Opinion

Appointed statewide officials have a dismal record in California, something Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s lieutenant governor-designate may want to remember. California can finally stop holding its collective breath: We have a lieutenant governor-designate. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger announced on Monday’s “Jay Leno Show” that he was appointing state Sen. Abel Maldonado to the job vacated by now-U.S.…

So, former eBay CEO Meg Whitman has decided she wants to trade on-line flea-market trading for the governor’s office of the largest state.  In one fell swoop, no less.  She’s never run for office before at any level. Truth to tell, I’ve never actually met Whitman.  I did, however, run the campaigns that beat the…

In “Twelfth Night,” Shakespeare reminds, “Youth’s a stuff will not endure.” But given what has been happening to the Republicans among the youngest voters, their resulting electoral problems could indeed endure for 20-30 years. On November 4, the youngest cohort of voters, 18-29, gave Barack Obama a blow-out 66-32 win. It was by far his…

Many of my down-in-the-mouth Republican friends, contemplating the ongoing implosion of John McCain’s campaign, are consoling themselves with the idea that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin represents the future of the party. She’s the new rock star in the firmament of the Grand Old Party, they’re convinced — and she certainly will be the presumed favorite…

The celebrated 18th-century English sage “Dr.” Samuel Johnson once said, “Every old man complains of the … petulance and insolence of the rising generation.” See any evidence of this aphorism in the apparent — and increasing — disdain of John McCain toward Barack Obama? (Hints: Obama as Britney Spears or Paris Hilton? The Obama “Audacity…

Political consultant Mark Penn came in for a lot of outrage last week when a March 2007 strategy memo for Hillary Rodham Clinton’s campaign surfaced. In it, Penn suggested exploiting Barack Obama’s “multicultural, diverse” boyhood as a “very strong weakness.” According to Penn, Obama’s ties to “basic American values and culture are at best limited.”…

Now that it’s obvious Sen. Barack Obama will be the Democratic candidate for president, GOP nominee-apparent Sen. John McCain and the Republican attack machine predictably have already started in on the Illinois senator as a callow youth with scant foreign policy experience and a resultant na?ve view of the world. Hillary Clinton herself tried that…

While the once-imperiled California condor has made a striking comeback, there is another ailing bird in the state that should probably be considered for the endangered species list: California Republicans. As the 2008 Republican presidential contenders turn their sights toward California on Feb. 5, they might want to take stock of the sorry state of…

I have watched with interest as Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez has been pummeled over his use of campaign funds to pay for foreign trips and their related costs. I didn’t accompany Nunez on his travels, and hence don’t know the purpose of all the expenditures. But I do have enough firsthand experience in this area to…

Will the Terminator-turned-the-Governator turn into the Sen-â-tor? Although I can’t predict the ultimate outcome, I suspect the former muscleman will indeed take on U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer in 2010. The standard line among Republican insiders is that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, accustomed to being on center stage as a bodybuilder, movie star and governor, would never…