Next Up – a dramatic reading of A.B. 390: We’re pretty sure that no more than 5,999,950 of Jay Leno’s 6 million viewers were totally baffled when they tuned in to catch Lady Gaga Monday night and instead became eyewitnesses to history, as the gov made his really, really interesting announcement about California’s potentially, possibly, maybe new Lieutenant Governor.
Straightening out their sock drawers, our news department crew was sorry to miss the broadcast – but damn glad they did once they read the transcript of the painfully stagy Leno-Arnold byplay. Fortunately Dr. Hackenflack, a big Lady Gaga fan, was on the scene to provide live blog commentary on the event:
Leno: Let me ask you, what are you going to do about a lieutenant governor? We don’t have a lieutenant governor now. We haven’t had one for a while. Are you going to appoint another one? (A totally spontaneous question!)
Arnold: Absolutely. (Duh)
L: When are you going to announce that? (Wink, wink, nudge, nudge)
A: Well, we can do it right here. (What the…?)
L: You’re going to announce it right here? (I’m shocked – shocked!)
A: Yeah, exactly. Why not? (Who says my delivery’s wooden?)
L: You picked somebody? (Enough already with the build-up)
A: Yes. I’m going to… (Zzzz…)
L: Is it me? (Only good line of the whole schtick)…
A: I mean, I was planning to do it tomorrow. (Oy)
L: Don’t wait until tomorrow. (Zzzz II)
A: So why not? We have already a tradition. I announced my candidacy right here on the show. (What an amusing, unconventional fellow I am!)
L: That’s right. (Gee, I almost forgot).
A: So why not announce the lieutenant governor? So it will be Senator Abel Maldonado ––(Huh?)
L: Wow. (Wow is right – no wonder this guy’s ratings suck).
Props for T
he Flash: Jon Fleischman, who may be the hardest working blogger in show business, scooped the world at 4:09 p.m. Monday, citing “one of my better ‘insider sources’” to post the first report unconditionally stating that Gov. Schwarzmuscle had picked Maldonado for Lite Gov.
Having broken the news, the resourceful Fleischman immediately lurched into full advocacy mode, crafting a killer second graf for the ages:
Somebody get me a barf bag.
An hour later, perhaps chastened by switching to decaf, Fleischman thought better of the nanosecond honeymoon he’d accorded Maldonado with another post, this time offering heartfelt and sincere best wishes with a piece headlined “Congrats to Abel Maldonado.”
Two old white guys left standing at the altar: So Carly Fiorina was scheduled to call Calbuzz for an interview Monday, but her handlers stiffed us at the last minute with a murky explanation about some supposedly late-breaking, double secret probation type emergency development thingie.
We were pleased to see, however, that iCarly was not so in distress that she bypassed a Beltway breakfast session with the crew of the conservative American Spectator. Philip Klein’s post on the affair is well worth reading, if only for the challenge of trying to follow the rococo twists and turns of her extended riff on abortion rights.
On other issues, primary foe Chuck DeVore, R-Sirloin, jumped all over her statement that she would have voted for Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, while Mrs. Chuck tweeted exception to Fiorina’s comment that she’s a stronger GOP bet by virtue of not being “a white male.”
Asked why she is a better candidate than her Republican primary opponent Assemblyman Chuck DeVore (R-Calif.), Fiorina said that a woman stands a better chance of defeating Boxer.
“With all due respect and deep affection for white men – I’m married to one – but (Barbara Boxer) knows how to beat them. She’s done it over and over and over again.” Uh, really?
Among those who might take offense at her comment are:
1-The entire base of the California Republican Party.
2-Michelle Malkin, shrill harridan of the GOP’s Glenn Beck wing, who bashed
her for an “identity-politics driven campaign.”
3- Matt Fong, the former state controller who lost to Boxer in 1998 and is decidedly not a white male.
To summarize: Hurricane Carly would have been better off calling us.
Reads of the week: Washpost media writer Howard Kurtz may be a walking conflict of interest and self-important windbag, but he churned out a helluva’ piece this week, a splendid 2,500 word feature on Emily Miller, a former Hou
se aide who got caught up in the Jack Abramoff scandal and whose personal history is a moral lesson in the dangers of tempting fate with blind Beltway ambition.
We also liked the Oracle of Cruickshank’s smart piece over at Calitics of how California was 25 years late to the New Deal, and an insightful column by Russ Douthat, a strong successor as NYT house conservative to the insipid William Kristol, deconstructing the anti-intellectual strains of Huckabee Palinism.
Today’s sign the end of civilization is near – The Klingons draw close.
