The speculation about what will happen with political redistricting later this year is in full swing, with the latest exhibit offered today by GOP analyst Tony Quinn over over at the Fox & Hounds Daily website.

The only problem is that the Census Bureau hasn't yet released its data for California, so all this speculation is so much shooting in the dark. The bureau has begun releasing state-by-state data, one state at a time over the last couple of weeks. So far, the numbers-crunchers are taking care of the easy ones first -- the small states. Although the bureau did release Illinois data yesterday, so the states on its checklist are getting larger. Everyone expects that California will be last, since it's the largest state and therefore requires the most work to prepare. That data must come by the end of March.

Only then will anyone be able to offer any intelligent speculation.

That being offered so far is based on data from the Census Bureau's most recent American Community Survey, a report that reveals a great deal of demographic information but is not a count. The neighborhood-by-neighborhood data provided in the American Community Survey provides a rolling average of population over the last 5 years. Given that the greatest recession since the Great Depression hit in the middle of that, along with an uprecedented housing and foreclosure crisis, it's a very safe bet that the population picture on April 1, 2010 (Census day) will be significantly different from what a rolling average over the previous five years would show.

ACS population numbers cannot be used, as the state's top redistricting data diva, Karin MacDonald of the Statewide Database at UC Berkeley asserts, to draw prospective districts or make conclusions about possible redistricting scenarios.

"You might as well call Miss Cleo on the Psychic Hotline," MacDonald said recently of those who try to use ACS data for such purposes.

Her advice: Be patient. There will be plenty of time to go crazy with the numbers once they're actually released next month.

Working in California's Capitol, one hears a great deal of overblown political rhetoric about what makes the state good ...
-- Innovation
-- The California Dream
-- Diversity
-- A can-do spirit

... and what allegedly makes it bad ..
-- Too many taxes.
-- Too much regulation.
-- Illegal immigration.

It turns out that when you ask ordinary Californians what makes their state good or bad, however, the responses don't match the rhetoric.

In its recent online survey of more than 1,000 representative state residents, the reform group California Forward asked respondents to type into a box whatever came into their heads on those questions. It then ran the data through a word-counter and produced a chart with all the words that had the most mentions. The more mentions, the bigger the word.

The word Californians most used to say what is good about their state: WEATHER.

And the top word among the bad: TRAFFIC.

A couple possible conclusions: The state economy is not going to fall completely apart as long as the sun keeps shining here and the snow keeps falling almost everywhere else. And, it's not going to take off until somebody figures out how to eliminate freeway gridlock.

In October, even as Republican Mike Stoker was campaigning vigorously and proclaiming that the 35th Assembly District race in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties could be competitive, Democrat Das Williams was confident enough of victory that he contributed $78,500 to other candidates and to the state Democratic Party.

Final campaign finance reports on state races were filed this week, and they show that Williams during that final month of the campaign contributed $57,000 to the state Democratic Party, $3,900 each to the campaigns of five other legislative Democrats around the state, $1,500 to the United Farm Workers PAC and a combined $750 to two local candidates, including Oxnard Harbor District Commissioner Jason Hodge.

During that same month, Stoker took in $60,000 from the state Republican Party. In addition, the Ventura County Republican Party chipped in $28,000 on Nov. 22, after the race was over.

During all of 2010, the two candidates in the area's most expensive legislative race combined to spend $1.6 million -- $1.2 million by Williams (most of it in his contested primary race) and $400,000 by Stoker.

Williams may have had a nervous moment or two at the end, however. Between Oct. 29 and Nov. 1, he received $45,000 in contributions from two county Democratic committees (Sacramento and Stanislaus), perhaps indicating that those last-minute independent expenditures by business groups on behalf of Stoker made him think twice about the money he had given to the state Democratic Party early in October.

Less than a month into office, Gov. Jerry Brown has asserted his penny-pinching ways on state government through a variety of moves. He's ordered the number of state-issued cell phones for state employees cut by half, he's ordered that the state non-emergency vehicle fleet be cut by half, he's eliminated the Office of the Secretary of Education and the Office of the First Lady as part of a wholesale downsizing of the governor's office.

He made clear in remarks to reporters after last night's State of the State address that there will be more to come. He asserted that the actions he has taken so far have been "more than symbolic," but also indicated that more substantial government-streamlining proposals are on their way.

For example, he said, "There are agencies that can be merged ... I'm working on it."

Expect some rather dramatic proposals within the next six weeks or so, as Brown continues to take highly visible steps designed to both streamline government and also to show voters that he's serious about changing how Sacramento does business.