What Gavin Newsom should do next

The SF Mayor had folks yammering when Maureen Dowd wrote an article in which Gavin appeared to indicate he was retiring from politics after his term expired. “This is it. God bless. It was fun while it lasted,” he said of his career, with a rueful smile. “Guys like me don’t necessarily progress very far, which is fine.”


The obvious move is for Newsom to run for Lt. Gov. He is at least considering it, although seeming to lean heavily against it according to KTVU.

If he wants to have a significant career in politics, it is the best move he can make. He's termed out as mayor, his gubernatorial campaign was a non-starter, no other logical races for him to get in to.

The current Dem contenders, Janice Hahn and Dean Florez, aren't exactly setting the world on fire. Hahn's biggest campaign coup so far is getting the endorsement of Ed Begley Jr. And Florez's biggest achievement is that he has no ties to Ed Begley Jr.

According to the Fresno Bee:

• Lieutenant governor: Florez reported raising $229,747 in the second half of 2009 and has $957,381 cash on hand. Democratic primary opponent Hahn, a Los Angeles City Council member who only recently entered the race, raised $420,691 and has $341,341 at her disposal.

So we are 5 months from the primary and both candidates have less than $1 million Cash on Hand. Newsom swamps them both in name rec and could easily raise that type of cash- he couldn't keep up with Jerry Brown, but Florez and Hahn he can take.

Lt. Gov is not a high profile job, but Newsom doesn't need to raise his profile. He should spend the time traveling the stay, going to all the red counties and SoCal and letting people see that he is not a fire breathing San Francisco radical (funny how many people in SF think he is  way too moderate).

If Whitman or Poizner becomes governor, Newsom is a front-runner in 4 years. If Jerry Brown wins, Newsom bides his time- either for 8 years or 4 if Jerry only runs for 1 term. Newsom would also have a great platform to run for Senate in 2012 if Feinstein declines to run for reelection (decent chance since she's 117 years old).

And with all the wackiness from Edwards, Sanford, Spitzer, Vitter, etc., the fact that Newsom slept with his campaign aide's wife is old news. Kind of.

Here's Eliot yucking it up with Colbert:

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Can Meg Whitman take a punch?

It sounds more and more like she'll be running for Governor of California. Her biggest assets will be her assets (she's a billionaire) and the fact that eBay is generally regarded as one of the great Silicon Valley success stories. Her two most likely competitors for the GOP nomination are Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner (also loaded) and former Congressman Tom Campbell. Campbell was most recently the Dean of the Haas Business School (Go Bears!) and is probably one the five smartest people I've ever met.

Campbell has long been a moderate voice within the Republican ranks and Poizner and Whitman tend to lean that way as well. It will be interesting to see if someone moves to the right or if a movement conservative candidate emerges. Maybe Moose Lady wants to move down from Alaska.

Can Meg Whitman emerge as the nominee or will she flame out like Al Checchi did in 1998?

NY Times profiles her here.