January 25, 2021
For almost three decades, California Republicans have nurtured political fantasies about what I call their “great white hopes” — big-city Republican mayors that they believe would make peachy-keen candidates for statewide office. After all, they were elected and re-elected as chief executives of major, diverse cities. So, what could possibly go wrong if they try…
December 14, 2020
Gov. Gray Davis made history on Oct. 7, 2003, by becoming only the second governor in the lifetime of the U.S. to be recalled by voters. The only other was a governor of faraway North Dakota in 1921. With Gov. Gavin Newsom now under threat of recall himself, Democrats would do well to remember the…
November 23, 2020
The biggest casualty of the 2020 election was, of course, Donald Trump, who became only the fifth president since the 1800s to be booted out of office after one term — and the first in 28 years. But the second most prominent victim may turn out to be Trump’s sidekick, Vice President Mike…
June 16, 2020
In our many collective decades of covering and engaging in local, state and national politics, we have been frustrated by the failure of city councils, boards of supervisors, state legislatures and Congress to effectively eradicate abusive behavior by the minority of law enforcement officers who are nurtured and protected by a culture of corruption in…
February 27, 2020
Having been asked to write a piece for CalMatters about the California primary this Tuesday, I first asked myself, what do I really know for sure about the race and the candidate field that would be enlightening or even interesting to share with the readers? After pondering that question, instead of playing a prognosticator with…
August 5, 2019
Gov. Gavin Newsom set off a blizzard of criticism last week by signing a law requiring that all presidential and gubernatorial candidates provide five years’ of income tax returns in order to appear on California’s primary ballot. Most of the pearl-clutching has plopped into the following three baskets:
May 21, 2019
If the most recent polls are to be believed, Joe Biden has jumped into a commanding lead in the brigade-sized Democratic field, after his long delayed, almost Hamlet-esque entry into the race. The former two-term vice president has zoomed into an impressive double-digit lead not only nationally, but in the key early…
March 5, 2019
Ever since Sen. Kamala Harris announced her presidential campaign, there’s been a gush of speculation about the importance of her home state in the nomination process – especially since the California primary has been moved up to March. I’m neither for nor against Harris in the primary, and I will enthusiastically support her if she…
January 17, 2019
Could the burgeoning number of independent voters in California constitute the basis for a third party, to compete with the Democrats and the Republicans? I regularly get calls from national political reporters asking for reaction to this prospect, and now some state-based pundits are suggesting California’s penchant for innovation will change the political-party equation. There’s…
December 13, 2018
There’s a hoary, but self-evident, saying in retail, “You can’t sell cat food if cats don’t like it.” The California Republican Party on life-support should take that maxim to heart, but it probably won’t. In 2013, when former state Sen. Jim Brulte took over the chairmanship of the state Republican Party, he asked me to…