Fresno Bee Opinion Talk

The Associated Press just moved a breaking news bulletin: WASILLA, Alaska -- Spokesman: Sarah Palin is resigning as Alaska governor on July 26.

I will update when we hear anything else.

UPDATE: Here's a link to our story.

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin said Friday she is resigning from office at the end of the month, raising speculation that she would focus on a run for the White House in the 2012 race.

The former Republican vice presidential candidate made the surprise announcement from her home in suburban Wasilla on Friday morning. She said she would step down July 26 but didn't announce her plans.

"Once I decided not to run for re-election, I also felt that to embrace the conventional Lame Duck status in this particular climate would just be another dose of politics as usual, something I campaigned against and will always oppose," Palin said in a statement released by her office.

I just posted the American Flag at my house, since this is the beginning of the Fourth of July holiday weekend. I took this photo with my cell phone. The Flag looks kind of cool with the early-morning sun slicing through the shadows, and a slight morning breeze bending the stripes on our glorious Flag.

On the Fourth, we're going to have a barbecue, and then watch fireworks around the neighborhood. What are your holiday plans? Share them with Opinion Talk readers in the comments section of this post. Some of you took us up on the offer of tickets to the Fresno Grizzlies's game. There will be a huge fireworks show after the game. What are the rest of you doing?

On Saturday, the actual holiday, we'll run the Declaration of Independence in place of our editorials and letters to the editor. That's been a tradition for the past several years. I love reading the document, and being reminded about what our founders were up against as they declared our freedom and started a revolution. The final line of the Declaration is one of my favorites. The signers were people of means and they had a lot to lose, including their fortunes and their lives. Here's that final sentence:

"And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor."

This slideshow, called "Johnny the Bagger," is very inspirational. It was sent to me by my roommate.

According to the website that posted it, Walk the Talk.com provides resources for personal and professional success.

The governor's office offered this video from a legislative session to show that the Democrats aren't serious about the budget crisis. This was sent to me this evening from the Schwarzenegger press office in response to the blog item earlier in the day on state Sen. Dean Florez criticizing Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on budget mess.

"I think this is inexcusable," Schwarzenegger said. "How do they explain this to the California people? In the midst of the biggest budget crisis, we are having a debate about cow tails. Ask the Legislature to stop debating about cow tails and let's do the budget."

The Florez responded with this statement:

Senate Majority Leader Dean Florez, D-Shafter, called on Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to "stop tweeting his obsession with cow tails and start tweaking the Budget to move us toward a solution."

While Florez has been meeting with Senate leadership to negotiate a Budget that would allow the state to avoid issuing costly IOUs, Schwarzenegger has been repeatedly posting on Twitter to mock legislation aimed at ending animal cruelty -- which California voters identified as a high priority with their overwhelming support of Proposition 2.

State Sen. Dean Florez, D-Shafter, and the Senate majority leader, issued this statement about the state budget and issuing IOU's to pay state bills:

The Governor's cavalier attitude toward the state issuing IOUs under his watch is certainly a game-changer in the current effort to bridge the gaping $24 billion dollar hole in the state's finances.

In a nutshell, under the governor's IOU plan the state pays vendors and others it owes with the equivalent of a post-dated check that is good for the face value of the amount owed plus interest. IOU recipients, for the most part, "sell" their IOUs to a bank for the face value of the check for quick cash.

The bank holds onto and then redeems the IOU at a later date, earning millions of dollars in interest.

This type of borrowing is nothing like pulling out the state's credit card to pay the bills. Rather, this is more like the state going down the street and getting an expensive payday loan.

The Governor's payday scheme not only makes California the laughingstock of the credit markets, but it unnecessarily puts a black eye on the state's long-term credit rating.

This means that, for years to come, millions of taxpayer dollars get shoved into the pockets of Wall Street bankers every time we issue long-term debt to build schools or roads, or other needed public projects. Somewhere in the neighborhood of $6 billion dollars in additional interest alone will be added to the cost of selling bonds that voters have already approved.

Fresno Mayor Ashley Swearengin is getting nervous about too much dancing in Fresno restaurants and has ordered new rules involving the practice. This a quote from a member of the mayor's staff: "Crime peaks when there's dancing."

I'm not sure how to react to that statement, so I'll start with a paraphrase of a quote from one of my favorite movies: "I'm shocked, shocked to find that dancing is going on in here.". . . And then maybe my reaction would be: "Stop me before I dance again." Unfortunately, I'm not much of a dancer, but a lot of Fresno residents are. . . But they better stop it. It's making the adults at City Hall raise their eyebrows. Sounds a lot like the script to the movie, "Footloose."

By the way, I love that dancing scene in the warehouse in "Footloose."

Of course, with restaurants going out of business all over Fresno, this dancing thing won't be an issue for long. Besides, how dare the restaurants try to stay in business a little longer by encouraging patrons to stick around after dinner to dance, and maybe buy a cocktail or two. We have our rules in Fresno, and we don't care if they hurt our economy.

Bee columnist Joan Obra explains the dancing issue in this column in today's Bee.

Here's part of what Obra wrote in her column:

If you dine, drink and dance, it's time to pay attention to Fresno City Hall.

That's because the city is working on a policy that would change Fresno's nightlife. Under the new rules, you could dance only in nightclubs, not restaurants or bars. And you couldn't linger late at night in their parking lots.

Why would the city do this? Well, city planners say some restaurants pushed the rules too far.

Faced with sliding sales, restaurants drummed up business with drinking and dancing. After dinner, they shut the kitchens, brought in music and made room for dancers, turning restaurants into nightclubs.

Then came noise, fights and calls from angry neighbors -- resulting in police officers trying to control the impromptu clubs.

If Assembly Member Mike Villines has to be in Sacramento because of the state budget stalemate, he might as well hold a fundraiser for his run for insurance commissioner next year. Our colleagues at The Sacramento Bee report that the Clovis Republican is taking in a little baseball along with campaign cash.

Villines' campaign for insurance commissioner is holding a $2,000-a-head fundraiser at tonight's Sacramento River Cats game in West Sacramento. The River Cats are playing the Fresno Grizzlies so we know who the assemblyman will be rooting for. The opening pitch is at 7:05 p.m. You still have time to drive up there.

If there's a mid-game budget vote in the Assembly, Villines can slip out and head to the Capitol, which is only a few minutes from the ballpark.

I don't have a problem protecting endangered species as long as there's a balance between human and environmental needs. Right now the balance has tipped to the environmental side, at least when it comes to water for agriculture.

But I can't understand why farm water is targeted by environmentalists and government scientists and sewage dumped into the Delta is ignored. If something harms endangered species, shouldn't that draw the attention of the regulators? It seems there are two standards at work here.

"Each day up to one billion gallons of partially treated sewage is dumped into Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and its associated waterways," says the Coalition for a Sustainable Delta.

So the environmentalists and the government agencies look the other way when it's the cities of Sacramento and Stockton and others polluting the fragile Delta.

The Coalition for a Sustainable Delta calls it the Great Delta Toilet Bowl because of all the sewage that's being dumped into the Delta. The coalition says this is especially harmful to the Delta smelt.

Here's more from the coalition Web site:

"The Sacramento region is by far the largest polluter and each day discharges over 146 million gallons of partially treated sewage. Contained in this wastewater are significant concentrations of ammonia. On a monthly basis, Sacramento adds 125,000 gallons of ammonia to the Delta -- far more than any other source. These discharges are believed to have a significant impact on the delta smelt and other threatened and endangered species."

If the Delta smelt is being harmed by this dumping, the practice should be halted immediately. Who in their right mind thinks that dumping sewage into a waterway is good for the fish living there?

Save the fish. Shut down the sewage dumping of Sacramento, Stockton and 11 other communities.

At least there will be one-liners during Senate speeches, even if the public's work seldom gets done. Al Franken is a United States senator. Everybody gets a copy of his book, "Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot."

Read about the latest -- and final -- chapter of the 2008 Minnesota Senate race here:

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) -- Democrat Al Franken says he's "so thrilled" to finally be celebrating a victory after nearly eight months of recounts and courtroom fights in Minnesota's Senate race.

Franken spoke in Minneapolis on Tuesday soon after Republican Norm Coleman conceded the election. Coleman's concession came after the Minnesota Supreme Court said Franken should be certified as the winner.

Franken says he's "thrilled and honored by the faith Minnesotans have placed in me." He says he can't wait to get started, and believes he'll be sworn in next week.

Franken says he expects to sit on a few Senate committees, including Judiciary. That would put him in place to take part in Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation hearings.

I've stayed largely silent on the entire issue since Michael Jackson's unexpected death last week. But this latest news just makes me angry. According to CNN, Michael Jackson's body will return to his Neverland Ranch on Thursday morning for a public viewing Friday.

People have a wide range of emotions about Jackson. Some consider his contributions to American pop music comparable to Elvis, the Beatles. There are those who never stopped loving and admiring him. Then there are those who liked him for a time, maybe even years, but had to turn away when it all got a little too creepy.

In Mike Osegueda's tribute column, he says that when he thinks about Michael Jackson, he doesn't think about the performer. He thinks about the memories of things that happened in his life against the backdrop of Michael Jackson's music:

I think about riding shotgun in my mom's car while we sang along to "Billie Jean" playing in the cassette player.

I think about my dad playing "Thriller" and "Off the Wall" on his record player.

I think about going to the mall one day and coming home with a cassette copy of "Bad" -- one of the first pieces of music that was mine.

I think about how when my cousin died, "Rock With You" played at his funeral.

In no way do I mean to diminish the meaning of those memories for Mike or for all the people who have been devastated by Jackson's death. Believe me, I FULLY get the impact music can have on our memories.

I just know there are some memories that overshadow everything else. Memories that can poison a soul for a long, long time, muting music and everything good.

I believe Jackson was a child molester. Yes, he was never convicted, I know. I don't think most child molesters ever are.

A long time ago, someone touched my life the way Jackson touched the lives of his victims. That man died a few weeks ago. I've made peace with my memories. But new anger flares inside of me upon hearing that Jackson's body will be put on a pedastal one last time.

It makes me sick that his body will be put on display like royalty, like a dead president. No matter what his musical achievements may have been, I think his crimes overshadowed that part of his life.

May his victims rest in peace.

What is it about this development in central Fresno that has such odd twists by those who are supposed to save it?

Now Kirk Vartanian, the Fresno businessman who is trying to revive Granite Park, is in Fresno County jail after being accused of threatening a woman with a knife and trying to suffocate her with a pillow. He also is wanted in Las Vegas for allegedly passing about $250,000 in bad checks at two casinos. Bail in both cases is more than $660,000. Click here to read the latest Bee story on Vartanian.

Now the financial company holding the paper on Granite Park thinks the retail and recreational center on Cedar Avenue between Ashland and Dakota should change its name. Granite Park has had so much bad publicity that it needs rebranding, says Martin Boone of OMNI Financial of Santa Cruz. OMNI has foreclosed on a $22.4 million loan and took possession last week of most of the 24 acres at Granite Park.

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled in a 5-4 decision in the New Haven, Conn., case that white firefighters in New Haven, Conn., were wrongly not promoted because of their race. This is the controversial case that involves Judge Sonia Sotomayor. The Supreme Court nominee was on the other side of the case as an appeals court judge.

This is from the New York Times: "New Haven was wrong to scrap a promotion exam because no African-Americans and only two Hispanic firefighters were likely to be made lieutenants or captains based on the results, the court said Monday in a 5-4 decision. The city said that it had acted to avoid a lawsuit from minorities. The ruling could alter employment practices nationwide, potentially limiting the circumstances in which employers can be held liable for decisions when there is no evidence of intentional discrimination against minorities."

Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote the majority opinion. He was joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Samuel Alito, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas. The dissenters were Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, David Souter and John Paul Stevens. Ginsburg wrote the minority opinion.

Sacramento Bee columnist Dan Walters says the California prison system is the fastest-growing segment of the state's debt-ridden budget. It's also by far the costliest prison sytem in the nation, with the state spending $45,000 a year on each inmate.

Here's more from Walters:

Given their high costs, one might think that our prisons would be very commodious and successful in rehabilitation. But they are terribly overcrowded, so much so that a federal judge may order inmate releases. The system's recidivism rate is among the nation's highest, as are its costs of supervising parolees. And prison health care is so bad (despite its $14,000 per inmate annual cost) that a federal receiver has been put in charge and he wants to spend much more.

It's a case study in political dysfunction, with penal policies being made in a highly charged atmosphere, with the union representing prison guards wielding way too much influence over those policies, as well as their own compensation, and with politicians' pandering to the union and public emotion rather than doing their jobs.

Maybe it is time to turn the operation of the state's prisons over to a private firm. The state obviously doesn't do the job very well.

It's been disappointing so far to see Interior Secretary Ken Salazar deal with California water issues. But he gets another chance today to show that the Obama Administration is serious about finding water solutions for the region. Salazar will bein Fresno for a hearing on the contentious water issue.

The Bee's editorial board offers its suggestions to Salazar in today's main editorial. Click here to read the editorial.

Here is part of what we said:

We would like to see a balanced approach to the highly contentious water issue from the Obama administration, and hope Salazar has learned from his early missteps on this issue.

It will take cooperation from the state and federal governments to resolve California's water crisis because of the overlapping jurisdictions and the need for state and federal funding to build the needed water infrastructure. We hope the Salazar visit begins that cooperation