The door to the state treasurer's vault. (Photo: Dorothy Mills-GreggWelcome to the underground: Treasures, secrets and hidden passageways, right here in Sacramento. Well, sort of. The steps of the Jesse M. Unruh State Office Building across from the Capitol are familiar to tourists, school children and government employees. But they’d be startled to learn that below their feet is a different world: the state treasurer’s vault.
A Californian casts a ballot. (Photo: Vepar5 via Shutterstock)Democrats are traversing the 4th Assembly District, seeking support in the sprawling district that stretches from the Bay Area to Sacramento and even further north into the Sacramento Valley and North Coast mountains. The big money from Sacramento hasn’t dropped in yet and might not, depending on whether special interests feel they have a candidate they really want.
The attitudes of voters. Illustration by Niroworld, via Shutterstock.Friday night, my wife Jodi got home after a long week. Trying to decide what we should do, she flipped through some channels, looking at the networks, a couple sports channels, a few news channels, HBO and Showtime, and then finally announced “I don’t think there’s anything good on TV, let’s go see a movie.”
Rough&Tumble's Jack Kavanagh, right, stops by the Capitol Weekly podcast in our new, high-tech audio booth. (Photo: Tim Foster)Rough &Tumble’s Jack Kavanagh stops by the lavish offices of Capitol Weekly for a chat with John Howard and Tim Foster about journalism, the internet, and why you won’t find The Economist on R&T.
A homeless woman sleeps on a park bench in Santa Monica. (Photo: Joseph SohmStuck in the limbo above the federal poverty level yet below adequate income streams to make ends meet, these “hidden poor” are often a forgotten demographic. Why is identifying the “hidden poor” so important? On average, their health is much worse than their wealthier neighbors – and thus more expensive to treat – yet they are rarely included in health statistics.
Cardboard cutouts at the state Democratic Convention. (Photo: Capitol Weekly)Capitol Weekly’s John Howard and Tim Foster chat about California politics, including the state Democratic Party’s convention, forgotten assets, the possible end of Daylight Savings Time and more.
A scientist works in a biological laboratory. (Photo: Anya Ivanova, via Shutterstock)A new stem cell company that targets cancer by unleashing an “eat me” trigger has emerged from a $30 million investment by the state of California. Creation of the Palo Alto firm, which is called Forty Seven, Inc., was announced Feb. 24 by its backers and its key researcher, Irv Weissman, director of Stanford University’s stem cell program.
A view of the main floor at the state Democratic Party convention in San Jose. (Photo: Alvin Chen/Capitol Weekly)First, take 3,000 political junkies, mix in a few dozen ambitious politicians, stir thoroughly. Let simmer for three days and — Whee! — you have California’s Democratic Party Convention. It was an earnest carnival reflecting what makes California politics so much fun.
Stock vector illustration, via Shutterstock.With the release of official voter registration numbers this week, the focus has been on the continued decline in Republican registration and growth in Independent voters. The stories, for the most part, treat these two factors as directly related, like two ends of a see-saw. As Republicans lose ground, independents grow and common wisdom within California’s political class jumps to the causal link. However, looking closer at the data, there are two significant factors that should temper this quick rush to judgement.
Morro Rock. (Photo by Alex Matthews, Capitol Weekly.)I’ve slept just three hours in the last 48, but I’m wide awake. I got off my second job at 1 a.m. Wednesday morning and woke at 4:30 a.m. to make the trek down from San Francisco to Morro Bay in time for the Feb. 10 Coastal Commission meeting. At 8 a.m., I was making good time down U.S. Highway 101 when one of my tires blew out near Paso Robles.