California: Jon Fleischman

Now that Arnold has shown himself content to throw California into an economic downward spiral, let nobody have any illusions that California is doing anything but fighting for its very viability in the 21st Century.  If Arnold doesn't get his way, well he'll just line up with the Yacht Party idealogues, eschew any real solutions that bring in revenue to address the very serious problems facing the state.

But lest anybody have any doubts about where the Republicans are going with this, check out Jon Fleischman's giddy post after the Governor's press conference:

I may be the only pundit out there who will say this -- but here it goes:  I'm excited!  While the circumstances of how we got to this point, such as years of overspending  and the current economic, recession, are tragic - they say that, "adverse situations create unique opportunities for change.

Links a-plenty:

• Carly Fiorina has been diagnosed with breast cancer.  I know she was considering a 2010 Senate run against Barbara Boxer.  I agree with approximately none of her policy prescriptions for the country, but I wish her the best.

• It's considered a great victory that the members of the California Congressional delegation are sitting down to a meeting together.  That's because it's the first one in two years.  Maybe they can talk about that proposal to split the state in two, therefore ending the need to have such meetings!

• This is truly incredible.  You may remember that Duf Sundheim, a former chair of the Yacht Party, started a group called "California Republicans Aligned for Tomorrow" (CRAFT, a synonym for yacht) designed to recruit moderate candidates and take back California for Christ the Republicans.

A day after Calitics called the roll of the Yacht Party on the budget deal to be voted upon tomorrow in the State Senate, Shane Goldmacher does the same and comes up with just three Republicans who haven't signaled a no vote:
The field of potential Republican votes for the budget compromise in the Senate -- widely viewed as the most challenging caucus to corral support -- has narrowed so significantly that only three members have yet to throw cold water on the tentative deal.

That happens to be the bare minimum of Republican votes needed to pass the $40 billion-plus budget plan.

Those three are Senate Republican leader Dave Cogdill, Sen.

Good ol' Jon Fleischman is at it again. It seems Jon is getting a bit worried that some of his fellow Republicans aren't willing to throw the state off the cliff.  No, Jon wants to break the unions, break the state, and break the government for all but the wealthiest amongst us.  Developing nation status here we come!

What did he do today, why he brought a resolution for consideration by the California Republican Party, of which he is one of the vice chairmen.

Fleischman, who publishes the conservative FlashReport Web site, said the resolution is meant as a "stick" to dissuade GOP legislators from agreeing to any budget plan with higher taxes crafted with majority Democrats and Gov.