I would gladly vote for this bill if there was a requirement that the curriculum on global warming be science-based and balanced. That discussion and examination is desperately needed not only in our schools but in the halls of government.
Mr. President: I rise with sadness to note the passing of former State Assemblyman and former State Controller Houston I. Flournoy. Hugh Flournoy truly was a remarkable and rare public servant who never lusted for political positions except as a means to a higher end. Though he was disdainful of politics in general and political office in particular, he cared very deeply about this state and its people.
Abraham Lincoln finally had enough of Stephen Douglas' obfuscations when they met to debate in Charleston, Illinois. He said, "Judge Douglas is playing cuttlefish – a small species of fish that has no mode of defending himself when pursued except by throwing out a black fluid which makes the water so dark the enemy cannot see it, and thus it escapes." Lincoln's cuttlefish story came to mind during the governor's State of the State message when he blamed the state's massive budget deficit on formulae that lock in spending.
California's water shortage is real. The last major dam built in this state was the New Melones in 1979. In the intervening time, the population has grown from 23 million to 38 million people. California now stores less than one year's water consumption in the entire system, which is why the prospect of even a moderate drought has become ominous.
Speech by Senator McClintock Opposing SB 86 on Property Seizures, Senate Chambers
This bill is opposable on many grounds, but I want to focus on the provisions related to the state's practice of looting safe deposit boxes and retirement and college funds under the pretense that they are abandoned solely because their owners have set them aside for three years. The federal district court has issued an injunction ordering the state Controller to cease this practice.
Senator McClintock's Speech Opposing the 2007-08 Budget, Senate Chambers
The budget package that comes before us today is at least slightly improved over what was put before the Senate the night it walked off the job and went on summer holiday on August 1st. At least an effort has been made to balance the budget on paper. And that's something, since we just closed the last budget year with what appears to be the biggest budget deficit in California's history, a deficit that has reduced the $10 1/2 billion budget reserve that we began the last year with to around $4 billion.
This is not the first time the California Legislature has reached an impasse in its budget negotiations. In past years the state has gone until early September without a budget agreement. But whenever the budget has snagged in the past, legislators kept working to resolve it. This is the first time in California's history that they simply walked off the job.
Speech by Senator McClintock on the Budget Act, Senate Chambers
Mr. President: I'd like to begin with a brief review of the numbers in this budget and the very real risk it runs. Let's begin with the $3.5 billion reserve. This is actually what is left out of the $10.5 billion reserve that we began the last fiscal year with. That should be a warning right there: we started with $10.5 billion in the bank at the beginning of last year. We're now down to $3.5 billion. Still, you'd think that's more than enough to cover the $700 million deficit in the budget now before us.
You have asked under what circumstances I could support SB 77, the budget act for FY 2007-08. In my judgment, the largest general fund budget the state can safely sustain under current conditions is slightly over $100 billion, or $8.3 billion more than was spent just two years ago and $21.7 billion more than was spent at the outset of this administration. Here are my thoughts on the scope of the problem and on what immediate steps can be taken to address it.
As the Senate immigration bill faltered, Sen. Diane Feinstein complained that the status quo is de facto amnesty because the mass deportation of millions of illegal aliens is logistically, politically and socially impractical. Feinstein and her cohorts seem oblivious to the fact that it is precisely this attitude that discredits any of their promises that a new, tougher law will somehow be enforced once an amnesty is granted. Sorry: been there, done that.
