Free Republic

State Sen. Roderick Wright indicted on charges of voter fraud and perjuryThe Inglewood Democrat is accused of listing as his residence a home in the district he wanted to represent when his actual home was elsewhere. He has pleaded not guilty. By Jean Merl, Los Angeles Times September 17, 2010 A Los Angeles County grand jury on Thursday unsealed an eight-count felony indictment against state Sen. Roderick Wright (D-Inglewood), accusing him of filing a false declaration of candidacy, voter fraud and perjury beginning in 2007, when he changed his voter registration to run for the Legislature. Wright listed as his...

Six employees of Los Angeles City Councilman Richard Alarcon have been ordered to appear before a grand jury this week, six months after prosecutors obtained search warrants to determine whether the councilman has been living at his legal residence. Alarcon said Monday that his chief of staff, Saeed Ali, and five other workers in his office have received subpoenas instructing them to testify on Wednesday. Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley's office received permission in January to search two homes owned by Alarcon's wife, Flora Montes de Oca -- one on Nordhoff Street in Panorama City, the other on Sheldon Street in...

Housing experts painted a grim picture of Los Angeles' real-estate market Tuesday as City Councilman Richard Alarcon called for city, state and federal funds to help bail out city homeowners who can't pay their mortgages. Warning that the region is embroiled in a foreclosure upheaval, Alarcon said he's also considering asking lawmakers to declare a state of emergency to direct state and federal money to counseling and loans for people about to lose their homes. "We're in a crisis. We don't need bureaucrats who are going to sit on their thumbs and not get things done. Who do we go...

Senator Alarcon’s talk about the views of the Founding Fathers on immigration caught my attention and interest. I am quite familiar with the writings of Benjamin Franklin on the subject and Senator Alarcon may be very surprised to learn that there was no more ardent or vigorous critic of illegal immigration than Benjamin Franklin. He wrote about it extensively during the mass immigration of Germans into Pennsylvania, in the 1750s. His solution however was not to ban immigration, but rather to insist upon legal immigration. And that is the problem I have with this resolution: it blurs that vital distinction...

“We’re going to close down Los Angeles, Chicago, New York, Tucson, Phoenix, Fresno” on May Day this Monday, labor organizer Jorge Rodriquez told the British wire service Reuters. “We want full amnesty, full legalization for anybody who is here [illegally],” said Rodriquez, organizer for one of the unions of AFSCME, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees of the AFL-CIO. “That is the message that is going to be played out across the country on May 1.”  Listen to the cynicism behind Rodriquez’s arrogant statement. Government workers who belong to AFSCME unions will not see their jobs taken...

Fixing workers' compensation comes down to changing the minds--and strengthening the spines--of a handful of power players in Sacramento. These powerful few must find what we pundits sometimes call the “political will” to take action that goes against their own short-term self-interest. This point was made rather amusingly on March 10 when Democratic state Senator Richard Alarcón of Los Angeles--who, along with a few other key legislators, bears responsibility for dragging out California’s workers’-compensation crisis in 2003--made a boob of himself in public. Alarcón misunderstood an e-mail, sent to politicos whose actions will determine whether Sacramento fixes this crisis or...