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San Francisco -- A 21-year-old man was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole Friday for murdering the son of California's secretary of state during a street robbery, the San Francisco District Attorney's office said. Clifton Terrell Jr. could have faced the death penalty for shooting the 27-year-old son of Secretary of State Bruce McPherson in November 2001 because murder committed during the course of a robbery is a special circumstance under California law. But former District Attorney Terence Hallinan, an opponent of capital punishment, elected not to seek a death sentence for Terrell, who had turned...

Scientology, The Clearwater Bar Association, and Judge Greer Judge George W. Greer presides over Florida's Sixth Judicial Circuit Court. He is known internationally for the Terri Schindler Schiavo guardianship case. Pat Anderson, former attorney for the Schindlers, characterized Judge Greer's unprecedented rulings as "The Rule of Terri's Case." The Clearwater Bar Association is delighted with Judge Greer's performance in this particular case. They presented the John U. Bird award to the Pinellas-Pasco Circuit judge on May 15, 2004. This prestigious award, which is the Clearwater bar's highest honor for a judge, was granted to Judge Greer for the way he...

Shelley's Last Day As Secretary Of State Uneventful Friday was the last day in office for California Secretary of State Kevin Shelley, who has already packed up his office and left town. "Kevin Shelley was here on Tuesday. (He) called an agency-wide staff meeting. (He was) very, very cordial, very pleasant. (He) thanked the staff for all of their hard work," said Secretary of State Office spokeswoman Caren Daniels-Meade. Shelley stepped down after being investigated for misuse of government money. He made the announcement last month and was set to resign March 1. But he extended the date until Friday...

Terrell convicted in McPherson killing SON OF SECRETARY OF STATE BRUCE MCPHERSON WAS GUNNED DOWN ON S.F. STREET By Ken McLaughlin and Mary Anne Ostrom Mercury News More than three years after former state Sen. Bruce McPherson's son was murdered in a botched San Francisco street robbery, 21-year-old Clifton Terrell Jr. was found guilty of the crime Wednesday. Secretary of State Bruce McPherson, his wife, Mary, and other family and friends helped fill the San Francisco courtroom every day of the two-week trial, which ended Feb. 22. Sentencing is set for May 6. Assistant District Attorney Harry Dorfman said he...

(02-11) 10:01 PST SACRAMENTO, (AP) -- Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is expected to name a longtime former Santa Cruz legislator, Bruce McPherson, as California's 29th secretary of state Friday, sources told the San Jose Mercury News. McPherson, 61, who left the state Senate last year after 11 years in the Legislature, would replace Kevin Shelley, who resigned last Friday while facing numerous investigations into his conduct in office. Shelley's resignation takes effect March 1. The governor's office scheduled an 11 a.m. announcement on the appointment.

June 30, 2003 Chairman, Public Safety Committee State of California Sen. Bruce McPherson Via: Fax (916) 445-4688 Dear Senator McPherson, United States defense contractors such as Barrett Firearms Manufacturing, Inc., Murfreesboro, TN USA rely on orders from the US Military as a primary source of income but this government income for most contractors is only part of the necessary income for long term survival. Commercial or civilian product sales are also a main source of income that makes payroll and for good working conditions for their employees. We must support these defense contractors in both peace and war and allow...

Dear Sierra Friends, A very good Friday afternoon to you all! In case you had not heard, I wanted to make sure you knew that the Sierra Nevada Conservancy bill, AB 2600, will be heard on the Senate Floor this coming Monday, August 23. Senator Bruce McPherson (R—Santa Cruz) will be presenting AB 2600 as the bill’s official floor jockey. Below, I am including material we’ve put together on the highlights of the consensus reached by Assemblyman Leslie and Assemblyman Laird and the Schwarzenegger Administration. If you have any questions, feel free to contact me by phone or e mail....

DILORENZO IS ESSENTIALLY CORRECT that the tariff supplied ninety percent of federal revenue before the Civil War. For the thirty years from 1831 to 1860 it was eighty-four percent, but for the 1850s as a decade it was indeed ninety percent. But the idea that the South paid about seventy-five percent of tariff revenues is totally absurd. DiLorenzo bases this on pages 26-27 of Charles Adams, When in the Course of Human Events, but Adams comes up with these figures out of thin air, and worse, appears to be measuring the South's share of exports, and then transposing that percentage...

<p>A .50-caliber BMG sniper rifle, in the wrong hands, would be terrorism unleashed.</p> <p>The gun is powerful enough to punch a hole in an oil tank or take down a civilian airplane. Its 5 1/2-inch long bullets can pierce an inch of armor 40 yards away and hit a target a mile away. A massive weapon, with some models weighing in at 28 pounds, it's ill-suited for hunters -- it would take out a deer and the tree behind it -- but ideal for assassins.</p>

<p>SACRAMENTO - Buried under a pile of papers on state Sen. Bruce McPherson's desk on the fourth floor of the Capitol is a handwritten note from a Democratic colleague: ``More than any other single person here now, you are in a position to force a break in this dire logjam.''</p>

July will bring the 140th anniversary of the battle of Gettysburg. Across Pennsylvania fields baking under the hot summer sun, reenactors will be out in force - most from the South, eager to replay, or imaginatively reverse, the whole encounter. Reenactments began in 1913, a time closer to the battle than to us. But Gettysburg is a place that history embalmed as a special shrine long ago. What new could there be to say about it?In the hands of two master historians, Stephen Sears and James McPherson, plenty, it turns out - though their books serve quite different purposes. McPherson's...

SAN FRANCISCO (BCN) -- A judge in San Francisco held two young men for trial on almost all counts in the 2001 robbery-killing of a state senator's son and several other street robberies committed the same night. Dwayne Reed, 23, hung his head down as Superior Court Judge Kay Tsenin read her ruling. Last week she had found his Miranda rights had been violated and his admissions to police could not be used against him at trial, even though they were available at this stage of the proceeding because she deemed them voluntarily given. Nineteen-year-old Clifton Terrell, Reed's co-defendant in...

Princeton professor James M. McPherson's recent arguments for affirmative action, in a newsletter to members of the American Historical Association, makes many sweeping assertions and implicit assumptions that need not even be challenged to show the shakiness of his arguments. However, since we both belong to an organization devoted to history, let me make a few corrections of the history that Professor McPherson offers. First of all, he mentions that his academic career began in 1962 at Princeton, as a result of what he now calls "the infamous 'old boy network,' " which he characterizes as affirmative action for white...

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- A gambling investigation at Florida State centers on former Seminoles quarterback Adrian McPherson, who was kicked off the team last month after he was accused of stealing a check. University vice president John Carnaghi said Thursday that police ''are investigating rumors and hearsay regarding a single, former football player, Adrian McPherson.'' ''The investigation does not currently extend to any other student athletes at FSU,'' he said. McPherson's lawyer, Grady Irvin Jr., said his client has never bet on a sporting event. McPherson started four games this season, going 3-1. ''We will not participate in this unbelievable rumor...

As things seem to be going at present, it would seem that we are about to be bombarded with yet another round of blatant anti-Southern propaganda straight from the mouths and pens of Marxist/socialist "historians" who really know better but hope you don't. We were recently "treated" to yet another showing of Ken Burns' "The Civil War." I've heard comments by some that this series was somewhat redone and is, this time around, more objective than in the past. Having watched the miserable thing in its entirety twice over the years I felt no need to subject myself to it...

Some of the pro-north activists around here have been asking for a factual refutation of McPherson. Since I'm too cheap to purchase "Battle Cry" due to the fact that its revenues go into the pocket of an avowed Democrat with marxist political affiliations, I decided to examine his positions in one of those free articles on the web. Here goes... The following is intended as a refutation and analysis of the main arguments found in James McPherson's article "The Civil War: Causes and Results." I've broken it down by section to address his arguments in detail. His statements are selected...

The New York Review of BooksJune 13, 2002 Review Could the South Have Won? By James M. McPherson Look Away! A History of the Confederate States of America by William C. Davis The South vs. the South: How Anti-Confederate Southerners Shaped the Course of the Civil War by William W. Freehling Lee and His Army in Confederate History by Gary W. Gallagher The War Hits Home: The Civil War in Southeastern Virginia by Brian Steel Wills The field of Civil War history has produced more interpretative disputes than most historical events. Next to debates about the causes of the...