Free Republic

Why are Senators Boxer and Feinstein and so many others we trust supporting Phil Angelides for governor? HEALTH CARE WORKER: "Phil Angelides was the one we could count on to stand up to Schwarzenegger." Our teachers. Our police and firefighters. And the Sierra Club. ENVIRONMENTALIST: "Join Barbara Boxer, Dianne Feinstein and all of us in supporting Phil Angelides for governor."

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's pick to chair the California Energy Commission is about to find himself out of a job. Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata has said he will not hold a confirmation hearing for Joe Desmond, who has served in that role for a year. Without confirmation, Desmond will be forced to step down by next week. Desmond drew the ire of Democrats and environmentalists on a number of fronts. He has pushed for the multibillion-dollar Frontier Line, a transmission system currently being studied that would connect California with Nevada, Utah and Wyoming. The Schwarzenegger administration sees the line...

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger this week called on California Energy Commission Chairman Joe Desmond to investigate possible price gouging by big oil companies, as gasoline prices across much of the state topped $3 a gallon. But Desmond has only two weeks left on the job--and likely won't be there to see the investigation through. Desmond's nomination must be confirmed by both the Senate Rules Committee and the full Senate before May 10 in order for him to keep his post. But the Senate, led by President Pro Tem Don Perata, D-Oakland, has refused to even schedule a confirmation hearing. Without such...

As California’s electricity supply tightens with summer weather ahead, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger will send a state-energy-agency reorganization plan to the Legislature next week that critics say favors big energy companies at public expense. The administration maintains it is not out to compromise the public interest, but only to streamline the state’s complicated, multiagency energy bureaucracy and encourage construction of the new electric transmission lines and gas pipelines that energy firms say are needed to keep the lights on in California. “This reorganization improves accountability, focuses the development of energy policy, reduces fragmentation and duplication, and improves communications,” said Joe Desmond,...