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The small but plucky band of professionally cursed MSM types who were forced to spend their weekend covering the California Republican Party convention could only gaze with wistfulness and savage jealousy to Washington, where two colleagues had scored one of the best gigs on the political beat: a road trip with Jerry Brown.

Oh sure, the Sacbee’s David Siders and Anthony York of the By God L.A. Times seemed hampered at the start because nearly every one of the dozen events on Governor Gandalf’s schedule for the National Governors Association meeting was “closed press.”

But as your Calbuzzards learned back when giant fleas were still tormenting dinosaurs as the Earth cooled, just hang with Brown for awhile and he’ll do something weird enough to head off any rude questions the suits might otherwise raise about your expense account (which reminds us of Old Chronicler Kevin Leary putting in for $500 worth of “refreshments with pilgrims” while accompanying the late Pope John Paul II from Rome to the start of his 1987 U.S. tour. But we digress).

So it was that the resourceful dynamic duo of the California press corps came up with a couple of Jerry-being-Jerry yarns that not only provided stories to dine out on far into geezerhood, but also won each a share of this week’s “If You Don’t Like the News Go Out and Make Some of Your Own” Little Pulitzer award. (h/t Scoop Nisker.)

Siders got things rolling Friday night with a swell piece that began with some understated snark about the press being banned from an event at the friggin’ Newseum (Mission statement: “educate the public about the value of a free press in a free society,” ha, ha) ferhevvinsakes, an absurdity which he apparently propounded to Brown clearly enough that Krusty tried to help the quick-witted newshound crash the party.

“You can come in,” he said. “Just come in and see what they say about that.”

Brown was persistent – “He can just walk through a little bit and get a smell of it,” he said – but the association had already spoken, and Brown’s wife and special counsel, Anne Gust Brown, suggested to her husband that with so many other governors present he could not change the rules.

So on his iPhone 4S, Brown consulted Siri.

“Should this meeting be closed to the press?”

Siri said it didn’t see any meeting about that.

Gust Brown translated: “She doesn’t think there’s a meeting about ‘Be closed to the press.'”

“Brown consulted Siri.” Can you believe they actually pay people to write this stuff? Siders’ video report is here.

Moonbeam meets Moonie: Next on the road trip hit parade was the governor’s encounter with an unfortunate and pathetically unprepared reporter from the Washington Times, to whom he provided a classic Brown drive-by dressing-down, of which California media types long ago learned to be wary.

The transcript of the exchange included in York’s richly detailed report is worth reproducing in full, not only to have it ensconced in our incomparable archive,  but also to note for the record the mad dog contribution of street fightin’ man Gil Duran:

Reporter: Gov. Brown, you’ve gotten criticism that you’ve ceded…
Brown: I’ve gotten criticism? Only from the Washington Times…
Reporter: I understand that you’ve gotten some criticism that you’ve ceded way too much to the unions.
Brown: Give me an example.
Reporter: As far as the education, teachers unions, and just as far as some of the contracts that have been negotiated, that you could be making the same mistake that you made in your last administration…
Brown: Which one was that?
Reporter: … Back in the day.
Brown: When California had a $6-billion surplus and was leading America, if not the world, in many different fields?
Reporter: Well, right now it’s going bankrupt.
Brown: That’s untrue. I’ve reduced the deficit that was left to me by a Republican governor from $26 billion to $9 billion and I have a plan to reduce it to zero.
Reporter: So you’re saying that the reason that California is going bankrupt is…
Brown: No, that’s not true. We’re going far. I mean, we’re doing quite well.
Duran: You need to ask a question that’s based on the truth.
Brown (to Duran): You don’t have to argue with her…
Duran: No, S&P just upgraded to positive. That’s not bankrupt.
Reporter: No, actually, because when Reagan came in later on, things actually changed.
Brown: No, Reagan came before me. Reagan came after my father and then I came after Reagan.
Reporter: And then you actually lost your term thereafter, no?
Brown: No, I’m the only Democratic governor in history to serve three terms. In fact only two governors have ever served a third term.
Reporter: So why is it then, that we’re seeing from the bankruptcy though…
Duran: There is no bankruptcy. That’s a lie. You’re lying.
Brown: California has a $2-trillion economy.
Reporter: Why am I a liar?
Brown: Last year… Are you a Moonie by any chance?
Reporter: Sir…
Duran: And your facts are totally wrong. I can prove it to you.
Brown: Because your incisiveness is kind of suspect. Anyway. California, the economy is doing better, it’s coming back. The private economy added $90 billion, and that feeds into the public sector as well. There are deficits because there’s been excesses in the last decade, brought on principally by the mortgage bubble and breakdown. And we’re now cleaning up after that mess. It does take a while to do that. I’d say we’re on a very positive course. Not as rapid as I would like, but the trajectory is all in the right direction.
Reporter: Thank you, sir.

“Are you a Moonie by any chance?” Not just “Are you a Moonie,” mind you, but “Are you a Moonie by any chance?” God we love this business!

Convention remainders: While Siders was hobnobbing with Beltway swells, erstwhile partner Torey Van Oot was stuck with wing nut double duty, conscientiously prowling the halls of the fashionable Hyatt Regency (VROOOM!) San Francisco (VROOM!) Airport (VROOM!) and keeping a watchful eye on Calbuzz as we stealthily pursued a red-hot rumor that Tom Del Becarro and Callista Gingrich share the same hairdresser.

Not a total loss: For unstinting effort, Van Oot takes home the Calbuzz MVH (Most Valuable Hack) Award for total convention coverage.  Incessantly tweeting, posting online and filing for the dead trees edition, the Flying Non-Dutchwoman was indefatigable, and receives high honors for being the only journo who actually covered Tim Pawlenty’s Saturday night banquet snooozzze speech, and Sunday’s intraparty feud over the…wait for it… GOP platform.

The MVF (Most Valuable Flack) Award meanwhile goes to Mark Standriff, the hardest workin’ man in show business.

The CRP’s former communications chief, Standriff reveled in his new gig as an independent political consultant, doing the double hustle on behalf of Difi wannabe, the elusive Elizabeth Emken, while simultaneously executive producing the party’s much-ballyhooed “town halls” for left-handed Lithuanian mimes and other such demographic subsets, not to mention serving as the Voice of God, making the loudspeaker introductions of party swells.

Program note: Standriff is well qualified for that last assignment, having served as PA announcer for the mighty Sacramento River Cats. We’re looking forward to his intro of Manny Ramirez when Man-Ram drops by Sacto for a cup of coffee sometime this summer on his way to the Oakland A’s, the ‘Cats parent club. Couple of boxes right behind the home dugout will do us, bro.

Enough to make a hog puke: In a week when GOP mullah Rick Santorum issued a new fatwa complaining that the late President Kennedy’s famous speech on the separation of church and state made him want to “throw up” (keepin’ it classy, Rick!), the CRP kicked off the weekend with a Friday banquet invocation that included the following language:

“Help us unite that we may take over the White House,” the minister said during the prayer, concluding with, “We ask this in Jesus Christ’s name, Amen.” Father, forgive us, for we know not what we do.

A wild and crazy party:  Sharon Day, the co-chair of the Republican National Committee, gave a report to the delegates that included an update on RNC finances, making it very clear that former party chairman Michael Steele left the cupboard bare when he was voted out of office in January 2011.

Day said the party’s new leadership has raised $51 million since then, and also cut a lot of dough from the RNC budget.  While she pointed to the great benefits of firing people – “we laid off half the staff,” she said, a trifle  too enthusiastically – Day inexplicably made no mention of what reductions, if any, were made in Steele’s entertainment budget.

We can only presume that she and RNC chief Reince Priebus blue-penciled Steele’s recruiting trips to West Hollywood lesbian bondage strip clubs.

Key convention quotes:

“I think the party’s going to have to find a way to address this issue to be able to grow.”
–Rep. Kevin McCarthy, the Republican House Whip and one of the few sane electeds on scene, when Calbuzz asked him how the GOP can attract Latinos without a policy providing a pathway to citizenship for illegals.

“Which one of you guys is gonna ask the question with the words “serial adultery” in it?”
–Jon “Flash” Fleischman, offering suggestions for our interview with Newt Gingrich.

“I personally think Dianne Feinstein has no intention of finishing her term.”
–Rep. Darrell Issa, predicting without a shred of evidence that Difi is running for re-election only so she can immediately resign and Brown can appoint her successor