When deprived of democracy, then hire your own legislature.

It’s the most populous state in the union, with an economy larger than most countries and a former governor who is the former “Terminator.” But when times are tough, California turns to the big guns, the mercenaries who give voice to the voiceless: Washington lobbyists.

The California state Assembly, which hired a K Street lobbying firm last month for $180,000 a year to represent its interests amid the deficit reduction process, is the largest in a slew of government entities frightened that budget cuts at the federal level could increase costs for localities. WA Times

Diane and Babs, our normal 1/10 Senators should be able to step out of the box. The many years spent serving tea to Nancy and Harry have dulled them.

More accurate voting

Pennsylvania’s Electoral College Reform Plan Is A Good Idea

By tying at least one electoral vote in each state to a Congressional District, the proposal would put nearly every state into play in a Presidential election.

Do we have a better political sample than the  Congressional District?  Maybe popular vote?

Welcome to the revolution Jerry Brown

Jerry Brown warns of 'veto blues' as he mulls about 600 bills

Calling Grover Norquist

Aerospace industry campaigns against further defense cuts

The defense-aerospace sector is lobbying supercommittee members not to make any additional Pentagon budget cuts, saying they could hinder America’s national security, force thousands of job losses and further erode the nation's economic viability.

Gibbs separation and the markets

The thing that silicon intelligence is doing is shrinking the event separation cost by an order of magnitude.   So, the firm builds highly redundant and regular internal operations and the disorder is left to the market.  Silicon intelligence equilibriate with high disorder;  random deliveries of random size can be obtained at low cost.  Abundance, each firm assured in that its regularity will be preserved.

Boom times in Silicon Valley

Silicon Valley’s economy exploded in 2010, with GDP growing by 13.4 percent, faster than U.S. GDP growth of 2.6 percent and far faster than San Francisco and Oakland, where GDP growth was just 0.5 percent.
Not only did the San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara metropolitan area grow fast, it also turned around quickly, according to numbers from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released Tuesday. In 2009, Silicon Valley GDP growth was negative 2.4 percent, but that changed by 15.8 points to hit 13.4 percent in 2010. Biz Journal

Proof by self declaration

While it is rational for any given individual household or even any one bank to cut back on risk as a result of this legacy of bad debt, that means that a substantial (and sub-optimal) number of worthwhile real investment projects are going unfunded and thus are not undertaken.Adam Posen

In the age of the Internet, investors cannot locate investments?
The problem more likely occurred because investors discovered their past investments were no good.

Science by self declaration

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke received what’s become a customary verbal thrashing at Monday night’s Republican presidential candidates’ debate just after a prominent Democrat took aim at some of Bernanke’s policy-making colleagues.

Both categories of criticism are unwarranted. Folks in Congress and aspiring to the White House have lost sight of the fact that an independent central bank is a prerequisite for an advanced economy.Neil Lipschutz

Welcome to the revolution John Lockyer

State Treasurer Bill Lockyer just said that about two thirds of the bills that come out of the California Legislature are “junk” that wastes the time and resources of the legislators for symbolic purposes.Cal Watch

Legislation to create a sub appointed legislature reporting to the main appointed legislature

Larson has introduced legislation offering the supercommittee three ways to add jobs to their mandate: Either the existing supercommittee should commit to returning recommendations on jobs, or it should add four new members and create a sub-supercommittee on jobs, or it should create a parallel supercommittee on jobs.WA Post

Are we all following along?