Welcome to my web log — a new endeavor for me and for the Star. It says "Politics Here and There" because the intent of this blog is to write about political happenings both in Ventura County and in Sacramento. Most of the readers, I suspect, will be from either here or there.
The blog will be a forum to report information and anecdotes of interest to political insiders and aficionados. It will consist of material gathered in the course of my reporting for articles and columns printed in the Star, but for which there is too little newsprint and probably too little general interest to accommodate in the printed version of the Star.
It will be a bulletin board, not a soap box. If you want off-the-cuff opinions, find a chat room.
The writing style will be somewhat breezier than you'll read in the newspaper, but the standards for accuracy, taste and fairness will be the same.
I hope you'll check it out and let me know what you think.
Timm Herdt
Ventura County Star
WHAT IF THEY GAVE A PRESS CONFERENCE.... AND SOMEONE CAME?
In Sacramento this week, Republican U.S. Senate candidate Howard Kaloogian, the former assemblyman and recall Gray Davis crusader, held a press conference to announce his opposition to President Bush's proposed amnesty reforms that would confer legal residency status on illegal immigrants working in the United States.
Joining Kaloogian was Ron Prince, the author of Proposition 187, who is now circulating a new initiative that includes many of the same features as the original initiative -- the implementation of which was blocked by the courts.
After the news conference, Prince repeatedly refused to talk on camera with Univision reporter Xochitl Arellano of Sacramento's KUVS. At one point he shouted at Arellano and her cameraman, "Stop harassing me."
Perhaps the Spanish-language media isn't the most important forum for Prince to communicate with potential supporters of his new version of Proposition 187, but the incident did raise an interesting question: When someone stages a news conference to speak to the press and a TV camera shows up, is that harassment?
