Capitol and California

If today's parents accomplish anything, it's to teach our daughters that there is nothing any man – including the president of the United States – could say to diminish them.

On one covert video, farm workers illegally burn the ankles of Tennessee walking horses with chemicals. Another captures workers in Wyoming punching and kicking pigs and flinging piglets into the air. And at one of the country's largest egg suppliers, a video shows hens caged alongside rotting bird corpses, while workers burn and snap off the beaks of young chicks.

Back in the doldrums of the recession, California exporters regarded China as a potential savior, a massive marketplace with an emerging middle class and a turbocharged economy.

The State Bar Court has recommended disbarment of Del Norte County District Attorney Jon Alexander, forcing the county to replace him as its chief law enforcement officer.

The firing of a former engineering supervisor for the California Department of Transportation, whose unit was involved in falsification of test data for foundations of state bridges, was upheld Thursday by the State Personnel Board.

Former Lt. Gov Abel Maldonado has secured a contribution – but not an endorsement – from one of California's most influential GOP donors as he moves closer to a possible 2014 run for governor.

In a sharp rebuke of Gov. Jerry Brown, a federal judge Friday rejected his administration's bid to end federal court control of mental health care in California's prisons, finding that treatment has not attained a constitutional level and "systemic failures persist," which are leading to inmate suicides and other problems.

President Barack Obama has called California Attorney General Kamala Harris to apologize for complimenting Harris on her looks during a Bay Area fundraiser earlier this week, White House spokesman Jay Carney said Friday.

Looking at California exports in February, what was down was actually up, according to trade experts.

Two dozen Republicans considering a run for the California Legislature are spending the weekend in class.

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama will unveil a spending plan Wednesday that he hopes will provide a compromise to the two feuding parties on Capitol Hill, offering Republican-friendly proposals – including those that cut Social Security and Medicare – tied to tax increases on the wealthiest Americans.

A federal investigation into a California legal aid group has now become a test case in how far law enforcement officers can go.

Just five months after Washington state and Colorado voted to legalize marijuana for recreational use, a poll released Thursday found that a majority of Americans now agree and say it should not be illegal to smoke the drug.

President Barack Obama was praising the bona fides of California Attorney General Kamala Harris on Thursday when he complimented Harris for something unlikely to show up in her campaign platform.

IRVINE, Calif. - In the search for a college student lost while hiking in Orange County's backcountry, things were beginning to look grim.

The rush started Tuesday when the new defense secretary, Chuck Hagel, announced that he would give back a share of his salary for each day that Pentagon employees are furloughed.

At first blush, federal bankruptcy Judge Christopher Klein appeared to give Stockton and its legal ally, the California Public Employees' Retirement System, a major victory this week.

California could collect another $1.5 billion in refunds from the energy crisis under a pair of court rulings this week, state officials said Thursday.

Gov. Jerry Brown, often uncomfortable with protocol-heavy events of the sort that will fill his schedule next week in China, said Thursday he is "excited" about the trade mission – even if a week of banquets and meetings "can be a little bit … it's not, like, exciting."

A newly upheld conviction of a former Fort Bragg soldier on charges of possessing computer-animated child porn offers several key lessons for military men and woman well beyond the sprawling North Carolina Army base.

It could become easier to fire a teacher in California: The Assembly Education Committee voted 7-0 Wednesday to approve a bill that would streamline the process for jettisoning incompetent or abusive educators.

The National Rifle Association and gun manufacturers are to blame for the "disconnect" between the broad public support for gun control and the reluctance in Congress to ban assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines, U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein said Wednesday.

California state employee retirements rose nearly 8 percent for the first quarter of this year compared with the same period in 2012, according to the latest data from CalPERS.

Making a down payment on his vow to go all in for Democrats in 2014, President Barack Obama courted well-heeled donors in California on a two-day fundraising jaunt that required him to walk a fine line: Berate Republicans too much, and Obama could put fragile prospects for achieving his second-term goals in jeopardy.

A technology long deployed on the battlefield could be coming to a farm, newspaper or police station near you.

A bill to regulate the sale of ammunition in California cleared the Assembly Public Safety Committee on Tuesday.

California's insurance commissioner Tuesday criticized another rate increase by Anthem Blue Cross, even while acknowledging he's powerless to stop it.

The first two budgets that Jerry Brown proposed after returning to the governorship cleaved deeply into California's safety net of health and welfare services serving the aged, disabled and poor.

A proposal to honor Cesar Chavez with a "California historical landmark" shortly after the state holiday named for him carries symbolic significance.

Seven people camping in trees to protest construction of a Highway 101 bypass in Mendocino County were arrested Tuesday by dozens of California Highway Patrol officers who were lifted into the trees on cherry-pickers.