Kamala Harris Becomes California AG

After a tough campaign in which she was targeted for defeat by none other than Turd Blossom himself and narrowly won, Kamala D. Harris had the last laugh as she took the oath of office as California's Attorney General on Monday.

Harris was sworn in front of a star studded crowd that included incoming Lt. Governor Gavin Newsom, Los Angeles mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Sacramento mayor Kevin Johnson, the California legislative Black Caucus and California senator Mark Leno (D-San Francisco).    

The daughter of an Indian cancer researcher mother and a Stanford University economics professor father from Jamaica made history with the win by becoming the first woman, the first African-American and the first South Asian to become California's Attorney General.

In her speech she not only called herself a daughter of Brown v. Board of Education, she talked about Chief Justice Earl Warren.

Like Harris, he started his career in the Alameda County Prosecutor's office, later became California AG and eventually ended up on the Supreme Court as its Chief Justice in 1953.

The Warren Court from 1953-1969 produced the grioundbreaking legal decisions that expanded civil rights and civil liberties to the disgust of conservatives.  

"It's often said that a good prosecutor wins convictions. But a great prosecutor has convictions. Chief Justice Warren put it this way: "Everything I did in my life that was worthwhile, I caught hell for."

So to my fellow Californians, I say: In the coming four years, and in the continuing work of the Attorney General's office, we are going to do whatever it takes -- and catch hell if necessary -- in the cause of protecting and defending the lives and livelihoods of all Californians, by moving beyond the status quo."

The former San Francisco DA is off to a good start in the catching hell department.    Many law enforcement organizations in the state opposed her election, and the conservafools in California already hate Harris for stating during the campaign she wasn't going to defend Prop 8 and her opposition to the death penalty. 

She made it clear in her inauguration speech that she wanted to be not only 'tough on crime', but 'smart on crime' as well.    Unlike the conservalie that's being spread, Harris would not only prosecute violent criminals, but also wants to use an approach she pioneered as the San Francisco DA to focus on job training, drug rehabilitation and education in order to decrease recidivism rates and eliminate the overcrowding of expensive prisons.

“We have accepted a fundamental misdiagnosis of the problem. We treat crime as a monolith with a one size fits all solution instead of recognizing that our approach in the overwhelming majority of non-violent offenders is failing badly.”    

Conservatives also fear Kamala Harris' rising political star in California and national politics.   They are terrified of the prospect that if the personal friend of President Obama is successful in keeping her campaign promises, she could one day like Chief Justice Earl Warren, the man she's role modeling, become California's next governor, US senator, a Supreme Court Justice or the Democratic nominee for president in 2016 and beyond.   

And it would be a great benefit to California and the nation if she did.

Congrats Madame Attorney General.