Morning Briefs on the Los Angeles Political Machine for Thursday

When Los Angeles City Clowncil Central Committee Strongman Herman "Mini Amin" Wesson wants to increase dialog on a given Committee (especially when it involves raising the Minimum Wage), he simply names himself to it.

LA City Clowncil Central Committee Strongman Herman "Mini Amin" Wesson.

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Wendy Greuel Makes the DWP Drool

Another great viral video from the folks at the NearChaos Blog!

Wendy Greuel grants raises to DWP. DWP's union bankrolls Greuel campaigns. DWP raises your utility rates to pay for it all (in the form of de facto taxes). 

The DWP's union boss expects more raises for DWP after negotiations next year (LATimes 2/16/13). Possible rate increases are in DWP's financial plan for 2014, 2015 and 2016 (LATimes 9/25/12). Does anyone know why DWP is exempt from pension reform City Council passed last year? (LATimes 1/29/13)

Kevin James Discusses Pension Crisis with John Stossel

Candidate for Mayor of Los Angeles, Kevin James, recently appeared on the John Stossel program on the Fox Business Channel. Topic of the day was the coming fiscal disaster to hit California due to public employee pensions. Also of note, is that the LA City Council are the highest paid in the nation. Wow.

Watch the video...

Indeed, it's Sort of a Hotsheet!

Paul Krekorian's "Letter-Gate" scandal has ended the days of his every so often column at Studio City Patch. Following disclosure that a letter from a "constituent" asking a question and praising the Second District Councilman was actually not from a real person and a fabrication of his Press Chief, Jeremy Oberstein, the AOL owned property has now demoted the Krekorian column to the "blog" section of Patch, user provided content that is about a step below Facebook postings.

Phil Jennerjahn is telling us "We told you so."

Labor maven Madeline Janis is whining about former Mayor Richard Riordan's pension reform efforts. Her screed is that the former millionaire mayor's administration was fraudulent and ineffective, which is probably true to some extent, and that any "development" successes such as the Staples Center, Hollywood and Highland, etc. were the result of deals done between union interests and developers. Poppycock. It is indeed Riordan's brand of crony capitalism and clueless Downtown LA mentality, partnered with the thuggery of LA's union establishment that is responsible for a dearth of successful development in LA and the City's slide into fiscal collapse and over irrelevance.

Los Angeles County is cutting staff and shuttering several courtrooms as part of a cost savings measure. Among those closing include legendary courthouses in Beverly Hills and Malibu, where a number of high profile celebrity cases have been prosecuted with the likes of famous troublemakers Lindsay Lohan, Robert Downey, Jr., etc.

Morning Briefs on the Los Angeles Political Machine for Hump Day

What happen to our former bloggin colleague Ed (Headington)?

Big things in politics await those who blog at Mayor Sam. In recent memory, the likes of Zuma Dogg, Phil Jennerjahn, Jim Alger, Walter Moore, Michael Higby and this blogger, have parlay their bloggin expertise into campaigns for public office. Now another former bloggin colleague, media consultant Ed Headington, is running for Assembly in the Republican 38th District. 

 Ed is a nice guy and very much respected in the political community for his media consulting. But lets be realistic about Ed chances in this red district that is currently served by Assemblyman Cameron Smyth. Voters in this district are not going to run to the polls to vote for someone who worked for Assemblyman Gil "One Bill" Cedillo and who would be the anglo incarnation of his former boss, if elected. Thus, Ed has to resort to tire (but still funny) political gimmicks, such as the "missing candidate on the milk cartoon". But Ed knows a thing or two about "disappearing".

In the CD 14 City Council Election of 2011, then CIty Councilman Jose Huizar Campaign Manager Michael Trujillo, send out this repugnant, insensitive, bile email to campaign staff and others. If you refer to the list of recipients above, notice the blank space, to the right of "Eric Hogenson", what name was deleted and why, is a political story to be continue ....

** OTHER NEWS:

** The LA Weekly's Gene Maddaus goes in search of evidence of an impending Developer Rick Caruso for Mayor Campaign. The results of his search are reported here and regurgitated by The City Maven.

** The likes of IBEW's Boss D'Arcy, S. David Freeman, Ari Swiller and the City of Los Angeles General Fund, are the lucky ones to benefit from the 11% of DWP rate hikes pass by the City Council yesterday.

** Memo to the likes of EAA, SEIU 721, AFSCME, IBEW, PPL and UFLAC, when are the brothers and sisters going to admit that Mayor Tony Villar, screwed your rank and file big time? In addition, you had 14 supposed allies vote to create a two-tier retirement system for new employees. One can see the late Miguel Contreras rolling over his massage table in disgust..

** Former City Controller Laura Chick can't let go of the fact that City Attorney Carmen Trutanich, beat her and successor The Valley Greuel in court, But then most objective political observers could blame eight years of Mayor Tony Villar, on her.

Your thoughts ..............

Scott Johnson in CD 14