any doubt that parental rights are very far down the list of importance to lawmakers, it should be gone by now. The rights of teachers over children, health care workers over patients and the insured and government employees over the state’s citizens and taxpayers have never been so unbalanced.

The work product of government has taken a back seat to union jobs.  Even serious discussions about public health take a back seat to union jobs.

As I wrote earlier this week, “The unspeakable issue at the root of Pan’s bill is the influx of children from other countries into California’s public schools, who bring with them new strains of measles, mumps, chicken pox and flu bugs, among other communicable diseases.”

But it is not politically correct to talk about immigration. Instead the Legislature is proposing that everyone get vaccinated, whether the sheeple want the vaccinations or not.

With the health care lobby spreading big bucks around to legislators in buckets, it’s no wonder that mandatory vaccinations are a hot bill topic.

Hostility toward voters

Assemblyman Bill Monning, D-Carmel, the Assembly Health Committee chairman, clearly wanted no discussion to take place at the hearing about issues with vaccinations, or illnesses from immunizations.

There was a high level of hostility in the large committee room the likes of which I have never seen in a committee hearing. Sergeants-at-arms were nearly as agitated as Monning, and spent the entire hearing barking at the many mothers holding babies, and parents who showed up to testify. They forced people to sit, refusing to allow anyone to stand along the wall, or mill about the room, as is standard at most hearings.

But the next day in the Senate Health Committee hearing, with many of the same lobbyists and capitol regulars present, sergeants allowed a circus-like atmosphere in the same committee room to go on during the hearing. No one was required to sit quietly, and there was no hostility toward bill opponents.

I spoke to Assemblyman Brian Nestande, R-Palm Desert, after the hearings. The proper role of government came up because he questioned why the state was even involved with vaccinations. During the Assembly hearing, Nestande tried to get to the root of the controversy, but was shut down quickly by Monning.

Ironically, earlier in the week, Nestande had introduced the winner of his There Ought Not to Be a Law contest, his answer to Sen. Joe Simitian’s There Ought To Be a Law contest.

The winner of Nestande’s contest became AB 2585, which seeks to repeal SB 929 of 2011. SB 929 mandated raised to 8 years of age from 6 the mandatory age a child must be placed in a car seat. SB 929 penalizes parents who do not comply, but Nestande said that most parents are completely unaware of the law. The change would reduce government family life and restore parental responsiblity.

Nestande said that there is already too much government in our lives, and is looking to repeal other intrusive legislation. But after safety experts were trotted out one after another to provide grisly and emotional testimony about the awful things that have happened to children during auto crashes, AB 2585 failed to pass out of the Assembly Transportation Committee on a party line vote, 2-10. Democratic legislators didn’t find his contest or bill very funny, but maintained the existing revocation of parental rights.

Nestande said that  that the primary intention for the contest is to repeal laws that are ineffective and inefficient. He could be very busy in the next year with this excellent goal.

Regulate the sheeple

California lawmakers continue to further regulate people’s everyday life, despite other very serious matters in the state. California has the second highest state unemployment rate in the country. Public employees’ pensions are about to break the state’s budget. Prisoners are being let out of prison.

Yet legislators spend their time regulating car seats; mandating bicycle and skiing helmets, fitted sheets in hotels, clean light bulbs and electric cars; banning plastic bags; imposing a babysitter bill of rights; passing a state workers bill of rights; fighting trans fats; and banning Happy Meal toys.

But those issues seem like child’s play compared to the violation of parental rights with the immunization bills

Voters can do something about this, but only if they don’t want to be sheeple under total control of the government.

April 20, 2012

By Katy Grimes

The Sacramento Bee is shilling today for “sustainable communities,” another way to describe global warming.

“The Sacramento Area Council of Governments board on Thursday approved what’s called a “Sustainable Communities Strategy,” what the Bee refers to as “a guide for cities, counties and transportation agencies to collaborate on getting more houses and apartments near jobs, and more jobs and housing near transit.”

I hear this kind of talk and all I think of is the Cabrini Greenhousing project in Detroit, or the former Soviet Union, the single-party state ruled by the Communist Party.

Elitist leftists always have these great planned community ideas–for other people. They don’t want to live this way.

“Sacramento is the third region in California to put together a sustainable communities plan. San Diego and Los Angeles just did. The Bay Area is next. They all stem from a law by Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento, that pushes metro areas to build more compactly from the inside,” the Bee wrote.

The law referred to by the Bee by Steinberg, is SB 375, a companion bill to AB 32, and probably will cause even more damage to the state. AB 32 is California’s global warming solution.

It’s not just about ending global warming anymore, California now can expand state government legally, and steal even more from taxpayers. And it is doing this through the state’s Air Resources Board, a scary, unaccountable state agency of appointed officials.

SB 375 requires California’s Air Resources Board to develop regional reduction targets for greenhouse gas emissions, and requires the reduction of emissions from vehicles throughout the state. What AB 32 didn’t cover, SB 375 did.

The Air Resources Board explains: SB 375 “enhances California’s ability to reach its AB 32 goals by promoting good planning with the goal of more sustainable communities.”

However, the sustainable communities goals created by the CARB were so outlandish, California officials now have a license to steal more from taxpayers.

Analysts say that the massive emission reduction targets will undoubtedly result in higher gas prices (as high as 9$ per gallon), will increase all travel costs by estimates of more than 450 percent, will increase taxes and add new taxes, and the ultimate goal to force more and more people to live in high-rise boxes and take public transportation. 

While Democrats continue to complain about predatory lending, they ignore the fact that it was their party which forced these lending practices through legislatively in order to allow people who could not qualify for home loans, to suddenly buy homes. But when the recession hit, these were the people who were suddenly victims, “hit hardest by the recession.”

Now Democrats and global warming activists want to build sustainable communities for people who can’t afford their mortgages.

Sen. Steinberg and other Democratic lawmakers do not live the way that they have mandated for  the rest of us… politicians are the 1 percent.

April 20, 2012

By Katy Grimes

Democratic Leaders in the Legislature have figured out a clever way to bypass the legislative committee process, in order to ensure the results they want. This latest legislative trickery and rule manipulation created quite a stir at the state Capitol Thursday.

Earlier in the week, without warning, the Assembly Banking and Finance Committee, chaired by Assemblyman Mike Eng, D-Monterey Park, dropped three bills off the schedule. But these weren’t just any bills, they were the bills which make up the mortgage reform “Homeowner Bill of Rights” package, sponsored by Democratic Attorney General Kamala Harris.

Ostensibly, this bill package would reform California’s mortgage and real estate crisis.

However, after the Harris bill package dropped off the Assembly committee schedule, a related bill, AB 278 by Assemblyman Jerry Hill, D-San Mateo, popped up on the Senate floor Thursday, and was shoved through to passage, with only support from Democrats.

AB 278 is just a shill-bill dealing with unlicensed real estate agents. But it is being used fto trigger the necessary procedures required to create a Democratic-controlled conference committee to manage the outcome of the Attorney General’s bills.

Supporters of the conference committee option said that, because the Harris bill package was complex, the conference committee would provide lawmakers the opportunity to deal with the major policy changes.

But others are outraged and say that creating the legislative conference committee will allow the bill package to bypass the entire committee policy and finance process, as well as avoid scrutiny by the public.

Homeowners Bill of Rights

Harris is pushing lawmakers to pass the Homeowners Bill of Rights, patterned after President Barack Obama’s legislation of the same name. The legislation is supposed to protect homeowners facing foreclosure.

But bankers have objections.

Small banks and local credit unions did not cause the mortgage crisis — investment bankers did.

But that’s not stopping lawmakers from punishing all bankers, regardless of the ramifications.

A $25 billion national settlement agreement reached in February, struck among the Department of Justice, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, 49 state attorneys general and the country’s five largest mortgage loan servicers: Bank of America Corp., Citigroup Inc., JP Morgan Chase & Co., Wells Fargo & Company and Ally Financial Inc., according to Forbes.

The five biggest U.S. banks agreed to the deal, which would impose a ban on all banks from filing a foreclosure notice when a homeowner is in the middle of the loan modification process.

The national ban expires in three years, but Harris is pushing for California to keep the ban in place permanently.

Critics say that the bill package in the California Legislature may actually pave the way for more lawsuits, and slow any recent improvements in the already slow-to-recover housing market. With economists predicting another mortgage meltdown, the American economy could be in for an economic hurricane.

Opponents also say that the legislation would create expensive, new lending obligations, which would likely result in a much higher cost to borrow money, which could be an additional blow to the housing market.

However, instead of allowing Harris to defend her bills in the committee hearing, legislators bowed to pressure from above, and pulled the bills from the committee calendar.

Talk around the Capitol after the hearing episode was that the order to pull the bills came from the highest office in the state, and referred to a feud between Gov. Jerry Brown and Harris. But this has not been confirmed.

In the right corner…

Thursday’s maneuver did not go down without a fight. Sen. Sam Blakeslee, R-San Luis Obispo, urged Senators to oppose AB 278, and reminded colleagues that the Legislature had recently passed dozens of spot bills, weakening the legislative process. “This is not the historical norm,” Blakeslee said.

Spot bills are empty bills which do not yet contain language, but will be used at the end of the legislative session to pass laws legislators couldn’t get passed through the traditional committee process.

Blakeslee said that in the past, only the state’s 2010 water bond, the 2004 workers compensation reform, and electricity deregulation had been dealt with in conference committee, and only after already being vetted using the standard committee process.

A conference committee is traditionally used to work out the differences which committees could not.

“We are speaking about a bill on real estate,” Blakeslee said.

Blakeslee explained that by avoiding the usual and legal committee process, the public would never hear the policy and financial debate surrounding the bills. He expressed his irritation that the Senate Banking and Finance committee, of which Blakeslee is the vice chairman, would never have a chance to weigh in on the bills.

“There’s not precedence in the use of the conference committee,” Blakeslee said. “I am standing in defense of the majority party. It raises serious questions about to what lengths this body will go to jam through legislation without the types of processes we have historically used.”

“These are regular policy issues. “We should not pervert our process to produce the desired outcome,” Blakeslee said.

“And to the minority party, do not surrender your constitutional power,” Blakeslee added.

Leadership weighs in

“To have hearings on policy is right,” said Senate Minority Leader Bob Huff, R-Diamond Bar. “To obfuscate is not.” Huff pointed out that the Senate Joint Rules require that all bills, other than budget bills, must be heard by policy committees of each house.

“We form a conference committee to find a meeting of the minds,” Huff said. “Without normal transparency, major policy issues here will be decided on in some smoke-filled back room. Trampling on the rules is a slippery slope.”

“Read your rules,” Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento replied. “Read your Senate rules. Because we pride ourselves on following the rules, and in this instance we have done so.”

“We’re not trying to hide anything,” said Sen. Juan Vargas, D-San Diego. “Important things can be done in the conference committee.”

Capitol staffers explained that the conference committee members, appointed by Assembly Speaker John A. Pérez, and Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, will consist of six members in total, made up of one Republican and two Democrats from each house. Committee appointments will be announced next week.

April 18, 2012

By Katy Grimes

Debate over a vaccine bill injected drama into a hearing of the Assembly Health Committee in the California Legislature Tuesday. Legislators ignored parental concerns. And the Capitol sergeants brutalized parents holding infants.

What should have been a hearing addressing parental concerns in a democracy turned into Lobby Day for the California Medical Association and hundreds of public health doctors, medical school students and other medical practitioners who flooded the hearing room in support of AB 2109 by Assemblyman Richard Pan, D-Sacramento, himself a medical doctor.

The unspeakable issue at the root of Pan’s bill is the influx of children from other countries into California’s public schools, who bring with them new strains of measles, mumps, chicken pox and flu bugs, among other communicable diseases. Children who have recently traveled out of the country also bring home infectious diseases.

It is not politically correct to address that problem. Instead the Legislature is proposing that everyone get vaccinated.

It’s no different that a teacher punishing the entire class because of one bad kid. The inability to single out the issue is the problem.

Tense Hearing

The Health Committee chairman, Assemblyman Bill Monning, D-Carmel, appeared agitated from the outset of the hearing. He admonished the gathered audience of mostly parents several times before the the hearing even started.

Dean Blumberg, an associate professor for U.C. Davis specializing in infectious diseases, testified in support of Pan’s bill. Blumberg said that, even with the many life-saving vaccinations available, he still sees children who have not been vaccinated. The children end up sick, with preventable illnesses.

And for that reason, Blumberg said California needs to maintain very high school immunization rates. He added that Pan’s bill does not infringe on parents’ rights to choose to vaccinate, or not.

Doctors Show Support for AB 2109

All of the public health players were at the hearing and testified in support of AB 2109: The California Medical Association, the California Pharmacy Association, the Association of Physician Assistants, the California State Employees Association, the County Health Executive Association, as well as the doctors and dentists’ unions.

Doctors and medical students lined up to show support for the bill, and each assured the committee that they would sign a waiver form for parents opting out of vaccinations.

Vehement Opposition to AB 2109

Dawn Winkler testified in opposition to AB 2109, and said that children get more than 50 vaccinations. Winkler, the California State co-director of the National Vaccine Information Center, and executive director of Health Advocacy in the Public Interest, said the bill was not about parents receiving more accurate information about vaccinations. “They already have that available,” Winkler said. “This is about parents’ rights, under the law. Why on earth should parents have to obtain more information about vaccinations and opt-out permission? This will interfere with the right to free education and the right to religious freedom. This bill poses a threat to freedom.”

Hundreds of parents testified that they have been “fired” by their childrens’ pediatricians for refusing vaccinations. “I’ve been bullied by my pediatrician, harassed, and kicked out,” one woman explained. Many others relayed similar stories.

Bob Sears, a private practice pediatrician and 14-year member of the American Association of Pediatricians, said he believesin providing vaccinations, but expressed concern over evidence that many doctors will not sign the waiver for parents to opt-out of vaccinations. “A study of over 1,000 pediatricians found that 39 percent of the American Association of Pediatricians said they will kick parents out if vaccinations are refused,” Sears said.

The bill’s sponsors, The American Academy of Pediatrics, the California Medical Association and the Health Officers Association of California, said that the continued increase in personal belief exemptions and resultant decreases in community immunization rates “could have a significant impact on public safety and because PBEs are relatively easy to obtain,” and recommend strong support for AB 2109.

“How many kids won’t be able to sign up for school?” Sears asked. “Free choice is not having to get a doctor to sign off on a free choice.”

Sears said that the  Centers for Disease Control admits that as many as 30,000 adverse reactions to vaccinations are reported every year. And between 3,000 and 4,500 severe vaccine reactions, up to and including death, occur every year in the United States. Some doctors say that the numbers of severe reactions to vaccinations are much higher than the CDC’s numbers.

Parents Oppose AB 2109

Testifying in opposition to AB 2109, hundreds of chiropracters, parents, medical doctors and students lined up and shared why they oppose the bill.

“Two of my three children are vaccination-injured,”  one mother said. Parent after parent testified about vaccine-injured children, and why they opted not to vaccinate the rest of their kids. Others reported that they had been harassed, bullied and kicked out of numerous pediatricians’ offices for refusing vaccinations for their children.

One physician said that children in foreign countries are healthier than American children because they don’t get the 50 vaccinations American children get.

Parents testified that they were intelligent and educated enough to make the decision to vaccinate or not. “I am a Carnegie Mellon graduate. My son got the mandatory Hepatitus B cavvination and got very sick,” a mother testified.

“I am a member of MENSA,  have a bachelors degree and am smart enough to make the choice for my family,” another mother testified.

An attorney testified that she represents parents over privacy and HIPPA rights. The HIPAA Privacy Rule provides federal protections for personal health information held by doctor’s offices, and gives patients an array of rights with how that information is used.

Committee Questions AB 2109

Assemblyman Dan Logue, R-Linda, asked what will happen to school-aged children if parents can’t get a doctor to sign off on the vaccination opt-out waiver. Pan said that there are 150,000 medical practitioners in the state. “We will get somebody to sign the form,” Pan said.

But Sears disagreed. “The biggest issue is: Can you find a doctor to sign the form?”

Logue pressed for an answer. “I asked what happens if no one signs the form?”

“Children can’t go to school,” Winkler said.

Logue asked if parents will be billed for an office visit if the physician will not sign the waiver for parents who choose not to vaccinate.

Pan tried to convey that some of the visits to doctors are considered well-care, and under some insurance, parents will not be billed. “We want these kids to go to school,” Pan said.

“But will the insurance company charge them?” Logue asked. He never received an answer.

“How do we know parents lack information?” Assemblyman Allan Mansoor, R-Costa Mesa, asked. “How do we know that they aren’t already informed?”

“Some parents are, but many others are uncertain,” Pan said. “Outbreaks are possible if people have been traveling…. It’s about the other children at school. They depend on the rest of us to get vaccinated,” Pan said.

But that was as far as Dr. Pan went, despite the elephant in the room.

Parental Rights v. Public Health

Most parents were at the hearing concerned about injuries and illnesses from vaccinations. And many of the parents present had children who had been vaccine-injured, including autistic children. There is a growing belief that the dramatic rise in autism is directly related to the increase in childhood vaccinations.

But Monning would not allow anyone to discuss this angle. Only Assemblyman Brian Nestande, R-Palm Desert, managed to ask a question about the correlation between vaccinations and autism, and Monning told him to wrap it up quickly. “The bill does not mandate immunization, just counseling of parents,” Monning said.

Pan interjected that there are recent studies showing a link between obesity and autism, “but the bill is not about that.”

Sears said that the real reason there are illness outbreaks is that many vaccinations wear off quickly. “The point is not because of unvaccinated children. The recent Pertussis whooping cough outbreak was caused by the vaccination wearing off. It was found to be only 41 percent effective,” Sears said.

Sears said that he is not against vaccinations, and administers many to his patients. “Not all vaccinations work well, and you can’t blame the unvaccinated children,” Dr. Sears added. “The issue I am against is taking away the choice of parents.”

Blumberg told the committee that it was apparent the parents present at the hearing were educated and informed, and were not the parents being targeted by the bill.

Bill Passed Out of the Committee

April 14, 2012

By Katy Grimes

What a train wreck. Barreling down the tracks in one direction, on April 9 a congressional committee launched a probe California’s high-speed rail project over charges of conflicts of interest and questionable spending of federal dollars.  Barreling head-on toward it from the other direction, on April 12 the California High-Speed Rail Authority voted to approve its own revised business plan.

The state action leaves only an up-or-down vote from the state Legislature to break ground on a project the CHSRA now pegs at costing $68.4 billion.

The project costs have varied from an original estimate of $33 billion, to an official high estimate of $98.5 billion, and back down to a dubious $68.4 billion. But the Legislative Analyst’s Office said that it is “highly uncertain if funding to complete the high-speed rail system will ever materialize,” and rail experts have estimated the project will cost more than $136 billion.

The next stop for the CHSRA is to convince the Legislature to approve the project in order to move full steam ahead. Right now, the rail authority and supportive Democrats are counting noses in the Legislature to determine where the needed votes will come from.

Reublicans want the plan demolished, and Democrats aren’t talking much at all.

However, Article XVl of the California Constitution authorizes the Legislature to either pull the plug on high-speed rail, or at the very least, reduce the amount of indebtedness, if no debt has been contracted.

There is still plenty of time to stop this runaway train.

What Voters Approved in 2008

California voters approved Proposition 1A in 2008, the “Safe, Reliable High-Speed Passenger Train Bond Act for the 21st Century.” Here are some details:

* $33.5 billion cost. They approved a total cost of $33.5 billion for a high-speed rail system. The $33.5 billion was to be made up of a combination of 1/3 federal funds, 1/3 state funds and 1/3 private funds. Importantly, the investment from California taxpayers was limited to a $9.95 billion bond.

Today, the costs have skyrocketed to $98.5 billion from $33.5 billion, reliance on federal funds has increased by more than six times the original cost and no private funders have materialized to invest in the project.

Assemblywoman Diane Harkey, R-Dana Point, said it’s highly unlikely any private parties will pony up investment money on the project. “There are no private party investments, and no earnest deposits,” Harkey said. “As long as California continues with this plan, we will never attract private capital.

Instead, the state is taking a hugh risk with taxpayer “capital.”

* S.F. to L.A. Voters approved a system connecting San Francisco to Los Angeles, with a trip time of two hours and 40 minutes, at a cost of $55 per ticket. But the plan has veered sharply inland from San Francisco to Los Angeles, over to the Central Valley, with a leg from Fresno to Bakersfield. And the cost of the trip jumped to $105.

* Ridership: 95 million. Even ridership numbers have been toyed with. Voters were told that there would be a ridership of 95 million passengers by 2030. Ridership estimates have decreased nearly three times since 2008, and they are still absurdly inflated. In the new report, they’re estimated to be as high as 36 million passengers by 2060 (page 5-17). That’s about a third of the Prop. 1A promise.

* Bond repayment. Repaying high-speed rail bonds will cost the state’s General Fund $647 million per year for 30 years, or approximately $20 billion for the $9.95 billion bond.

High-Speed Fairy Tale

The High-Speed Rail Authority claims that high-speed rail throughout the world runs profitably. But:

France subsidizes its high-speed rail system by nearly $10 billion annually. Japan subsidizes its rail system with nearly $2 billion annually. And Spain spends nearly $3 billion on high-speed rail subsidies every year.

“Jobs, jobs, jobs” was the campaign rally cry for Jerry Brown during his run for governor, and when he vowed his support for high-speed rail. He supported it so much it’s earned the nickname the “Browndoggle.”

But while Brown continues to blindly support the rail plan, the High-Speed Rail Authority claims that the project will create 20,000 jobs. However, a January report by the Assembly Republican Caucus found that there is evidence to prove that the rail authority overstated job creation by nearly 50 percent. “Even using the HSRA optimistic job creation estimates for Phase l, California investment will be about $1.96 million per job created, or $5.8 million per direct job created,” the caucus report found.

The rail authority must have used the New Math to calculate jobs. The HSRA claims that jobs are calculated in “job-years.” One year of full employment equals a job-year. Therefore, one person employed for 20 years counts as 20 “jobs” using this new math.

Greenhouse gases

The High-Speed Rail Authority has always claimed that the rail plan will dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions. But estimates of just how much carbon emissions will be reduced have gone from absurdly high, to only ridiculously high. Now “methods are still being developed” to determine just how much GHG will be reduced.

Even the California Air Resources Board in its AB 32 scoping plan dramatically dropped the estimates of greenhouse gas reductions for high-speed rail by 82 percent of what voters were promised in 2008.

High-Speed Rail 5.0

Sen. Doug LaMalfa, R-Richvale, calls the latest reincarnation of the high-speed rail business plan, “High-Speed Rail 5.0.”

“In plan number one we had the ballot initiative and cost estimates of $33 to $45 billion. Plan number two was up the ticket prices,” La Malfa said. “Plan number three was the $98.5 billion plan. Plan number four was the $68 billion plan, and Orange County was kicked out. Plan number five is the latest business plan approval with Orange County back in.”

Harkey added that the plan is wrought with inconsistencies and violations of the 2008 law. She explained that it’s not high-speed rail if it will be used in crowded urban areas such as Orange County. Nor can high-speed rail be used in moving freight.

What’s Ahead For High-Speed Rail?

The Legislature has until Aug. 31 to authorize the bond sale that would get the project started. While Republicans can’t kill the rail project by themselves, there are many Democrats who are not supportive of it, but appear to be holding out to make deals on local transit projects.

Keep an eye on termed-out legislators, or legislators who don’t have to run again until 2014 for key votes on the plan.

Sen. Joe Simitian, D-Palo Alto, has been somewhat cryptic in his comments about the rail project. Simitian has warned the rail authority several times in committee hearings that it needed to have a more realistic business plan or state funding for the rail project would be cut off, but repeatedly says that he favors high-speed rail “if done right.”

While Simitian has voiced concerns aloud in committee hearings, he has voted to pass rail bills, while simultaneously telling the rail authority and committee members to provide him with amendments addressing his concerns.

Rep. Darrell Issa, R-San Diego, chairman of the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, notified the California High-Speed Rail Authority about the probe earlier this week, and ordered the agency to preserve its documents and records.

Issa’s committee announced earlier this week that it’s questioning whether the $4 billion from the federal government has been spent appropriately, and said they want to investigate possible conflicts of interest between rail officials and contractors.

“California high-speed rail was sold to voters as a grand vision for tomorrow but in practice appears to be no different than countless other pork-barrel projects — driven more by political interests and consultant spending than valid cost-benefit analysis,” Issa said. “Before more taxpayer money is sent to the rail authority, questions must be answered about mismanagement, conflicts of interest, route selection, ridership and other risks.”

While offering her praise last week for Gov. Jerry Brown’s revised approach on California’s high-speed rail, U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein still cautioned that the federal funding for the project could depend on final cost projections. But that was last week’s high-speed rail plan. This week the plan is again different.

“If this was a debate, the rail authority would get smoked,” La Malfa added. “This is the most abusive waste of the taxpayers’ money, and one of the biggest frauds since the $600 toilet seats” for military aircraft, a scandal from the past.

April 13, 2012

By Katy Grimes

California employers have been regulated and mandated to the point of ridiculousness — and unprofitability. But a California Supreme Court decision this week finally gives employers a break—while still giving employees a break.

Resolving the increasing uncertainty due to legal hair-splitting by employment lawyers over the scope of an employer’s obligations for meal and break periods, the California Supreme Court ruled this weekthat an employer’s obligation is only to provide the break periods, but not force employees to take the breaks.

The law states that employees must be provided a 10-minute break within the first five hours of an employee’s shift. And, during an eight-hour shift, employers must provide two 10-minute breaks and a 30-minute meal period.

The decision came down in Brinker Restaurant Corporation vs. Superior Court, and is only one of many class action lawsuits on means and rest breaks pending in California. California’s many trial lawyers have made successful practices of suing California’s diminishing employers.

Brinker Restaurant operates Chili’s and Maggiano’s Little Italy. 

At issue in the state is the rights of employers – those people who stick their necks out, and invest their own money into companies which provide a product or service. These employers hire employees, pay them a wage and provide benefits to produce the product or service.

Attack on employers

But employers in California have been under attack for many years.

In addition to the issue of meals and break periods are the putative overtime laws, and whether employers had to pay overtime after eight hours in a day, or after 40 hours (total) of work in a week. Employers argue that paying overtime after eight hours every day restricts scheduling and production flexibility. Most other states base overtime on the 40-hour work week.

California also does not allow employees to work flexible-schedule weeks, such as four 10-hour days; or three 12-hour days, without paying overtime. Many employees prefer these alternative schedules, and employers find much more production and scheduling flexibility with the alternative schedules.

California’s overtime, and hour and wage laws, are complex and largely appear to be driven by the political party in power.

Overtime was enacted many years ago to compensate employees who were being “overworked” by employers, defined by the government as working employees beyond eight hours in one workday. Overtime law requires employers to pay employees time and a half for working more than eight hours in one day, as well as more than 40 hours in one week. Double-time is paid after 12 hours in one day, and again on the seventh consecutive workday in one week.

In effect through 1997, the old daily overtime rules required only certain industries that had specific wage orders regulating them, to pay overtime daily. Manufacturing and clerical workers were subjected to the daily overtime laws. But construction, mining and logging were not, so they could instead opt to pay daily overtime or defer to the federal standard of paying overtime after 40 hours worked in a workweek.

New law

In 1998, Gov. Pete Wilson signed legislation relieving California’s employers from the state’s daily overtime laws, allowing employers to pay overtime after 40 hours in one week, instead of the daily overtime. Widely hailed as a pro-business move, Wilson’s goal was to give employers and employees more flexibility in production and schedules. Labor union representatives were outraged, and claimed their members would lose income with the overtime change.

Almost immediately, Assemblyman Wally Knox, D-Los Angeles, authored AB60, which was referred to as organized labor’s reaction to Wilson’s elimination of daily overtime. In 1999, Gov. Gray Davis signed AB60, called the “Eight Hour Day Restoration and Workplace Flexibility Act of 1999,” dramatically changing the state’s overtime compensation laws. The act went into effect for most employers on January 1, 2000. However the list of exemptions was long, and included public employees.

The 1999 act’s most dramatic change was the restoration of the daily overtime requirement. Ironically, union employees covered by a collective bargaining agreement were not covered by AB60, nor were public employees.

Federal law, and the vast majority of states, only require that overtime be paid for hours worked in excess of 40 per week. However, California requires that overtime be paid after eight hours work in one workday and after 40 hours work in one workweek.

Along with overtime laws, meal and break periods became regulated. Instead of allowing employees and employers to determine break and meal periods, the government stepped in and overreacted.

Fortunately, the state Supreme Court decision this week brought a modicum of sanity back to the workplace and may put an end to some of the class action lawsuits.

“In a unanimous opinion authored by Associate Justice Kathryn M. Werdegar, the court explained that neither state statutes nor the orders of the Industrial Welfare Commission (IWC) compel an employer to ensure employees cease all work during meal periods,” the California courts reported.

The court also upheld the 30-minute meal break period “during which the employee is at liberty to come and go as he or she pleases.”  A meal break must be afforded after no more than five hours of work, and a second meal period provided after no more than 10 hours of work.

The court’s opinion in Brinker Restaurant Corporation v. Superior Court is available on the California Courts Web site.

April 11, 2012

By Katy Grimes

Does California need another small business loan guarantee program specifically for clean energy companies and agricultural businesses? California State Controller John Chiang and San Francisco Sen. Leland Yee think so. But some are questioning the motive behind the bill, saying it is merely a vessel for landing federal funding.

Chiang and Yee, both Democrats, have authored legislationcreating the California Agricultural and Renewable Energy Export Loan Guarantee Financing Program, with plans to operate out of the Treasurer’s office under the existingCalifornia Pollution Control Financing Authority.

The purvue of the pollution control financing program has been greatly expanded over the years to include all types of small business, with multiple pieces of legislation every year broadening the scope of the program.  In a fox-guarding-the-henhouse manner, most of the legislation appears to have been sponsored by the treasurer’s office.

With Controller John Chiang making no secret of his desire to run for state treasurer, SB 1465 sponsored by Chiang’s office makes sense.

But many are worried that the new loan guarantee program will cannibalize the existing and successful Small Business Loan Guarantee Program.  More likely, however, this is just a shell program in which to grab available federal money, which always comes with a use-it-or-lose-it string attached.

The larger concern is the continuing expansion of the California Pollution Control Financing Authority.

Loan Programs

Recently, the California Capital Access Program and the Small Business Loan Guarantee Program made a joint proposal to the Obama administration for small business loan funds. They came home with approval for $84 million. The first payment was scheduled to be received in January.

But this wouldn’t have been possible without commensurate legislation.

The state treasurer’s office oversees CalCAP, which “encourages banks and other financial institutions to make loans to small businesses that fall just outside of their conventional underwriting standards.”

On February 16, the treasurer’s office passed emergency regulations to the CalCAP program, allowing “microbusiness lenders” to be included in the program.  This is significant because as the definition of responsibilities for this obscure loan program has expanded, and the treasurer’s office now controls vast amounts of money available to small businesses identified as credit risks.

SB 1116, introduced Feb 17 by Sen. Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, and sponsored by the treasurer’s office, addressed this change. According to the bill, the change is “to increase borrower participation in CalCAP, and enable the Treasurer’s office to expend the full amount of its $84 million allotment of federal funds for CalCAP from the federal State Small Business Credit Initiative Act of 2010. Any portion of those federal funds which California fails to spend by the end of 2016 will revert to the federal government.”

On February 24, Yee and Chiang introduced SB 1465.

Last year Assemblyman Bob Blumenfield authored AB 796, which would create the Capital Access Loan Program for small businesses, also administered by the California Pollution Control Financing Authority, to provide loans through participating financial institutions to small businesses. AB 796 has been amended five times and is in the Senate Senate Committee Governance and Finance committee.

At a hearing Monday in the Senate Government Organizational Committee, Yee said that the purpose for his proposed legislation is to promote export development for clean energy and agricultural businesses in California. But opponents say it would just create a competing state program.

Yee’s explanation sounds noble, but there is a dubious lack of detail in the bill.

“There’s nothing magical about export financing,” said Rina Venturini, who represents Financial Development Corporations, which provide loans to small California businesses, and do it very efficiently. Venturini testified in opposition SB 1465.

Committee Chairman Sen. Rod Wright, D-Inglewood, asked Yee and a representative from the controller’s office why the bill was needed, and why small businesses needing loans couldn’t just continue to use the existing programs. “This provides another avenue to small business,” Yee said.

And that is about as much information about SB 1465 as Yee or the controller’s office could provide.

In apparent haste to meet the 2012 legislative deadline for new bills, SB 1465 started out with language specific to providing loan guarantees to the solar industry. Then the bill was amended to include agriculture and renewable energy.  The controller’s office said that, as SB 1465 makes its way through the committee process, it will probably be refined, the language tightened up and maybe even more dramatically amended.

But with the current success of the existing programs, as well as all of the behind-the-scenes moves to land the federal funds, something doesn’t add up.

Financial Development Corporations

FDC’s have a default rate of only .05 percent, Venturini told me, proving just how efficient they are. The Small Business Administration default rate is between 7 and 9 percent, which is still low, but not nearly as clean as Financial Development Corporations.

Venturini explained that, with FDC loans, money does not actually change hands between the banks and small business borrowers.  Only if a borrower defaults does funding kick in. And the very small, low overhead Financial Development Corporations provide work-through assistance to the risky borrowers in order to prevent defaults and help rebuild credit for small business owners.

The loans are geared toward risky borrowers to begin with, which is why they need guarantees and why FDCs help with loan work-outs.

CalCAP is not suited to spend time on loan work-outs the way FDCs are. CalCAP is located in the Treasurer’s office in Sacramento. FDCs are located throughout the state closer to borrowers.

Are you a good bill or a bad bill?

“In order to stimulate our state’s economy and create jobs here in California, we must assist our small businesses who want to expand globally,” said Yee. “SB 1465 will provide new opportunities for our agricultural and clean energy sectors, while ensuring that taxpayer dollars are used appropriately and effectively.”

Then is this just a redundant program?

The controller’s office describes the proposed loan guarantee program as “complementary” to existing programs. “It is additional assistance to small business outside of the Small Business Loan program,” said Jacob Roper, a spokesperson with the controller’s office. “Small business is facing funding problems.”

Roper explained that the idea came from the California Export Development Office, another loan program run by the state from 1985 to 2003. The export development office made money for the state while it assisted California companies with loan guarantees. Initially funded with $2 million from the general fund, the program consistently performed well, and was a success.

But it was shut down in 2003 when the California Technology, Trade and Commerce Agency was eliminated. Since then, the Small Business Administration and the Financial Development Corporations have filled in the gap nicely and effectively, according to Venturini.

There are 11 Financial Development Corporations already operating in California, managed by the Business, Transportation and Housing Agency; two are specific to agriculture financing, and one is just for energy financing. Venturini testified that there is nothing preventing any business from acquiring export financing, and questioned the need and motive for creating a redundant loan guarantee program.

“This is duplicative and will be in competition with the Small Business Loan Guarantee Program,” Venturini told legislators.

But Yee said that small business is always in need of help. “Why are we closing the door on those individuals?” Yee asked the committee.

“Your program will cannibalize existing fund programs,” Wright told Yee. “We shouldn’t damage existing programs.”

But there was no mention at the hearing about acquiring federal funding.

Instead, Yee said, “This bill is a shell. We don’t have funding. We ought to give it a chance to come back with a new funding scheme.”

April 10, 2012

By Katy Grimes

For more than 100 years, California was known as a great manufacturing state. It could be again if a new bill passes.

For decades, businesses clamored to come to the Golden State, and entrepreneurs armed only with a great idea built fabulous businesses.

But the last decade in California has seen manufacturing disappear faster than the Cuckoo bird.

“A robust manufacturing industry is an indicator of a nation’s ability to foster innovation and drive broad, sustained economic growth, and no state has been more important to U.S. manufacturing competitiveness than California,” the Milken Institute wrote in 2002.

From 1997-2000, California had 5.6 percent of all manufacturing investments in the country. By 2001, it dropped to 1.9 percent, when a sales tax on equipment became a barrier to new investment.

Through increasingly invasive and expensive taxes, California politicians have killed off the taxpaying goose that laid the golden egg, leaving very little manufacturing left in the state.

What Is Killing Off California Business?

Increasing costly regulations and hefty business-killing taxes have caused many businesses with little or no profits to close, or move to other states.

For many years, California has been double-taxing manufacturers through a sales and use tax on equipment. Any time a business purchases equipment in California, the equipment seller must collect the sales tax, paid by the purchaser.

However, Assemblywoman Alyson Huber, D-El Dorado Hills, has introduced AB 1972, which seeks to provide a tax exemption to businesses for the purchase of manufacturing equipment, or for research and development. Tax consideration such as this goes a long way toward stimulating business investment, resulting in job creation.

“California has struggled to attract or retain jobs in the manufacturing sector as many of the state’s manufacturers have struggled to keep their doors open here,” an analysis of AB 1972 found. “From 2001 to 2011, California has lost 613,000 jobs in this sector according to EDD statistics cited by the California Manufactures and Technology Association.”

There is no doubt that California’s tax and regulatory climate is a direct contributor to these job losses. According to the Milken Institute Report, Manufacturing 2.0, the key reasons for the state’s loss in manufacturing jobs are the harsh regulatory climate, tax burden and business-unfriendly reputation. This report compares California to seven states — Arizona, Indiana, Kansas, Minnesota, Oregon, Texas and Washington — that saw an increase in their share of the nation’s manufacturing jobs.

During a Revenue and Taxation hearing Monday, Huber said that other states recognize that taxing the input as well as the final manufactured product is double taxation and discourages investment. But double taxation does even more than just discourage investment—it prevents manufacturing businesses from making necessary investments back into equipment so they may stay competitive and grow. Double taxation also renders California businesses unable to compete with even our closest states, which do not tax business equipment purchases.

The current policy has resulted in less production in California. Out-of-state companies elect to grow elsewhere and in-state companies continue to shift workers or facilities to other regions that do not burden capital investments with excess taxation.

Huber also warned that, with AB 32, California’s Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, currently being implemented, businesses will be required to purchase new equipment and make expensive retrofits.

On The Endangered Species List

The Milken Institute recommended:

• Streamlining the regulatory procedure for manufacturers, increasing transparency and accountability in the regulatory process and encouraging long-term investment through new policy tools—all of which can be achieved without relaxing or changing a single regulatory standard.

• Enhancing public incentives for manufacturers through better planning, coordination across government agencies and partnering with the private sector.

• Launching an industry-led campaign to encourage Californians to pursue careers in manufacturing, highlighting the attributes of modern manufacturing, its importance to the economy, its record of environmental stewardship and its high wages.

• Creating a network of education, training, research, and business incubation centers around the state to develop a highly qualified manufacturing work force, to invent and commercialize advanced manufacturing techniques, and to assist start-up businesses.

• Creating a public-private initiative to conduct research, develop new technologies and processes, and commercialize more efficient and environmentally sustainable manufacturing practices with incentives to facilitate adoption of new standards.

However, there is one outstanding flaw in the bill’s analysis: “Any sales and use tax paid by a business will, however, be factored into the price it charges for goods, which in turn, may be subject to taxation.” This is an assumption regularly used at the Capitol by people unfamiliar with business. Businesses can only charge what the market will bear, including equipment manufacturers. Sometimes added costs can be passed on, but many times they cannot. It isn’t always the end consumer/purchaser who picks up the increase.

With California continually adding taxes onto the backs of businesses, the very reason so many are leaving and closing up for good is because so many of the state’s costs cannot be passed along. Double taxation renders California businesses uncompetitive.

Huber said that while initially this tax exemption will decrease state revenues, it has been proved time and time again that within a few years the state not only recovers the revenue, revenues increase. Once manufacturers have had the time to reinvest in new equipment and the new jobs which come from equipment purchases, California’s economy may have a chance. But this bill needs to be passed first.

April 5, 2012

By Katy Grimes

The California Air Resources Board has created a stealthy new corporation in Delaware. The Western Climate Initiative Inc., which will manage cap-and-trade programs, even has its own form of currency.

WCI Inc. says it exists “to perform administrative and technical services to support the carbon trading market, including market monitoring of allowance auctions, and market trading of compliance instruments.”

“CARB is creating a whole new currency with these pollution certificates,” explained Assemblywoman Diane Harkey, R-Dana Point. “Initially the state was to unite with other Western states to reduce the purported menace to the future of our planet,” Harkey said. “However, our partners determined that they would prefer not to tackle the issue during a recession; the cost of making their states less competitive in a tough business environment outweighed the benefit.”

Harkey has been trying to get her legislative colleagues to understand that the “fix,” setting a goal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels, with increasing population on the horizon, “is guaranteed to cost employers and everyday people more for the electricity and products they need. California’s only remaining partner is the Canadian province of Quebec.”

At a recent legislative hearing with CARB officials, Harkey asked why WCI was registered in Delaware and not in California. But CARB’s Richard Corey couldn’t provide a legitimate reason. “WCI is an established … it’s a program to link with others,” Corey said. “Many California companies are incorporated in Delaware, like Chevron and Disney,” Corey added. “And the Delaware incorporation law is taught in law schools around the country. It was on the advice of counsel.”

“California has Sunshine laws and open hearing regulations,” Harkey said. “We have public funds we are dealing with here, not like Chevron or Disney.” Harkey noted that Delaware is not subject to California state open meeting or sunshine laws, leaving many questioning why the WCI opted for such secrecy.

The WCI Board of Directors is made up of Matt Rodriquez, the newly appointed secretary for the California Environmental Protection Agency; James Goldstene, CARB chairman and CEO; and the equivalent officials for the Canadian provinces of British Columbia and Quebec. No other America states are involved.

The Fleecing Game

Imagine 50 million Californians living on less water and electricity than 38 million Golden Staters do now. That’s the scheme being hatched by some state officials and legislators. With the state’s population growing at about 3.4 million a decade, the 50 million figure should be reached around 2040.

Instead of addressing the historic economic and energy problems in the state, Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown continues to push the High-Speed Rail plan. This week its supposed cost was scaled back from $98 billion to a mere $68 billion.

To fund his pet choo-choo, now he’s pushing a cap-and-trade program to sell carbon credits.

Brown and public employee unions have also proposed a $9 billion tax-increase ballot initiative.

California is no longer a manufacturing leader, but is leading the country in manufacturing schemes.

Schemes

Top of the list of schemes is cap-and-trade, or emission trading–a way to tax residents and businesses by another name.

Throw in renewable energy mandates and the implementation of AB 32, the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, and it’s clear state leaders are closing their eyes as the California Express runs off the rails.

Legislators are still too busy patting themselves on the back for passage of the extremeRenewable Portfolio Standardlast year. But lawmakers will soon be forced to address the impending energy crisis their own laws caused. That’s because their renewable energy mandates won’t be able to power the Golden State.

You Pat My Back, I’ll Pat Yours

The California Independent System Operator, is a quasi-governmental agency which regulates the reliability of the state’s energy grid. In a recent study, it  warned that, as California tries to meet the stringent requirements of the Renewable Portfolio Standard of 33 percent renewable energy production, “so does the need for flexible capacity resources.”

The study continued, “Integrating a 33 percent Renewable Portfolio Standard creates several new challenges for the ISO. Among these challenges is ensuring that the ISO has sufficient flexible capacity to address the added variability and unpredictability created by intermittent resources.”

The “intermittent resources” referred to by CalISO are wind, solar, algae, ethanol and all other earth-friendly fuels. While they are not consistently reliable energy sources, most can serve as intermittent alternatives.

The 33 percent figure is the highest in the country after the Legislature pushed through and passed the environmentally restrictive Renewable Portfolio Standard. It mandates that California obtain 33 percent of all electricity from renewable resources by 2020. This figure includes all of the energy purchased outside of California. Energy experts say that California purchases more than 30 percent of its energy from out of state.

Carbon Trading Scheme

It appears that CalISO doesn’t believe that meeting the 33 percent renewable energy mandate is possible. Its study said, “California is making plans to link the cap-and-trade system with that of Quebec in 2012, under the auspices of the Western Climate Initiative, but challenges remain as allowances trade at record lows.” So far, no other countries are interested in participating in trading carbon credits.

However, the California-Quebec relationship is not trading apples-to-apples: Quebec gets 97 percent of its energy from hydroelectric sources. California is trying to reduce traditional electricity production, including hydroelectric power, and instead replace it with as much “renewable” energy as possible from wind and solar, algae and ethanol. But energy experts have been saying in recent months that California’s energy demand is too much for the alternative energy and lower usage standards.

Additionally, Quebec has only 80 regulated industries; California regulates more than 300 industries.

“This will create the largest carbon market in North America and provide a model that can guide future efforts to establish a creative road map for future national approaches in Canada and the U.S. to reduce greenhouse gas emissions,” said Western Climate Initiative Inc. co-chairmen James Goldstene, executive officer of the California Air Resources Board, and Jim Whitestone of Ontario’s Ministry of the Environment, at a recent hearing about cap-and-trade.

CARB officials plan on giving away free carbon allowances for the first auction “to the State’s large industrial emitters as well as the State’s electric utilities in order to reduce the economic impact of the cap-and-trade program,” a background paper explained.

But it appears that state officials have quietly recognized that selling carbon credits could actually do more damage to the state. The first carbon auction has been postponed from August to after the November election – with little comment, and no fanfare.

Carbon Currency

California’s new cap-and-trade program places a limit on greenhouse gas emissions from the businesses and entities responsible for approximately 80 percent of the state’s greenhouse gas emissions.  CARB will issue carbon allowances to these businesses and entities, which will be able to turn around and sell them to other businesses on the open market.

The “cap” is the state-imposed limit on businesses that emit greenhouse gasses, and the “trade” is the sale of carbon credits to other businesses. It’s the ultimate example of the government picking which businesses get to survive, and which will not, because not just anyone can purchase or sell carbon credits. Only the businesses chosen by CARB get to sell, and profit, from selling carbon credits to polluters.

Businesses will be limited on how many credits they can purchase. If a business produces more carbon emissions than the state allotted, CARB will issue stiff fines and penalties. Or the business can just reduce their production output and lose money instead.

Cap-and-trad emission credits are not a new scheme. For years, the state’s many air quality management districts have been requiring certain polluting businesses to purchase “clean air credits” from larger government approved companies, which were allowed to purchase up most of the credits. It’s a government run pay-to-play scheme.

“The capital gains from trading in the new currency of pollution ‘allowance certificates’ could very well create the next boom and bust cycle for our state if the scheme works as planned,” Harkey said. “With the creation of a carbon market for pollution, California will be monetizing pollution and charging businesses and residents for the air we breathe. We are getting fleeced.”