Los Angeles city government is in trouble. Projections are that it will face a budget deficit of at least $400 million in the coming fiscal year. But the financial bind in which the city finds itself is no accident. It is the result of a series of conscious decisions by elected officials and bureaucrats.  Read more >>

To free wheeling, big spending politicians, David Walker is the "boogeyman." To those who want ever bigger government, his exposing of their dirty secrets is a nightmare. So who is this man who has politicos shaking in their boots?  Read more >>

Several news reports over the last week had me thinking of the 1973 Charlton Heston movie Soylent Green, an "Al-Gorean" view of the earth's future as a dying planet no longer able to provide enough food to sustain the human population. At one point during the film, the mayor of New York treats his children to a visit to Central Park where they get to see the tree. That's right -- the tree, because it is the last one, a feeble specimen ensconced in a guarded geodesic dome.  Read more >>

After the bill that would have criminalized spanking was withdrawn as part of Sacramento lawmakers' efforts to showcase their best behavior while their allies fire up an initiative campaign to extend term limits, many Californians thought they would be safe for a while from whacko legislation.  Read more >>

In an April 17 op-ed piece in the San Jose Mercury News, state Senator Don Perata complains that in California we are witnessing the hollowing out of the middle class because of what he sees as an inadequate response to our education, housing, transportation and health care needs.  Read more >>