Political Fix (17 September, 2015)

What Happened To AB954? The California State Legislature stayed in session until the wee hours of Saturday morning, September 12, wrapping up end of the year legislation on assisted death, climate change, medical marijuana and family leave. The Senate even passed Resolution 39 that instructed Californians to “Dump Trump,” but Assembly Bill 954 never saw […]

Political Fix (20 August, 2015)

No Matter How You Vote, Crazy Wins OK, it’s official. Those opposed to chickens and mini goats inside Visalia’s city limits are as crazy as those collecting signatures to pass an initiative in favor of making them legal. Here in our office, for expediency’s sake, we refer to each side as pro-goaters or anti-goaters, and both […]

Political Fix (6 August, 2015)

Separated At Birth In 2004, Visalia City Councilmember Phil Cox declared that he was going to run for Tulare County Supervisor District 3 because, among other things, he was seeking to improve communication between the county and Visalia. Sound familiar? At the end of July, Visalia City Councilmember Amy Shuklian declared that she was going […]

Political Fix (16 July, 2015)

The Family Food Freedom Act – The rest of the story Let’s just say the painful truth out loud about the Food Freedom Act. A wise man told me during the Tulare County Supervisors’ meeting that Visalia could have avoided this whole initiative process if they had just given Gingi Freeman a medical exemption. When […]

Political Fix (2 July, 2015)

Eat your vegetables If you always skip over the articles about the newest, hottest trade agreement here is your opportunity for a painless recap.  Consider it eating your political vegetables. Just in case you thought you were always forgetting the acronym for the trade pact, you weren’t. There are three of them, TPP, TPA and […]

Political Fix (18 June, 2015)

The Next Republican Governor In the last issue of the Valley Voice I considered Tulare County Supervisor Allan Ishida the Republican sacrificial lamb to run for governor against the immensely popular Lieutenant Governor Gavin Newsom.  But I forgot about Fresno Mayor Ashley Swearengin. She may not beat Mr. Newsom in 2016, but Democrats can’t win […]

Political Fix (4 June, 2015)

Supervisor Allen Ishida Declares His Candidacy for Governor Supervisor Allen Ishida filed his intent to run for Governor of California on May 15. He can’t formally declare his candidacy until 2016, but wanted to get his campaign committee number from the Fair Political Practices Commission so he can start fundraising. His announcement is historically significant because […]

Political Fix (7 May, 2015)

An Adoring Fan I rarely get feedback on Political Fix, so I was happy when a reader finally took the time to send me a personal email. It was Wayne Millies from the Whitlatch Group. He said, “It’s quite clear you’re a progressive liberal hack from your previous columns; however, you’ve outdone yourself this time […]

Political Fix (16 April, 2015)

 Six things you didn’t know about Marco Rubio Well finally we have some officially declared presidential candidates.  The first to announce was Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, then Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, Hilary Clinton and now Florida Sen. Marco Rubio. Neurosurgeon Ben Carson has announced that he is definitely going to announce, so we have that […]