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*  Two officials on the rather obscure San Francisco State Building Authority after they had objected to the sale of several buildings on the grounds that the people who owned the buildings would have undue influence over the process.  Both were Republicans, but, you know, dissent is for suckers.

*  Also in SF, the Board of Supervisors is looking at handing $200 million of contracts on the Central Subway to a firm that hired the previous MTA executive director Stuart Sunshine. Well, there’s some nice revolving door BS for you.

*  LA County Sheriff Lee Baca’s office released 200 prisoners because they simply didn’t have room for them.

*  The corruption investigation into the failed Assembly candidacy of Jim Ayres continues. Some consultants in the Sacramento area got raided.

* Sen. Roy Ashburn is out on personal leave after the no-good awful last week he’s had.

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*  Sen. Ashburn was arrested on suspicion of DUI last night.

*  Elected officials received nearly $1 million in gifts, with the governor getting about 60% of that.

*  Timm Herdt wonders if the addition of John Perez will mean the Big 5 will be able to add some sunshine to the budget negotiations.

*  The new Speaker’s text messaging ban on the floor might be tough to enforce, but is probably good for appearances.

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*  The SF Chronicle’s Chip Johnson takes a swing at the initiative system.

*  Another foreign boondoggle, more corporate cash to run his private jet. This time, it was over $300K for his trip to the Middle East.

*  5 students were arrested yesterday at the Capitol. They were there protesting the budget cuts.

*  Remember all that BS that we did for Race to the Top funds? Well, it looks like we didn’t even make the lists of finalists. Yay, the feds got us to jump through regressive hoops for free! Good job Arne Duncan!

* thereisnospoon and clammyc did an interview with Mickey Kaus, the radical centrist who wants to primary Barbara Boxer.

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* Reaction comes in from the “inauguration” of Speaker Perez. He’s not planning on running for Mayor of LA, but will ban texts between Lobbyists and Legislators on the floor.

* Speaker Perez also plans a “more open” Legislature. He’ll be posting more on-line (yay!). And, hey, if you want to see the speech, it’s on YouTube already. Part 1 & Part 2.

*  After a successful and widely popular Winter Olympics up in Vancouver, Lake Tahoe and Reno are getting a bid for the 2022 Winter Olympics under way. I (Robert) am all for it. If nothing else it’d help improve rail links from Sacramento to Tahoe/Reno. Denver is reportedly interested in 2022 as well, but after having won the 1976 Winter Olympics and then flaking out when Coloradans didn’t want to pay for it, I doubt the IOC will give them another chance.

*  CapAlert has your guv race news roundup. Condi endorses Whitman, Poizner files, and more!

 

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*  Meg Whitman goes negative against Steve Poizner.

*  Jerry Brown plans an “eloquent announcement” for Governor.

*  If you haven’t been watching the Republican Senate primary, there’s been charges of anti-Semitism and anti-Israel being lobbed back and forth.

*  Meg Whitman opposes marriage equality.

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*  This could leave a mark: a judge ordered California to pay back wages for furloughed state workers.

*  Meg Whitman supports the water bond. Shocker.

*  Andy Pugno, the Prop 8 attorney, is running for AD-5. Only thing is that he doesn’t live in the district. But, he’s really considering it.

*  Greg Lucas looks at the finger pointing in the Legislature.

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*  Van Jones landed on his feet. He got a job at the Center of American Progress and a post at Princeton.

*  Arnold is working on an anti-obesity program.

*  The City of Beverly Hills disowned a homophobe who claimed to be representing the city. Lauren Ashley is a Carrie Prejean wannabe who doesn’t really understand her own bigoted view of the Bible. She actually didn’t win any title in the city, and lives in Pasadena.

*  Have CalPERS and CalSTRS fully divested from Iran? Perhaps not.

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*  David Lazarus has a story in the LA Times about Health Net fighting against paying for procedures that keep an LA-area man alive. It isn’t just one company or another. This is what the Tea Partiers are fighting to preserve. I wonder how they’ll feel about the system they love so much when they are in Bob Iritano’s position.

*  Poor John Yoo, now he has to freak out against pretty much anybody who criticizes him. Yesterday, the Berkeley Law professor essentially called Dawn Johnsen a partisan hack, and that pretty much anybody who disagrees with him probably also a hack. It’s not easy trying to rationalize torture and professional misconduct, and look sane. But hey, 2 out of 3 isn’t bad.

*  Now that Meg Whitman captured the Howard Jarvis Non-Taxpayers endorsement, CalBuzz asks can Poizner still compete outside of the grassroots?

* From the “reap what you sow” file, wingnut talk radio host Lee Rodgers was fired by KSFO last week because the parent company didn’t want to pay the last 4.5 months on his contract. And how is this long-time defender of corporate rapacity reacting? By getting his union involved. Once again conservatives show that progressive solutions are perfectly acceptable for themselves, just not for anyone else.

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*  At HealthyCA, Dan Weintraub reports on California’s decreasing teenage birth rate.

* More from Dan Weintraub’s Healthy CA: Medi-Cal is a value choice. Do we want to provide insurance for those under the poverty line or not? Prior to Gov. Davis, we only went to 86% of the poverty line, and then we went to 100%. That’s hardly a huge committment to the people of California. It requires that a family of four earn preposterously low incomes. Yet, those changes did create a surge in Medi-Cal recipients.

* Poizner plays populist by going after Anthem Blue Cross.

*  The California Young Republicans voted overwhelmingly to endorse Steve Poizner for governor.

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*  Janice Hahn’s campaign manager, Michael Trujillo, sent out an email in the middle of the night blasting Gavin Newsom for thinking of getting into the race. It might throw a wrench into what appears to be a central theme of Hahn’s campaign: she wants to bring the city perspective to Sacramento. (Check the video to the right for her appearance at the CYD Bay area candidate forum.) Obviously, to the extent that any LG can bring any perspective to Sacramento, Newsom seems as equipped to bring that perspective as he is anything else.

*  More from the SF Gate Politics Blog: What Meg Whitman didn’t bother to do, register to vote when she lived in Boston, her “domestics” did.  Specifically, while she was working for Mitt Romney at Bain, she didn’t vote, but her cook did.  Think Romney might be a little peeved about that, considering he lost an election while she was living there? Oh, and as an aside, Meg Whitman also doesn’t really understand what “mass layoffs” means.

*  This morning’s CalBuzz post features a couple of noteworthy stories, one of which I went into earlier. The other story concerns the outing of the Prop 8 federal judge Vaughn Walker’s “outing.” Walker never really tried to hide his sexuality, because he has made a commitment to maintain his impartiality, just as every other judge does.  As I’ve said at the Prop 8 Trial Tracker, Walker’s sexuality should bear no more relevance than Alito’s gender in his decisions.

* This story on Sen. Wiggins is unfortunate, as it seems a medical condition is causing her to act erratically.  She has announced that she won’t be seeking re-election. Asm. Noreen Evans appears to be the favorite for that seat.