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<p>WASHINGTON, (AP) -- Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., has broken her ankle and will skip next week's Democratic National Convention.</p> <p>Feinstein, who was one of Hillary Rodham Clinton's top supporters, was to have chaired California's delegation to the convention in Denver.</p>

The rumor mill about whether Dianne Feinstein, the popular Democratic senator, will run for governor heats up every now and again. It began to simmer last week, after the San Francisco Chronicle's Matier and Ross published a private poll showing her beating another would-be Democratic candidate, Attorney General Jerry Brown, 50 to 24 percent. Brown, who served two terms as governor before term limits were enacted, has been the early frontrunner among the politcal chattering class. In fact, in that same published poll, Brown was the top choice when Feinstein wasn't included, besting San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, Los...

Will she? Won't she? And what if she does? That poll Matier and Ross published in The Chronicle showing Sen. Dianne Feinstein beating out all the other Democrats hands down in the governor's primary for 2010 is driving all the other wannabe candidates crazy, especially Attorney General Jerry Brown. I know Dianne has talked to at least one person about the governor's race. But she will never say so publicly, because if it got out that she was even "looking" at a possible run for governor, it would be the same as saying that she's in. But trust me, Dianne...

As San Francisco's juvenile justice system shielded young illegal immigrant felons from possible deportation, Mayor Gavin Newsom's office gave grants totaling more than $650,000 to nonprofit agencies to provide the underage offenders with free services - everything from immigration attorneys to housing assistance to "arts and cultural affirmation activities," city records show. Newsom has said the city began its policy of not referring young immigrant offenders to federal authorities for deportation under previous mayors, and that he reversed the practice after he became aware of it this year. However, in 2006, the Mayor's Office of Criminal Justice - a community...

State Attorney General Jerry Brown leads San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and other Democrats making noises about running for governor in 2010 - but if Sen. Dianne Feinstein were to jump into the pool, she would swamp them all, a new poll shows. On the Republican side, former Rep. Tom Campbell has a 2-1 edge over other possible candidates - ex-Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner and ex-eBay chief Meg Whitman. Although voters don't seem to know any of them very well.According to the statewide poll by JMM Research of Sacramento, Brown...

There is no quick fix to $4.50-a-gallon gas, no way to provide instant relief to consumers we know are hurting. Yet President Bush and others continue to push the false promise of offshore oil drilling. Just this week, the president lifted the executive order banning drilling that George H.W. Bush put in place in 1990. And he's asked Congress to lift its own moratorium on oil exploration on the outer continental shelf -- which includes coastal waters as close as three miles from shore. This would be a terrible mistake. It would put our nation's precious coastlines in jeopardy and...

SACRAMENTO – With scattered rationing punishing cities and farms statewide, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein Thursday jointly unveiled a $9.3 billion water bond proposal, convinced that fears over prolonged shortages and environmental collapse in the vital Sacramento delta will be enough to overcome resistance to building dams and a north-to-south delivery canal. Schwarzenegger, a Republican, and Feinstein, a Democrat, plan to aggressively push lawmakers to approve taking the bond measure to voters in November. The plan still faces tough odds. The ballot is already crowded with controversial initiatives addressing same-sex marriage, abortions for minors and caged farm...

"Efforts in both chambers of Congress have Republicans wondering why Democrats seem to fear free speech. Rep. Michael Capuano (D-MA) has proposed limitations on how Representatives can post information to the Internet in a time when we should be demanding more transparency, not less. According to a source in the Senate, Dianne Feinstein has begun her own campaign to force Senators to seek permission before communicating over the Internet." "In the Senate, the problem gets even worse. Feinstein (D-CA) would have the Rules Committee act as a censor board, forcing members to get approval for the act of communicating on...

I think Dianne Feinstein is definitely the less insane of my state’s Senators. She’s actually seeing a government-run program that’s losing money hand over fist (and has been for years–this isn’t just a Democrat thing, it’s a government thing) and releasing it into the private sector: “It’s cratering,” she said of the restaurant system. “Candidly, I don’t think the taxpayers should be subsidizing something that doesn’t need to be. There are parts of government that can be run like a business and should be run like businesses.” Of course, ideology quickly came into play, because many of Feinstein’s fellow Dems...

Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton met face to face in Washington, D.C. Thursday night. The surprise meeting comes just two days before she's expected to endorse Obama. The only information the campaigns released about this meeting is that Obama and Clinton had a productive discussion about what it will take to succeed in November. Obama and Clinton did, in fact, meet positively in Washington, D.C. at the home of another U.S. senator, Dianne Feinstein of California. And while it's unknown what the specifics of their meeting, it could be assumed the Obama-Clinton dream ticket came up like it did earlier...

The George W Bush administration plans to launch an air strike against Iran within the next two months, an informed source tell, echoing other reports that have surfaced in the media in the United States recently. Two key US senators briefed on the attack planned to go public with their opposition to the move, according to the source, but their projected New York Times op-ed piece has yet to appear. The source, a retired US career diplomat and former assistant secretary of state still active in the foreign affairs community, speaking anonymously, said last week that the US plans an...

An ambitious agricultural guest-worker plan died with a whimper and not a bang this week, as senators quietly dropped the proposal from an Iraq war spending bill. With little ceremony and no debate, a quick parliamentary maneuver late Tuesday night killed California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein's guest-worker plan. The plan would have given temporary legal status to 1.35 million illegal immigrant farm workers, as well as their spouses and children. "We knew it was an uphill battle, but we thought it was one worth fighting," Scott Gerber, Feinstein's press secretary, said Wednesday. Still, the unexpected revival and equally abrupt demise...

Victory For Grassroots Americans Grassfire has confirmed that ALL amnesty language has been stripped from the Iraq Supplemental Spending Bill – the result of tens of thousands of phone calls, faxes and fast action by a number of key Senators who sent a letter to Majority Leader Harry Reid demanding the language be dropped. This happened as a direct result of grassroots actions. Thank you! The Letter from Sen. Jim Inhofe’s office reads: Dear Majority Leader Reid: We write to express disappointment that the Senate Appropriations Committee chose to include in the War Supplemental more than 100 pages of immigration...

CONGRATULATIONS! You have achieved what some believed to be nearly impossible last week. The AgJOBS amnesty has been stripped from the Iraq Supplemental bill. Here's more good news: the employment-based permanent workers have been stripped from the bill too! Unfortunately, the H-2B low-sill worker increase is still in the Iraq Supplemental so your phone calls are still needed... Our Capitol Hill team heard initial reports late last night that the AgJOBS amnesty had been stripped from the bill, but we wanted to await confirmation of that before reporting back to you. Apparently Senate Majority Leader Reid and other Senators were...

The good news: Republican senators went on record against the Feinstein/Craig illegal alien farmworker amendment today in a letter to Majority Leader Harry Reid. The bad news: There were only 10 of them willing to put their names on the letter: [Image of letter included on site.]Sen. Inhofe wants you to sign the No Amnesty letter. You can do so here. The text: Dear Majority Leader Reid: We write to express disappointment that the Senate Appropriations Committee chose to include in the War Supplemental more than 100 pages of immigration language that would grant legal status to more than one...

(VIDEO) Pro-amnesty senators are once again trying to shove their amnesty agenda down the throats of the American people, duplicitously attaching their amnesty legislation to an Iraq war funding bill. Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Larry Craig added an amendment that would grant five-year amnesty to illegal aliens who have either worked 150 days in agriculture or earned $7000 since January, 2004 - an estimated 3 million farm workers, PLUS their families!

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Dianne Feinstein has changed her tune about using Iraq war spending bills to provide temporary legal status for illegal farmworkers.She used to think it was a bad idea. Not anymore.Next week, the full Senate is expected to consider an emergency spending bill that includes Feinstein's agricultural guest worker plan. If it survives, the guest worker package would offer temporary legal status to 1.35 million illegal immigrant farmworkers."This is an emergency situation," Feinstein, D-Calif., told Senate Appropriations Committee colleagues Thursday, adding that "agriculture needs a consistent work force. Without it, they can't plant, they can't prune, they...

California Senator Dianne Feinstein is trying to use a must-pass Iraq war spending bill being debated in Congress to advance an agricultural guest worker program she's long advocated. Feinstein sits on the Senate Appropriations Committee, which voted 17-12 to add her farm workers amendment to a multi-billion-dollar bill to fund military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

I write to express my concern about the recent decision to eliminate the public corruption section in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California. According to press reports, the 17 Assistant United States Attorneys assigned to the public corruption/environmental crimes unit in the Los Angeles office are being reassigned to other sections within the office. Public corruption cases will now apparently be mixed in with other types of cases and handled by a larger pool of prosecutors, rather than by a specialized section. Press articles have also mentioned the low morale and ill will that this decision...

Time For Public Comment On New Rules For Guns In National Parks Friday, May 02, 2008 On April 30, the U.S. Department of Interior, through the National Park Service and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, issued a proposed rule to amend the current strict regulations on firearms in national parks and wildlife refuges. NRA-ILA led the effort to amend the existing policy regarding the carrying and transportation of firearms on these federal lands. The public has until June 30 to comment on the proposal, and NRA-ILA strongly urges members to file comments in support. “Law-abiding citizens should not be prohibited...

Statement of Senator Dianne Feinstein on Interior Secretary’s Proposed Rule Change Allowing Loaded Firearms in America’s National Parks and Wildlife Refuges -Radical change to Reagan-era gun restrictions would put public at grave risk- Washington, DC – U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) today strongly criticized a proposed rule change, announced by Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne, that would ease Reagan-era restrictions on carrying loaded firearms in America’s national parks and wildlife refuges. The following is Senator Feinstein’s statement: “I never thought I’d see the day when the Interior Department of the United States would allow weapons – including concealed weapons – to...

Big Government types and Prop 99 All you really need to know about the two eminent domain propositions on the June 3 ballot, 98 and 99, is that Proposition 99 is being touted by politicians and other government types as the real solution to government intrusion on private property ownership. Among them are the usual suspects, including California Sen. Dianne Feinstein and California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, both of whom believe in Big Government, and both of whom describe Proposition 98 as a hindrance to solving such state problems as water quality and supply. Feinstein, in a release at the end...

San Francisco financier Richard Blum has built his reputation - and his multimillion-dollar fortune - by swooping in and turning around troubled corporations. His first major coup was putting together a partnership in 1968 to buy the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus for about $8 million - and then selling it for $40 million four years later. So it surprised no one that Blum adopted an alpha dog approach when he became chairman of the UC Board of Regents last year in the aftermath of the university's widely publicized management meltdown. And he's gotten results: the imminent departure...

Bushed: A resident of San Francisco's Pacific Heights neighborhood whose regular exercise regimen includes walking the Lyon Street steps was startled the other night when a man popped out of the bushes right in front of the home owned by Sen. Dianne Feinstein and megabucks husband Richard Blum. It was a security guard who was keeping watch over the senator's home, which is also monitored by some eyes in the sky - cameras atop the house's roof. The guard promptly apologized, telling our walker, "I have to go off camera and go to the bathroom in the bushes." "That makes...

Dicks vows to block bid to lift ban on loaded weapons in national parks WASHINGTON – With a showdown looming, U.S. Rep. Norm Dicks says he’s prepared to block any effort by the administration to lift the current ban on carrying loaded weapons in national parks. It’s not an idle threat. As chairman of the House Appropriations interior subcommittee, Dicks oversees the National Parks Service’s annual budget and is in a position to prevent the administration from dropping the Reagan-era ban. While the Washington Democrat is usually reluctant to add legislative provisions to his spending bill, he is ready to...

WASHINGTON — The following is a partial transcript of the March 2, 2008, edition of "FOX News Sunday With Chris Wallace": "FOX NEWS SUNDAY" HOST CHRIS WALLACE: And hello again from Fox News in Washington. Well, we've had a number of make or break moments in this Democratic presidential campaign — New Hampshire, Super Tuesday 1 and now Super Tuesday 2. The question: Whether voting in Texas and Ohio this week will finally determine who wins the nomination. For answers, we turn to two Senate colleagues and supporters "[snip].... [snip].. WALLACE: You talk about women. Do you think there's been...

This is what the administration's recent pro-waterboarding PR offensive had been leading up to. But the Republican side backed down. Later this afternoon, the Senate will be voting on a bill authorizing the government's intelligence activities. Included in that bill is a measure sponsored by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) that would restrict the interrogation methods the CIA could use to the Army Field Manual, which bans waterboarding and other harsh techniques currently used by the CIA. The Republicans had been expected to challenge that provision, forcing a vote. But they didn't. After a vote on the bill in 90 minutes...

With a key vote upcoming at the Santa Clara City Council on whether to help build a new stadium for the 49ers, San Francisco city officials say a new infusion of federal cash is giving a big lift to their alternative plans to keep the team playing in the city at a new stadium at the Hunters Point shipyard. A federal appropriations bill headed to President Bush to fund the U.S. military for the fiscal year starting next Oct. 1 contains $82 million for Navy cleanup of the polluted former naval shipyard at Hunters Point - a $20 million increase...

The Talk Shows Sunday, December 9th, 2007 Guests to be interviewed today on major television talk shows: FOX NEWS SUNDAY (Fox Network): Former Gov. Mike Huckabee, R-Ark., and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. MEET THE PRESS (NBC): Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani. FACE THE NATION (CBS): Sens. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., and Chuck Hagel, R-Neb. THIS WEEK (ABC): Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del.; actor John Cusack.LATE EDITION (CNN) : Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf; Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.; Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio.

Dems Reach Deal on Energy Bill By H. JOSEF HEBERT – 14 hours ago WASHINGTON (AP) — An agreement among congressional Democrats — including those from auto industry states — to support a 40 percent increase in vehicle fuel efficiency is likely to be the tonic needed to push energy legislation through Congress before Christmas. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., a longtime protector of the auto industry, settled their differences in an agreement late Friday on the fuel economy, or CAFE, issue, clearing the way for a House vote on a broader energy bill, probably on...

LOS ANGELES — Censure? Driving home recently, I heard a story about Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s decision to support an administration proposal to provide absolute immunity from civil suit to telecommunications companies that cooperated with warrantless and illegal eavesdropping of their subscribers’ conversations. As a member of he Judiciary Committee, Feinstein’s support was obviously important, and I found myself shaking my head as I drove. Why grant immunity, I thought to myself, and why absolute immunity, without any regard to whether they knew or should have known that the requests being made of them were illegal? What kind of message would...

Sen. Dianne Feinstein has signed on to lead next June's ballot campaign aimed at revitalizing Candlestick Point and keeping the 49ers in San Francisco. Joining Feinstein as co-chairs of the campaign: former Mayor Willie Brown and Hunters Point-area Supervisor Sophie Maxwell. Word that DiFi will suit up comes a few weeks after Mayor Gavin Newsom tapped former 49ers executive Carmen Policy to act as civic go-between with the team and the National Football League. The 49ers are still intent on moving to Santa Clara, despite objections of Cedar Fair, the company that runs Great America and whose parking lot the...

The new Democratic-led Congress has a 16 percent approval rating - no better than the rating of the Republican-led Congress a year ago - no doubt because voters see members clamoring to score points in the never-ending game of partisan gotcha instead of working to do what is best for the country. When a politician does try to do what is right, there is too often more downside than upside. Consider the cheap shots that have come the way of Democratic Sens. Dianne Feinstein of California and Chuck Schumer of New York because they voted to confirm the nomination of...

Sen. Dianne Feinstein said Thursday that she favors legal immunity for telecommunications companies that allegedly shared millions of customers' telephone and e-mail messages and records with the government, a position that could lead to the dismissal of numerous lawsuits pending in San Francisco. In a statement at a hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which is considering legislation to extend the Bush administration's electronic surveillance program, Feinstein said the companies should not be "held hostage to costly litigation in what is essentially a complaint about administration activities." She endorsed a recent statement by Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W. Va., chairman of...

It is this reporter's opinion that the amnesty crowd won’t die easily. Led by Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, D-Nev., Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., and company, they've tried five times to shove comprehensive immigration reform through and each time the American people, in their infinite wisdom, have rebuked them. The defeat of the DREAM Act was a major setback. Then came California Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s attempt to add the AgJOBS bill to the Farm Bill and again they fell flat on their faces. Feinstein admitted that amnesty efforts lacked popular support and its proponents could not overcome the opposition. The recent...

I think this is a damn funny video from todays demonstrations.... instructions:click on the first link below, and then click:+ Watch video here .LINK...HERE's the Google "search" - youtube link. Interesting commentary by DUmmies re.: CODEPINK Demonstrates Waterboarding to Feinstein at CNN

Michael Mukasey's prospects for confirmation as Attorney General seem to be resuscitated, thanks to the endorsements of two Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee. We suppose this counts as progress -- of a sort. Judge Mukasey set off a cascade of Democratic opposition because he declined to make a pre-emptive legal ruling on "waterboarding" before he had the security clearances to review the classified evidence. Our sources confirm press reports that the CIA has only used this interrogation method against three terrorist detainees and not since 2003. Congress could have outlawed the practice at any time, but Democrats conspicuously did...

During a long career in public service and private practice, Michael B. Mukasey has forged an independent path as a lawyer and federal judge. He has presided over 1,600 cases in almost 19 years on the bench. He has extensive experience on national security cases -- presiding over such critically important cases as U.S. vs. Rahman and Padilla vs. Bush. In the Omar Abdel Rahman case, 10 defendants were given prison sentences ranging from 25 years to life. Judge Mukasey is not Alberto R. Gonzales. In our confirmation hearings (and subsequently, in writing), Judge Mukasey's answers to hundreds of questions...

CLICK active links for for authoritative information:. Democratic Sens. Charles "Chucky" Schumer of New York and Dianne "DiFi" Feinstein of California say the will support Michael Mukasey's nomination to be attorney general. Both are members of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

WASHINGTON -- A Senate committee took the unprecedented step Wednesday of sending four Federal Election Commission nominations to the Senate floor without recommendation after the committee's chairwoman, California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein, refused to back a controversial former Justice Department official. Feinstein told colleagues on the Senate Rules Committee that Hans von Spakovsky's record in the department's Civil Rights Division demonstrated that he's too partisan to serve on the FEC. Former career Justice Department voting-rights lawyers have charged that von Spakovsky, while a division counsel from 2003 to 2005, served as the administration's "point man" in a campaign to adopt...

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., sponsor of the bill with Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, said it was aimed at "providing a federal hand of assistance to those on the front lines" in the war against street gangs. The measure includes approval of $411 million over five years for programs to keep young people out of gangs, with almost half of that going into areas that have a high intensity of gang activity. It authorizes $270 million over three years for witness protection needs and creates a new federal crime of interference with witnesses in state court proceedings.

Maria Duarte is clinging to her dream of becoming a social worker. But she will need the support of Congress to achieve her goal. Duarte, a 20-year-old Cal State San Bernardino student, is one of the thousands of illegal immigrants who could become legal residents and eventually citizens under a bill pending in Congress. The Senate could vote as early as today on the legislation known as the Dream Act. Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill., is expected to offer the Dream Act as an amendment to the 2008 Defense Authorization bill. The bill would aid about 65,000 illegal immigrants such as...

www.gunowners.org/a091707.htmSep 2007 Anti-gun California Senator Dianne Feinstein Is At It Again! Gun Owners of America 8001 Forbes Place, Suite 102 Springfield, VA 22151 (703)321-8585 Monday, September 17, 2007 You may recall that in recent years, GOA has enlisted your aid in fighting so-called "gang" legislation, which typically includes attempts to apply federal RICO anti-racketeering statutes to minor gun infractions -- thus harassing and prosecuting otherwise law-abiding gun owners as though they were Mafia bosses. Well, Feinstein's S. 456 is the latest vehicle for such underhandedness. At issue is section 215 of the bill. In essence, your family, gun shop employees,...

Move over Bridge to Nowhere. Congress is back in town, and clearly back to business even uglier than usual. It takes hard work to come up with an earmark more egregious than that infamous Alaskan bridge, but California's Dianne Feinstein is an industrious gal. Her latest pork--let's call it Rambo's View--deserves to be the poster child for everything wrong with today's greedy earmark process. The senator's $4 billion handout (yes, you read that right) to wealthy West L.A. (yes, you read that right, too) is the ultimate example of how powerful members use earmarks to put their own parochial interests...

Move over Bridge to Nowhere. Congress is back in town, and clearly back to business even uglier than usual. It takes hard work to come up with an earmark more egregious than that infamous Alaskan bridge, but California's Dianne Feinstein is an industrious gal. Her latest pork--let's call it Rambo's View--deserves to be the poster child for everything wrong with today's greedy earmark process. The senator's $4 billion handout (yes, you read that right) to wealthy West L.A. (yes, you read that right, too) is the ultimate example of how powerful members use earmarks to put their own parochial interests...

REDWOOD CITY, Calif. Disgraced Democratic fundraiser Norman Hsu was a wanted man again after he failed to show up for a court date Wednesday and a judge issued a new warrant for his arrest. Hsu, whose criminal past has roiled the campaigns of top presidential candidates, was scheduled to ask a judge to cut in half the $2 million bail he posted last week when he turned himself in after spending 15 years on the lam from a felony theft conviction. Instead, San Mateo Superior Court Judge Robert Foiles ordered Hsu's bail forfeited to the county and issued a new...

A proposed ballot initiative being circulated to change how California awards its presidential electoral votes is so irksome to Sen. Dianne Feinstein that she is vowing to change the U.S. Constitution. Democrats say the so-called Presidential Electoral Reform Act -- which would throw out the Golden State's winner-take-all system -- is nothing but a ruse to win the Republicans the White House by assuring them at least 20 of California's 55 electoral votes. "I think this effort to essentially skew the presidential system ... would directly change the election," Feinstein said in an interview. So California's senior senator said she...

California Democratic Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer followed presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton's lead on Wednesday and announced they would get rid of donations from a fundraiser who is wanted for sentencing on a 1991 grand theft charge. Two California Democratic House members, Mike Honda of San Jose and Doris Matsui of Sacramento, also said they were dumping campaign cash from Norman Hsu. The moves came after two days of scrutiny on Norman Hsu, who had donated $23,000 to Clinton. The New York senator plans to give the money to charity. Hsu gave $1,000 to Feinstein and $2,000 to...

The temperature could get a little warm at the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce's annual 49ers booster luncheon today, as Sen. Dianne Feinstein takes the stage with a call for team owners John and Denise York to keep the Niners in the city. Feinstein, a big Niners fan and equally big critic of the Yorks' proposed move to Santa Clara, tells us she plans to use the event at the Hyatt Regency to urge the 49er Faithful to break their silence, "rally forth and convince Mr. York that San Francisco is the place to be.""I feel strongly that the 49ers...

U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) today announced that she will introduce a resolution to abolish the Electoral College and provide for the direct popular vote of the President. Senator Feinstein's announcement comes against the backdrop of a bid in California to qualify a ballot initiative that would skew the outcome of Presidential elections. "This proposed California initiative is very dangerous – it is an attempt to tinker with state law in order to influence the outcome of national Presidential elections," Senator Feinstein said. "There is no question that our system of electing a President is outmoded, but this initiative is...