Governor gets to play his favorite public role
The state’s newfound multibillion-dollar budget surplus is handing Gov. Jerry Brown a golden opportunity show off his favorite public persona — the one where he’s a sober, fiscally responsible statesman.
Brown puts on a show of splitting much of the surplus between two places where it’s required to go by law: schools and the state’s rainy-day fund. He cuts a deal with the University of California to keep tuition down while potentially heading off UC’s self-inflicted pension crisis. Then he creates a tax credit for the poorest of the poor, just to show he’s not a complete Scrooge.
Had Arnold Schwarzenegger proposed this budget when he was governor, the Democrats would
be howling in the hallways.
Of course there will be some wrangling, and in the end a couple of hundred million dollars will be found to “restore” some social and health programs cut during the recession. But don’t look for Brown to approve any new initiatives that cost money.
It’s not too hard to spot a Blake Griffin or a James Harden when they’re in town to face the Warriors. But sports executives aren’t exactly a recognizable bunch, and that can make for some pretty comical moments.
I was sitting in the St. Regis bar the other night when this guy came up and asked, “Do you remember me?” “No.” “I’m Chris Wallace. We met a few weeks ago right here. I’m the Grizzlies general manager, and I’ve brought you a gift.”
And he proceeds to give me a Grizzlies jersey with the number 1 on the front and “The Mayor” on the back, plus a pair of workout pants and two pairs of socks.
“I always come out a day early when the team plays the Warriors,” Wallace said.
He just loves San Francisco. As do I, which is why the Grizzlies jersey is tucked away in my closet.
Rep. Loretta Sanchez got her U.S. Senate race off to a stumbling start. First her campaign leaked that she was in. Then she sent word that she was still undecided. The next day, she announced that she was in after all.
You don’t win a race by hitting the gas and the brakes at the same time. A move like that just makes your operation look incompetent.
Over the years I’ve repeatedly seen the smart side of Jeb Bush. Last week I saw a different side, the one that needs to listen before he speaks.
Asked by Fox News whether he would have invaded Iraq if he’d known then what he knows now, he answered, “Yes.”
Fifteen minutes later, after realizing that he had stepped in it, Bush said he hadn’t understood the question. He thought he was being asked to second-guess his brother, George W. Bush.
What Fox was actually doing was giving him an easy way out of a question that is bound to hound him throughout his presidential run. It was a softball, but he saw a curveball.
He whiffed on it.
For the life of me, I cannot understand why Mayor Ed Lee would go public with the idea of tearing down the end of Interstate 280 in San Francisco and rerouting the Caltrain tracks underground.
For starters, it could mess up the whole environmental review process for the new Transbay Transit Center, which has the tracks coming in from a completely different direction.
And it’s doing nothing but upsetting the voters in Potrero Hill and Dogpatch, who figure that all those cars that won’t have a freeway anymore will be on their streets.
According to the map in The Chronicle, the rail line would go underground at 22nd and Tennessee streets, right outside City Attorney Dennis Herrera’s home.
I couldn’t help myself. I called him up and asked, “Is your house for sale? You might want to think about it, because your new neighbor is going to be a choo-choo train.”
This being a family newspaper, I can’t print his response.
Movie time: “Hot Pursuit.” The only funny things about this comedy with Reese Witherspoon and Sofia Vergara are the outtakes during the closing credits.
The story is about a mob widow and the cop assigned to bring her in to testify. Shock of shocks, there are forces out there that don’t want either of them to make it to the courthouse alive.
It could have been funny if they’d gone totally slapstick. Instead, it’s just a slap in the face.
“The D Train” is an even worse wreck. The story revolves around Jack Black playing a guy nobody knew in high school trying to drum up attendance at the class reunion by bringing in the town’s biggest success story. In this case, it’s a Hollywood star played by James Marsden. The story turns on the two being gay for the moment, and goes downhill from there.
Had a great lunch the other day with city protocol chief Charlotte Shultz, clothier Wilkes Bashford, event planner Stanlee Gatti, ballet board member Tom Horn and Matthew Goudeau of the Chinati Foundation.
The best line came form Horn, who said: “You know, Mr. Mayor, if you weren’t here we would have a fully royal table — one princess and four queens.”