The Name Game

Want a bridge or freeway named after you? Here’s the skinny. By Greg Lucas, Sacramento News & Review, February 20, 2014 

Bummer for James “Sunny Jim” Rolph. The charismatic mayor of San Francisco from 1912 to 1931, who died in office broke as California’s 27th governor, got his bridge taken away again.    Read more »

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A Great Day for Nothing

Very Little is Happening at the Capitol — A Perfect Time for Big-Picture Thinking 

By Greg Lucas, Sacramento News & Review, November 14, 2013 — Compared to the root-hog, bloodlust craziness of the death throes of the legislative session, the White Sepulcher is currently living up to its name. It’s quiet.    Read more »

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Congress and the Feds Can Learn a Lot from California’s Debt Management

On debt, California’s responsibility—and The Skipper’s sage advice   By Greg Lucas

Sacramento News & Review, October 17 — A growing body of 21st-century philsophical thought recognizes that the 98 episodes of Gilligan’s Island ask and answer all the Big Questions.

So, amid this recent flurry of mouth-frothing and hand-wringing over debt, it should be no surprise The Skipper and Mary Ann slice straight to the bottom line.    Read more »

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Never Judge the Chickenshitedness of a Bill by Its Advisory Committee

 By Greg Lucas

Sacramento News-Review, September 5, 2013 — With few exceptions, things in the Legislature are at least as chickenshit as they appear. Usually more.

No matter how petty the motivation for some legislative act seems, the real cause is pettier. A “no” vote is less likely to be sparked by some lofty ideological schism than the author of the bill neglecting to compliment the other legislator on their latest dye job.    Read more »

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You’re Not Funny

 

On Capitol Hazing Rituals and Legislative Grab-Ass

By Greg Lucas

(Editor’s Note: Steve Maviglio, press secretary to Assembly Speaker John Perez offered the following comment when this column initially ran: ” You should stop by the Assembly chambers sometime. Media hasn’t been banned and never was. We simply asked that interviews be conducted in a corner instead of just anywhere.    Read more »

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The Political Arena Is No Place for Heroes

Politicians may be skilled at consensus building and the art of compromise, but don’t expect them to grow taller than the hedge

By Greg Lucas

San Francisco Chronicle August 1, 1999

Sacramento — Where have all the heroes gone? (Long time passing) Where have all the heroes gone? (Long time ago) 

A hero is defined as:

1.    Read more »

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On the FBI at the Capitol and Legislators Fundraising

The FBI’s rubber-gloving of the Capitol prompts a look at campaign contributions 

By Greg Lucas

Sacramento News & Review, June 27, 2013 — The line between felony and fundraising is explicit.

Yet California legislative history over the past quarter century shows 14 Democratic and Republican legislators, lobbyists and others convicted in a federal-corruption investigation that came to light in 1988 for soliciting campaign contributions outside the lines.    Read more »

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Chaotic, Last-Minute Bill Passing Bad for Californians

Why lawmakers are afraid to go where no lawmaker has gone before

By Greg Lucas

Sacramento News & Review, May 30, 2013 — Don’t disturb lawmakers right now, they’re deep in the plak-tau.

Plak-tau is the Vulcan “blood fever” manifested during the final stages of pon farr, the once-every-seven-years Vulcan mating obsession, which is pretty crazed by itself.    Read more »

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Full Frontal Identity

California Legislators Race to Play Catch-Up with Internet Privacy Concerns—and Consumers’ Evolving Online Habits

By Greg Lucas 

Sacramento News & Review, April 18, 2013 — Big Brother has been watching since 1949 when George Orwell’s book 1984 was published. He keeps getting better at it.

Orwell’s dystopia is bereft of privacy.    Read more »

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“Armed and Legislated”

“Will the Flurry of Gun-Control Bills Even Matter?”

By Greg Lucas 

Sacramento News & Review, January 24, 2013 —The National Rifle Association is right:

People kill people. The use of firearms makes it significantly easier, however.

Put as nicely as possible, guns are facilitators. The number of California thumbtack-related deaths in 2010 pales against the 2,811 deaths involving guns the same year, a little more than half of which were suicides.    Read more »

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