California Faultline

NATIONAL

Last weekend a group of progressive Democrats issued a symbolic “no endorsement” for congressman Howard Berman and Henry Waxman for not being more aggressive against “the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and efforts to impeach Vice President Dick Cheney” and votes on the Iraq war. Both incumbents are running unopposed in the June 3rd primaries. [Daily News]

STATEWIDE

A new bill introduced by state Sen. Ron Calderon, D-Montebello would allow drug companies to purchase access to medical records so they could remind patients to refill prescriptions. [Long Beach Press-Telegram]

California Attorney General Jerry Brown is going after H&R Block for allegedly duping customers into believing they’re receiving instand refunds instead of what are actually high interest, short term loans. [KNBC]

The State of California is denying $100/day reimbursment to a Buena Park man wrongly convicted of a carjacking and sentenced to ten months in state prison because he had plead guilty in lieu of a potentially stiffer sentence. [LA Times]

LOS ANGELES

Kathryn Nack, who was Mayor of Pasadena from 1987 to 1995, passed away. [Pasadena Star-News]

On Wednesday at 4pm, ANSWER LA is coordinating a protest outside of the Military Recruiting Station at 7080 Hollywood Blvd. [LA Indymedia]

LA Times blogger Kareem Abdul-Jabbar has a Q&A with Barack Obama.

A federal public integrity unit of the U.S. Attorney’s office has been disbanded in Los Angeles, possibly due to their investigation of Rep. Jerry Lewis’ ties to lobbyists. [LA Observed]

Mayor Villaraigosa encouraged the L.A. City Council to approve the increases in the  DWP’s water rates by 6.2% and electricty by 8.5% to make improvements on the crumbling infrastructure. [KNBC]

LOS ANGELES

Two L.A. City Councilmembers are publicly butting heads over how to handle gang intervention funding - Tony Cardenas is vehemently against Laura Chick’s plan to pass control from Council to the Mayor’s office. [LA Times]

The City of Paramount relaunches its brand new $20,ooo website with a high tech feature unavailable since it first launched in 2001: email links to city council members. The site also has a searchable database of city laws, event listings, and news items. [Long Beach Press Telegram]

Most of the students at Pasadena’s Wilson IB Middle School are pro-Obama and are ‘”antagonistic’ toward the Bush administration.” [Pasadena Star News]

Gov. Bill Richardson keynotes and Gen. Wesley Clark headlines Tuesday’s conference “on how the U.S. should act toward ‘rogue states’” at UCLA’s Ron Burkle Center for International Relations. Other speakers include Former Foreign Minister to Thailand Kantathi Suphamongkhon, Kal Raustiala, director of the Burkle Center; Henry T. Wooster, and deputy director of the Office of Iranian Affairs at the U.S. State Department. [event info]

SAN DIEGO

The ACLU has filed a complaint against San Diego Mayor Jerry Sander, saying a Feb. 25th report on last October’s wildfire failed to address the need of minorities who didn’t understand warnings that were only sent out in the English language. [SignOn San Diego]

The controversial private military outfit Blackwater Worldwide has dropped plans to build a training base in east San Diego County after discovering gunfire tests exceeded county noise limits. [SignOn San Diego]

SAN FRANCISCO

The San Francisco Chamber of Commerce is hoping Mayor Newsom will veto a plan to “place human-shaped bronze markers” at the site of every homeless death in the city. [LA Times]

Speaking of Mayor Newson, he’s considering a run for governor in 2010, joining an anticipated race between “Attorney General and former Gov. Jerry Brown, former state Controller Steve Westly and Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.” [San Francisco Chronicle]

Did you know all California state employees are required to sign a loyalty oath? The pledge was added in 1952 at the height of anti-Communist hysteria.

Mariannne Kearney-Brown, a Cal State math instructor, was fired last month after refusing to sign the oath, concerned with wording pledging to “defend” the California and U.S. constitutions “against all enemies, foreign and domestic” could mean taking up violent arms.

Feeling that her religious rights were being violated, Kearney-Brown, a Quaker, filed a grievance that made its way to the state Attorney General Jerry Browns office, where a statement was drafted clarifying that the oath “does not carry with it any obligation or requirement that public employees bear arms or otherwise engage in violence.” In turn, Kearney-Brown signed the oath, and has been re-hired.

[source: Los Angeles Times]

(more…)