1. Ensign

2. Sanford

3. Palin

4. All the people in the G.O.P. and the conservative movement who enable #1, #2, and #3.

5. A political party that bases its entire social policy on the Book of Leviticus.

6. A political party that preaches free market conservatism but spends as much money as libs.

I remain profoundly skeptical of Obama and his policies, but the G.O.P. and conservatism are utterly bereft of intellectual and moral credibility. At best they are embarrassingly erratic and incompetent, at worst they are outright hypocrites who couldn't properly supervise a one-car funeral.

Disagree vehemently with Obama (and on economics and foreign policy I do), but right now he and his crowd are The Stable and Rational Party.

Lincecum's dominance is truly something to behold...he's in a Hersheiser-like zone at the moment...I remain pleasantly astonished by the Giants' prosperity...

The Celts put the fullcourt press on one Rasheed Wallace to join Gang Green for the '09-'10 campaign...I bet it happens...when KG himself participates in the lobbying, you know they're serious...

If we know anything about Boston's Finest Franchise, they always get their man...

How is THAT going to work? I don't see him and Kobe co-existing harmoniously...

Marbury has departed the Celts after his stint as an overpriced, underperforming sub. Good riddance. I predict he winds up a Warrior or a Clipper...

...that there are scarier things out there than an Obama Administration...

"When did the GOP become such a bunch of quitters? Whatever happened to the party of Larry Craig and his you'll-never-take-me-from-this-stall-alive spirit?"

-Bruce Reed, Slate

Sarah Palin's surprise resignation from the Alaska governorship is the latest jolt to the G.O.P. in particular and conservatism in general. Palin will exit the Governor's Office three weeks from Sunday.

The Dodgers slugger appears to be further proof of what a libertarian country this is at heart...The man got a thirty game drug suspension, and he's returning tonight to adulation and reverence...

A whole generation of baseball appears to be exonerated...at least in the court of public opinion...

So when will Rose make into the Hall of Fame? Shoeless Joe?

Today, the California Supreme Court unanimously upheld the death sentence for Richard Wade Farley. I was in high school when Richard Wade Farley murdered several people in my hometown of Sunnyvale, California. I was in high school TWENTY YEARS AGO!!!...

Farley did his deed in 1988. It took the courts four years to convict him and sentence him to death. It has been seventeen years since the man was sentenced to death for crimes he plainly and indisputably committed. Relatives of Farley's victims have passed away in those seventeen years, but Farley is still walking around breathing. Today's ruling by the California Supremes only means that we have 3-5 years of further appeals before he might possibly see the business end of a needle.

Which brings me to my rhetorical question...What is the point of having the death penalty if there's a 20-25 year lag between sentencing and execution? Why spend the money on this system with so little to show for it? It's an expensive exercise in futility. What kind of catharsis can be had by anybody when there's literally a generation between sentencing and execution?

Speaking to a gathering of teachers in San Diego today, Education Secretary Arne Duncan called for the creation of a system of "merit pay" for teachers. Such a system would be based in part on students' test scores.

Just as an opening aside, there's absolutely no need for the Department of Education. It was part of the great legacy of lameness left behind by Jimmy Carter in the late 70s. Reagan came to office swearing to get rid of it, but somehow he never got around to consigning it to the ash heap of history like he promised...but that's another story...

The fundamental issue here is merit pay for teachers. The reason that merit pay for teacher is intrinsically unworkable is that it is an attempt to apply capitalist principles to an inherently socialist system. Think about it.

That's basically why merit pay will never happen. It just won't work. So we should stop talking about it. It's an operational non-starter.

By sending the Marines into battle today in Afghanistan, Obama has shown that he has learned absolutely nothing from the misbegotten nation-building of the Dubya Era. Just as we pull out of one quagmire in Iraq, Obama entangles us in another...this time in The Graveyard of Empires.

Nation-building never works out well for us, counterinsurgency is an oxymoron, and we really don't have the money for any more of this nonsense.

Unless the continental U.S. is under invasion, we need to refrain from anything resembling a war for at least a generation. By then perhaps we'll have paid off the costs of the current fiascoes.

According to the Associated Press, missile experts here in the U.S. think that the North Koreans are using old Soviet missile parts for their rocket program...

I knew there was nothing to worry about...

I used to have this poster in my classroom that showed God's Other Son, Larry Joe Bird, diving for a loose ball. Beneath the picture was the caption, "It just makes me sick when I see guys just watching the ball go out of bounds...you gotta leave it all on the floor..."

That's a maxim that applies far beyond the NBA (although they could sure use a reminder) to life in general...

"San Francisco is 47 square miles surrounded by reality."

-Gavin Newsom

You said it buddy...make that your slogan next year...

I see where Arnold is now lambasting the labor unions as the source of the state's current fiscal jackpot.

There may be more than a little veracity in such an assertion, but what does that buy him? Shouldn't the rhetoric be more conciliatory at this point? Talk like that is only going to antagonize the other side and prolong the standoff...

Unless of course the goal all along has been to have the feds step in and bail us out...wait for things to get so bad that Obama has to jump in just to save his own political future...

There's nobody out there...NOBODY...the leading contender at this point is Romney, and that's largely by default...

It's not just that the bench isn't deep...there's NO BENCH!!!...

Maybe Pawlenty out of Minnesota, but aside from him, there is no talent,no bright potential out there...

From "The Streets of San Francisco" days, Ruthe Stein in The San Francisco Chronicle writes...

"Once, when the series was shooting in Chinatown, a teenage boy was hit by a car. Mr. Malden immediately jumped in to assist, holding up traffic until an ambulance arrived. A gathering crowd thought it was a scene from the show."

Mick La Salle in today's San Francisco Chronicle...

"The fact that Karl Malden broke his nose twice guaranteed that he would never be a leading man,but the look helped define him in ways that helped him as a character actor. Malden was really at his best when playing off the humble-man appearance...there would come a moment when the audience would suddenly see past the Everyman looks. And there, suddenly revealed, would be someone shrewder, more observant, and more formidable than they expected---someone with the dignity of true intelligence."

Nicely said.

Reading this morning's San Francisco Chronicle, it's no wonder most Californians are unperturbed by the issuance of IOUs by the state government. Even most Californians who depend on Sacramento for a regular check are utterly unaffected. Consider the following quote from this morning's article...

"California plans to begin issuing billions of dollars in IOUs today to scores of creditors, including private businesses and county governments."

"The move will not affect many individuals who receive government assistance. Low-income people, the elderly and the disabled will receive their regular checks on schedule. Schools, state workers, Medi-Cal providers, pension funds, and In-Home Supportive Services are all protected by law from receiving an IOU in lieu of a real check."


The bold-face emphasis is mine, not the Chronicle writer's...

I am impressed by how little the California public cares about the fiscal abyss into which we've fallen. Most Californians are impressively indifferent to the bleeding budget and the two parties' obstinate bickering over how to halt the hemorrhaging. I should know. I live with one of the indifferent.

There are three possible reasons for the public's general nonchalance on this issue...

1. They are utterly paralyzed with grief over the passing of the King of Pop.

2. They are totally unaware of the definition of a budget and the existence of state government.

3. Like my wife, they refuse to take the bait and get anxious about an inconsequential charade.

My wife's batting record in assessment of these crises is pretty much 1000, but I still think that there's a significant percentage of Californians for whom Reasons #1 and #2 apply.

The combination of ever-escalating insolvency and intransigence in Sacramento reinforces my conviction that this fiasco we call a budget process will climax with federal intervention. Today's revelation of a federal threat to seize control of the state parks if Sacramento tries to close them is but the first step in what will ultimately be an Obama usurpation of much of state government.

The G.O.P. will not yield on taxes and the Dems will not yield on spending. With the State Capitol degenerating into The Western Front circa 1916, California's economy will sag further, keeping the rest of the nation securely anchored to the ocean floor of recession. This, Obama cannot have. With the rising tide of national joblessness likely to crest at 10% this Friday, Obamanon will be under the gun to produce real recovery, or a reasonable facsimile thereof, in time for The Fall Classic, a mere sixteen months away. In short, a California that is utterly dead in the economic water plays all sorts of hell with his entire agenda, indeed, his very political survival.

I suspect that Obama will allow the trench warfare of California state politics to persist for another two weeks, three at the most. If there is no resolution at that time, he will direct Geithner to open the federal cash spigots in the direction of The Golden State.

But what about all of the other states with budget woes of their own? Won't they have a plausible case for similar federal munificence? Sure, but they won't get any.

How will Obama and Geithner get around that sticky political thicket? Easy. They'll construct a public fiction that all sorts of onerous conditions are attached to California's bailout, and that California will have to pay a steep political and economic price for accepting such federal aid. The effect will be to make California's acceptance of federal aid appear to be a most unappetizing option for other states, without ever really imposing any substantive penalties on The Golden State. A major bit of sleight of hand? Sure, but greater cons have been contrived in far more desperate circumstances.

The Feds are coming...I'm calling it right now...I'm nominating myself for The Nostradamus Award, right here and now.

Looks HILARIOUS!!!...Eager for its release...

I'm going to end my homage to the Late Great Karl with my favorite Malden moment...it's an especially powerful scene in one of the towering cinematic masterpieces of all time...as a crusading blue-collar priest in "On The Waterfront," Malden's Father Corrigan confronts the Mob's violent dominion over the New Jersey docks...in this particular clip, a longshoreman has been brutally murdered by the Mob after he dares to speak out against their reign...Father Corrigan's scorching eulogy rouses the conscience of Marlon Brando's Terry Malloy...

Just superb...

As you'll see, the 70s were scary times for tourists...fortunately, there was Karl Malden, his reassuring fedora, and American Express travelers' checks...

Keeping the streets of SF safe...one of the greatest opening sequences in the history of television...

The reassuring face of American Express for two decades...

Well that was faster than I had anticipated...Helen Thomas, hardly a paragon of conservative journalism or opinion, jumped ALL OVER the Obama Administration for their stage management of the news, contending at one point that Obama was worse than Nixon when it came to trying to control the press...

You know you're in trouble when CBS News AND Helen Thomas double team you with jagged queries about "pre-packaged questions."

No mention whatsoever of the passing of Karl Malden...MJ, Farrah, and Ed McMahon all get inches on the nation's Tabloid of Record, but not this giant of stage and screen?

Shame, Drudge...

The great Karl Malden passed away today at the ripe old age of ninety-seven. He was a stellar film actor for years, winning an Oscar in "Streetcar Named Desire," and probably should have won another two for "On The Waterfront" and "Patton" (his performances were excellent, but more importantly, he held his own against the two all-time cinematic divas, Marlon Brando and George C. Scott). For a man with a distinctly bulbous nose ( he once quipped that his nose alone qualified him for handicapped parking), he got a lot of superb mileage out of Hollywood.

However, for me, Karl Malden will always be the curiously cool old guy from "The Streets of San Francisco," and the American Express commercials ("Don't leave home without it.") in the '70s. Sporting a trenchcoat and a fedora throughout the 70s, he still came off like a badass...the seemingly genial grandpa clenching a pair of brass knuckles...

It is a low day...let us pay homage to the great Karl Malden...

God is punishing Spike Lee for all of those nasty, blasphemous things he's said about Larry Bird and the Boston Celtics...

At long last, we are leaving Iraq. Let our departure from Mess-o-potamia mark a departure from the utopian folly of nation-building.

Today Iraq, tomorrow Afghanistan. No more nation-building, no more utopianism, no more Lawrence of Arabia flights of fancy.

We have no more economic means to throw away in pursuit of impossible ends.

A prelude to taking over the entire state?...Hmmm...

Worst governor of California...ever? Gray Davis held the title, but after the last several months, Arnold has overtaken The Gray Ghost on Herbert Hoover points...

Let the Schwarzenegger Administration be a lesson to us all...recall elections buy us absolutely nothing...

Could Jerry Brown be any worse the second time around as governor of California?

Might he be improved this time around?

He's incredibly smart, experienced, and above all else, sane...and for that reason he has no chance of being nominated by the anemic cult that is the California G.O.P.

In about forty minutes the state of California will be insolvent. In a spectacular manifestation of dysfunctional governance, the richest state in the richest nation in the world is less than an hour away from utter bankruptcy, both literally and figuratively.

After Obama bails us out to save his own political skin, the Governor and the entire Legislature should resign and leave the state in shame.

I understand that Mark Sanford wants to get a lot of things off his chest, that he has things that he really wants to say, but for the love of God man, DON'T babble your inner angst and lovelorn yearnings to AP REPORTERS!!!

Sanford's political and marital suicide would have probably faded from attention by today, had the Palmetto State governor not invited a reporter and his tape recorder to witness and record him pouring a fresh gallon of kerosene on himself and striking a match. Thus, the story gets another couple of days of media attention with memorable quotes like, "Maria is my soulmate, but I'm trying to fall in love with my wife again," or "I've crossed the line with other women."

Good stuff for hour-long sessions with your therapist in a sound-proofed room, but when it's sprayed all over the Internet via the Associated Press, it exacerbates the not inconsiderable damage that you've already done to the political party and philosophy that you've professed to support these many years.

The GOP needs to take up a collection to immediately spirit the Governor out of the country and deposit him in the Andes where he can wander like Heathcliff, loudly lamenting the loss of his soulmate. Somebody apply a tourniquet to this human hemorrhage, please...

Glanced at the standings the other day, and the Giants are serious playoff contenders! When the hell did that happen?

"Entourage" is just good, reliable, decadent fun. I'm amazed that they've been able to sustain the quality of the show and maintain its consistent humor over six years. Most shows run out of gas after five years, but "Entourage" is the warhorse of HBO, producing an amazingly entertaining program that showcases sharp writing and the incomparable talent of Jeremy Piven.

Sure, it's mostly guy humor, but it's stellar nonetheless...

For over three decades, the GOP has enjoyed handsome political profits by harnessing its fortunes and its platform to the passions of religious evangelicals, henceforth described in this post as "The Theocrats." Obsessively preoccupied with what they dub "traditional values," the Theocrats have been the dominant faction in the Party of Lincoln, T.R., and Eisenhower since their ascendancy in late 1970s, elbowing aside the economic libertarians and good government reformers of earlier decades with their insistence that American society be ordered along the lines of The Old Testament (or at least, some particular remembrance of 1950s America). The energy of this faction paid great electoral dividends for Reagan (ironically our only divorced president) and The Bush Dynasty.

In their continuous genuflection to the menu of demands put forth by The Theocrats, the GOP finds itself in a philosophically schizoid condition. On one hand, Republicans tirelessly preach the virtues of economic freedom and minimal government involvement in the marketplace (while admittedly increasing the size, power, and intrusiveness of the federal government to a level of bloat that is as obscene as it is epic). The Republican economic message of the last thirty years can be condensed to seven words: when in doubt, cut taxes and deregulate.

On the other hand, the party that tells government to back away slowly from your wallet is the same party that argues for policing individuals' behavior in the name of Leviticus. They rightfully deride the government's competence to manage the marketplace, but they shrilly urge government regulation of private lives and behavior. To be governed by such a philosophic cognitive dissonance is plainly unsustainable. Ask Newt Gingrich. Or John Ensign. Or Mark Sanford. The party is buckling under the weight of its own moribund and contradictory thought.

Liberty can be defined in an eight word sentence that any preschooler can comprehend; leave me alone, and I'll leave you alone. It is infinitely more flexible in the face of human frailty and desirable in day-to-day living than societies constructed by mullahs, popes, or Puritan elders. In order to restore its status as a credible alternative to Obamanon's Second Great Society, the GOP needs to be a party that stands for liberty, not theocracy.

The sloppy, sordid mess that is the Sanford affair is more than just the implosion of another G.O.P. contender for the throne in 2012. It goes to the core of the Republicans' current problem. They have no plausible public identity. Or rather, their public identity has been exposed as fraudulent. Indeed, Sanford is the penultimate expression of the intellectual and emotional bankruptcy of the Grand Old Party and the conservative cause that it purports to uphold and defend.

From an ideological and policy point of view, Dubya's eight year reign utterly eviscerated the party's claim to the mantle of small, limited government. Pretty much from start to finish, Dubya expanded the role of the federal government to elephantine proportions, launching all manner of utopian enterprises that proved as costly as they were unworkable. From No Child Left Behind to The Patriot Act to Iraq and the mirage of democratizing the Middle East by bayonet, Dubya took the federal government (and the party that followed him fanatically) into bold new frontiers of unnecessary and unsustainable activity. 43 capped off this legacy of utopian slop with bailouts of banks and auto companies that were (by his own admission) totally at odds with Free Markets 101. Then he sauntered out of office, leaving the party's future and the nation's finances a shambles.

There is a symbolic connection between Sanford's meltdown and the rapidly eroding fortunes of his party and ideology. As governor, Sanford railed against accepting Obamanon's stimulus funds to the states, then collapsed and caved in. Sanford wanted to be a poster boy for small, limited government and traditional family values, but like Dubya, the rhetoric was woefully at odds with his operational reality.

The G.O.P. can't pretend that Sanford is an isolated issue, that his individual woes don't reflect deeper, more pervasive problems for the party and its philosophy.

The question for the G.O.P. and conservatism in the days and months ahead is what does it truly stand for? What can it honestly advertise itself as BEING without being exposed as a hypocritical fraud shortly thereafter?

Obama is clearly bent on doubling down on Dubya's Big-Government binge. Do the Republicans want to offer a clear and honest alternative? Do they want to be the party of economic liberty? Do they want to be the party of sober, balanced, adults?