California Roundup: New Judge, Fiorina Waffle, Water-and-Power Struggle

* Senate candidate Carly Fiorina flips on unemployment extension, tells the O.C. Register that she's changed her mind and would now vote to give more federal money to states so they can keep paying people not to work. Stated reasons: In the first place Californians are suffering, in the second place she doesn't answer to the GOP, and in the third place her vote wouldn't have made a difference in the first place.

* By a small majority, Californians support gay marriage. Dan Walters takes a fresh look at the passage of Proposition 8, the ballot initiative that outlawed same-sex marriage, and brings up the often overlooked point that a large turnout by nonwhite voters during President Obama's 2008 election actually helped Prop 8 to victory.

* More fallout from the city of Bell's eight-hundred-thousand-dollar city manager. City Council members are seeking Robert Rizzo's resignation.

* Will Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger break Reagan's 11th Commandment and support Jerry Brown? Will voters, who give him a 22 on the Tomatometer Field Poll, care?

* Schwarzenegger names Republican appellate court justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye to replace retiring Ronald George as Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court. If you're in the mood for a five-year-old puff piece on Canti-Sakauye ("As a judge, Tani's most memorable cases are when juveniles are tried as adults. Those are difficult cases and stay with her.") you came to the right place.

* Sordid backstairs intrigue leads L.A. Department of Water and Power to withhold $73.5 million it owes to the city. The public utility monopoly refused to cough up the second part of an annual payment it makes to the city's general fund after L.A. City Council refused to let it jack up rates.

Comments

[?]

a large turnout by nonwhite voters during President Obama’s 2008 election actually helped Prop 8 to victory

Is that racist or homophobic or both?

[hmm]

Thank you for making my state look good and reaffirming my decision to never move back to the state of my birth.

[Michael Ejercito]

Proposition 8 was helped a lot by those Roman Catholic anchor babies whose parents benefited from President Ronald Reagan’s amnesty and who came of age by 2008

[TXLimey]

It’s not just the Catholics.

Being pro-gay marriage is pretty much a white suburban phenomenon (and of course the hipper urban areas).

Uhh.. from the poll link..

The current survey found that Catholics were split over gay marriage ? 47 percent approving, 46 percent disapproving ? while only 34 percent of Protestants approved and 57 percent were against.

Catholic Spain, Portugal, Argentina, and Massachusetts all have gay marriage.

[Michael Ejercito]

Catholic Spain, Portugal, Argentina, and Massachusetts all have gay marriage.

What was the proportion of illegal aliens that received amnesty in 1986 who came from Spain, Portugal, and Argentina?

Catholic Mexico City also has it. 😛

[kilroy]

“Fiorina doesn’t want millions of Californians to suffer because politicians can’t get along.”

She’d much rather spread the suffering nationally. I had hopes for her beating Boxer and being at least fiscally responsible. WTF?

[LibertyBill]

Dont you just love false choice?

[Spartacus]

More fallout from the city of Bell’s eight-hundred-thousand-dollar city manager. City Council members are seeking Robert Rizzo’s resignation.

So, the terms of the city manager’s contract came as a total surprise to the city council? Or are they doing a 180 because of the political fallout? They can either come across here as callous or retarded; I guess they chose the latter.

Or maybe both.

[JW]

Bell City Council members are seeking the resignations of the city manager and two other top officials amid growing public outcry over salaries that appear to be among the highest in the nation, according to three sources close to the discussions.

At a closed-door meeting Monday night, as hundreds of residents protested outside, council members also discussed reducing their own pay. Most of them make $100,000 a year.

I’m buying long on tar and feathers.

Funny how these salaries “just happened.”

[Bah]

Another minority judge???!! Pathetic liberals.

[Colin]

Is this gonna be a daily feature?

[P Brooks]

Has Eric Holder sent a team of federal marshals to Bell, yet?

[P Brooks]

Senate candidate Carly Fiorina flips on unemployment extension, tells the O.C. Register that she’s

absolutely committed to doing anything it takes to get elected.

[JW]

I wonder how may HP employee votes she’ll be getting?

[MP]

Only those who didn’t lose money or jobs while she worked there.

So 0.

[PapayaSF]

I did a little contract work for HP back in her day, and yeah, she was not loved. And HP seemed like a bureaucratic nightmare. The short version of my story:

Me: “Should there be a comma here or not?”

HP Contact: “I’ll have to ask the committee about that.”

Me (thinking): This company is doomed.

[Jason]

She’d be perfect for government!

[PapayaSF]

That said, Fiorina can’t possibly be worse than Boxer.

[Nash]

At least Boxer voted against the PATRIOT Act.

[R C Dean]

The public utility monopoly refused to cought up the second part of an annual payment it makes to the city’s general fund

I guess I’d be a little surprised if nobody at the City had signature authority over whatever checking account the Water Department uses. So why can’t the City just write itself a check?

[Fist of Etiquette]

I just know this refusal by L.A. Department of Water and Power to pay has something to do with the Arizona immigration law.

[Hugh Akston]

Forget it, RC, it’s Chinatown.

[R C Dean]

Carly Fiorina has let us all know that she will not support, under any circumstances, cuts to the federal budget.

Because that’s what this unemployment extension kerfuffle was about: the refusal of the Dem majority to fund the extension with offsetting cuts.

[John]

Pretty much. I am sorry I have ever defended her. She is a typical weasel. No wonder she got ahead in the corporate world.

[MP]

She was an abject failure as a CEO. But, as all failed CEOs are, was paid quite handsomely for setting the company back 10 years.

[John]

In fairness, it turned out that she was right about buying Compac. I remember at the time everyone thought she was crazy to keep HP in the computer business. It turned out she was right about that.

I know the people at HP hated her guts. But wasn’t some of that due to her just not being one of them? I have never been totally convinced that she was as bad of a CEO as they make her out to be.

Regardless, she has revealed herself to be a weasel.

[Mo]

Really? Because one gander at the margins on the PC business shows that it’s killing their margins. The personal systems business generates $35B in revenue, but only about $1.6B in operating profit. That’s just a 4.5% margin. In comparison, their services business is about the same revenue, but $5B in profit.

[John]

a 4.5% margin is pretty good, especially considering the economic times. That is well ahead of inflation and the prime rate combined. And that is just one year. Who is to say the personal services business didn’t just have a great year?

I think it is a bit much to expect a company to produce better than 5% margins on everything every year. Yeah, you can do that if you are Bernie Madof or Enron.

[Rhywun]

Or Apple.

[John]

Even Apple had years in the early 1990s when they didn’t do that. And after the I phone debacle, I bet they don’ this year.

[Mo]

On what planet is 4.5% operating margin, which is before interest and taxes and excludes “non-recurring charges”, “pretty good”? The current average for the S&P 500 is 7.5%. HP as a whole had operating margins of 11.6%. Considering Walmart, which is the definition of a low margin, high turnover company, had operating margins of 7%, an operating margin of 4.5% sucks.

[John]

I misunderstood you. I didn’t realize that was before interests and taxes. Then, yes that is a shitty margin.

[Mo]

That’s the definition of operating profit. Profit after taking everything out, including interest, taxes and extraordinary items, is net income.

[MP]

Good article about the post-Carly CEO Mark Hurd.

[T]

Peter Principle at work. She worked hard, got promoted, and was eventually given a job she couldn’t handle. Too bad she took HP and Compaq down with her.

[Episiarch]

HP still makes excellent computers; my laptop is HP and it’s great.

Their software for their hardware, on the other hand…that’s abysmal.

[John]

Their computers also got a lot better after they merged with Compac.

[T]

My 12 year old laser printer is better than their current offerings.

I can’t speak to their laptops. My laptop seems like it would be nice, but my Corporate IT crippled it so I’ll never know.

[JW]

I’m still using a few LaserJet 4’s on my network, all about 15 years old. They never die.

[T]

Yeah, mine is a 4000. I told the wife 5 years ago we’d get a new one when it died. I throw in a toner cartridge about once a year and it keeps on rolling.

[JW]

Weird in that *everyone* I’ve known that has an HP laptop has had it fall to pieces within 2 years. That and all the warranty stories end in sobs.

You probably have the business level stuff, which if it’s like Dell’s Latitude series, is bullet-proof. Consumer level stuff, notsomuch.

[John]

I have an HP desktop that has worked great. Their printer I have is okay. I went crazy with the drivers when we upgraded to Windows 7. But other than that it has worked pretty well. I have heard a lot of horror stories about their laptops. But it seems I hear such stories about nearly every brand.

[Spartacus]

My HP laptop is nearly 4 years old and still works great. Most people I know that have trouble with their laptops treat them as if they were made of adamantium.

[cynical]

That’s what you get for not thinking the worst of a politician.

[Eric Holder]

See?! See to what horrors federalism leads?!

[Resident Smartass]

Forget California when there’s talk of porn, meth, sex, cocaine and meth parties going on at the Mineral Management Service.

[John]

I never get to work at the right federal offices.

[Nephilium]

You said meth twice…

Or is this just the lead up to the meth, meth, meth, porn, meth, sex, meth, and cocaine party?

[Alan Vanneman]

“…would now vote to give more federal money to states so they can keep paying people not to work.”

Yes, if we eliminated UI the unemployment rate would drop to zero. Uh huh.

[John]

And we could just make everyone eligible forever to. You are such a douchebag Venneman.

[TXLimey]

Hell, why should anyone work? We can just pass a law paying everyone. And why so stingy while we’re at it? Let’s set everyone’s wage at say $500,000, toss in an eco-friendly house with a pool and electric car, and we’ll all live like kings forever and ever.

[CrackertyAssCracker]

It would stimulate the economy. Because once you gave everybody 500K, they would go buy stuff, you know. And that is really the problem here, the consumer has just stopped buying stuff.

[Warty]

Vanneman, you’re more loathsome than the rat I fucked to death today.

[R C Dean]

Yes, if we eliminated UI the unemployment rate would drop to zero. Uh huh.

I dunno about that, but I’m pretty sure that paying people only if they are unemployed isn’t going to cause the unemployment rate to drop at all.

Because of the Iron Law:

You get more of what you reward, and less of what you punish.

[cynical]

They could at least transition them to a workfare program.

[guy in the back row]

break Reagan’s 11th Commandment

Do unto others, then split?

[Brandybuck]

Senate candidate Carly Fiorina flips on unemployment extension, tells the O.C. Register that she’s changed her mind

Well duh! Anyone with two brain cells could have seen this coming. Now that she has won the primary she no longer has to pretend to be conservative.

p.s. At the last state GOP convention, she staffed her booth with paid student groupies. These were some of the most politically ignorant folk I have ever seen at a political convention. It’s almost like she got them at a firesale from CalPIRG or something. All were outright unashamed Marxists.

[AlmightyJB]

she’s changed her mind and would now vote to give more federal money to states so they can keep paying people not to work

I have a better idea. Let’s pay politicians not to work. Think of all of the money that would save.

[AlmightyJB]

Food for thought. What is Tani wearing or not wearing under that robe?