The California Donnybrook: Start the Popcorn Machine

I have a good conservative friend who has lived in Washington, DC most of his adult life, where he is a registered Democrat, so that he could vote for Marion Barry in Democratic primaries, on the theory that “if you can’t have effective government, at least you can have entertaining government.”

That’s how I’m starting to feel about the Democratic horse race to replace Babs “Don’t Call Me Ma’am” Boxer out here in California. (Though just to be clear, in calling it a “horse race,” I know of no actual horses who have yet indicated their interest in running in the Democratic primary, but it’s only a matter of time, because diversity. Hey, it worked for Caligula didn’t it?)

There’s lots of talk in the media about how Jerry Brown and our two old ladies in the Senate have obstructed the upward political mobility of so many striving Democrats in the next generation, most of them members of sainted minority groups. Expect as this gets going for the organized minority groups to insist that it is their turn to have the Senate seat (because diversity). And so we’re going to see the infighting inside the entitled Left turn vicious before it is over. Start the popcorn machine!

Former LA mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is said to be interested in running, and also Rep. Loretta Sanchez. Mixed-race (and therefore a two-fer) Attorney General Kamala Harris has indicated she may make the race. Lt. Governor Gavin Newsome, perhaps the leading white guy Dem in the state, will probably take a pass and run for governor in 2018 instead. So is there another white guy anywhere who might make a serious candidate? Ah yes, Tom Steyer is thinking about it. I think he’s going to be surprised when he finds out he doesn’t have the proper melanin privilege for today’s Democratic Party.

But he will deliver lots of comedy gold in any case, such as his comment to the Puffington Host a few days ago that “People rail that democracy has been subverted to powerful economic interests, that ‘we the people’ have been overlooked. Based on what I have seen over the last several years, I fear there’s some truth in that charge, and that scares me—badly.” “Powerful economic interests”?—from a billionaire who spent $100 million trying to influence the last election? I’d say “that’s rich,” but the irony would be too obvious, even for a liberal.

Instead, I may have to start yet another Power Line award, which I’d call “The Tom Steyer Self-Awareness Prize.” Nominations open.

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