In California, both the State Senate and the State Assembly are trying to move as many bills as possible before this November’s election.  This is the exact opposite as the U.S. Congress.  A major difference is that the California legislature is controlled by Democrats with a Republican Governor.  Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is up for re-election himself and is making a few moves of his own.  He joined Democrats in supporting and signing a bill designed to cut fossil fuel emissions by 25% over the next 14 years.  By doing this, he  pre-empted challenger Phil Angelides’ pending strike on his (Schwarzenegger’s) stance on the environment.  Was the bill a good idea?  We will wait and see.  There is a nice clause in the bill allowing the state to remove certain restrictions on the companies it affects at any point in time.  Personally, I believe they will be forced to remove some as the bill itself may prove to be extremely harmful to a large group of companies besides the oil and energy companies which is what the bill was targeted to reform.

The main bill I was watching was SB 1437, said California public schools may neither teach nor sponsor any activity that "reflects adversely" on anyone because of their sexual orientation.

Schwarzenegger vetoed this bill due in part of its lack of clarity as well as its pointless nature.  The author of the bill state Sen. Sheila Kuehl, a lesbian, tried to re-work the bill in order to get certain language out of it.  Needless to say, what ended up on the Governor’s desk was a vague and somewhat manipulated version of the original which actually wanted to make teachers teach about gay and lesbian leaders in America.  Not for what they accomplished as Americans, but basically, bringing forth the fact they were gay first and foremost.

According to the Campaign for Children and Families, a conservative advocacy group that lobbied against the bill, SB 1437 would have altered K-12 public education textbooks, instructional materials, and school-sponsored activities "to positively reference trans-sexuality, transvestitism, bisexuality, and homosexuality, including homosexual 'marriage.'"

What worried me most is that they wished to discuss this lifestyle with children as young as 5; even a child as young as 12 should not be exposed to this concept in school.  I wrote about this several months ago when the bill cleared the assembly.  You can find this article here (http://calrepublicans.blogstream.com/v1/p13.html)

‘Equality California (EQCA), a homosexual advocacy group that led the push to pass what it calls the "Bias-Free Curriculum Act," described the bill as a simple nondiscrimination measure.’

Bias-Free?  I do not recall the school textbooks ever mentioning specifically that George Washington ‘WAS NOT GAY’ let alone a teacher mentioning in a class ‘today we will learn about how a bill becomes a law, unless it’s a bill about homosexuality, which is just plain wrong’.

No, there is no bias in not teaching about homosexuality.  The argument against this bill is simple.  Alternative lifestyles that certain people live should be kept private from children.  There is no need to educate our children in the classroom on what these lifestyles are.  This is up for the parents to decide.  Once the children grow up it is up for them to decide what lifestyle to lead, regardless of what I or other conservatives may believe is right or wrong. Unfortunately, its their lives. It certainly should not be engraved into their brains when they are trying to learn 2+2 or what the capital of Montana is.  These ridiculous bills represent another waste of time in government.  If both the Assembly and the Senate worked harder on true education reform, preventing this massive drop out rate that is occurring in public schools all over California, as opposed to wasting everyone’s time with this so-called ‘Sexual Indoctrination’ bill, perhaps our state and even our country would not be considered the 25th smartest in the world below even a 3rd world country in the list. (Based on international testing)

There is state law in California that prevents discrimination in all forms.  "I am vetoing this bill because the vagueness of the term 'reflects adversely' would not strengthen this important area of legal protection from bias based on sexual orientation,"  Schwarzenegger said in his veto message.

By vetoing this, was this Schwarzenegger’s move to rally a major conservative base?  He is already leading in the polls by over 13%.  There are still 2 more bills out there that need a veto, AB 606 and AB 1056.  If he does veto them, which he should, more conservatives will look forward to more family and faith based initiatives to come and more than likely go to the polls to vote for him as opposed to staying home.