Here’s a look at the best and worst performances of the week in California politics.

Gubernatorial Groupies

Winner: Jerry Brown. L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s announcement that he will not enter the 2010 governor’s race gives a boost to erstwhile Boy King Brown, seeking to become the first person to be both the youngest and oldest person elected California’s chief executive. One of the first politicians to recognize the coming political power of Latinos, the attorney general is well-positioned to capture the bulk of Villaraigosa’s cultural and geographic political base.

Loser: Gavin Newsom. Strategists for the 41-year-old San Francisco mayor insist that Villaraigosa’s withdrawal gives them exactly what they wanted all along: a two-man race focused on generational change against the 71-year-old Brown. But a new L.A. Times poll shows Newsom sucking wind big-time in L.A. Worse news came in the form of a sordid sex scandal, involving Nevada Republican Senator John Ensign, which carries echoes of Newsom’s own messy affair with the wife of his closest adviser a few years ago.

Senatorial Dis-Courtesies

Winner: None.

Loser: Dianne Feinstein. DiFi, who portrays herself as a policy wonk standing above the messy money-grubbing of politics, stepped into a big puddle of political embarrassment when aides sent out invitations to lobbyists for a fundraising lunch that all but put a price tag on her committee assignments. The invite said the menu would include: “The Select Committee on Intelligence for the first course, followed by your choice of Appropriations, Judiciary or Rules committees,” a case study of the kind of soft-core influence peddling that’s a daily occurrence in Washington. Feinstein cancelled the lunch after it got publicized, to “avoid misunderstanding.” Right.

Loser: Barbara Boxer. Boxer made herself instant fodder for TV comics when she went all diva at a committee hearing, demanding a military officer who was testifying address here as “Senator” instead of “Ma’am.” Republicans seized on her self-important display as evidence of liberal contempt for the armed forces, while those who knew her when she was just another supe schlepping zoning decisions in San Rafael could only shake their heads at how she long ago forgot where she came from.

Budget Follies

Winner: The California Commission on the 21st Century Economy. With Sacramento bogged down in yet another tiresome round of partisan finger-pointing over the state’s budget deficit, a tax reform commission appointed by Gov. Arnold and Speaker Karen Bass has moved quietly and efficiently towards sweeping recommendations to revise California’s Industrial Age tax code. Given their assignment, the commission’s final report will no doubt have something for everyone to hate; it also will have pose real solutions to the problem of boom-or-bust tax collections that swing wildly along with the business cycle.

Loser: Barack Obama. At a time when the U.S. government is generating debt at the speed of light, the president and his posse condescendingly dismissed California’s plea for loan guarantees to get the state through a looming cash crunch. The guarantees wouldn’t cost the Treasury a dime and, as Joe Matthews noted at foxandhoundsdaily.com, California taxpayers now effectively subsidize the feds, with only 80 cents in federal funds returned to the state for every dollar sent to Washington.

Media Mavens

Winner: Timm Herdt. As the governor and Legislature slash billions from schools and the most vulnerable people in California, the Ventura County Star’s man in Sacramento churned out a well-reported piece detailing $2 billion worth of corporate tax cuts that got slipped into the budget behind closed doors. Day in and day out, the veteran Herdt is one of the toughest reporters in the Capitol, and his “95% Accurate” (blog) is a must-read for keeping track of what Central Coast lawmakers are up to in the River City.

Loser: CNN. A revolution is unfolding in Iran, unemployment’s soaring, and the epic battle over health care is joined in Washington, but Wolf Blitzer’s heavy breathing big exclu this week is…the mayor of L.A. is not running for governor of California. State political junkies, all 112 of us, were glued to the sets for Wolf’s sloppy wet kiss interview with Tony V., but the rest of the nation, probably not so much. And “the most trusted name in news” wonders why it’s losing the battle on cable.

Capitol Letters thanks all our contestants for playing.

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