GavinTV - Mayor Newsom’s Seven-And-A-Half Hour snoozefest of a campaign commercial disguised as a  “State of the City Address” is getting VERY bad reviews and nobody is watching it.: One county Supervisor compared Newsom’s performance to Fidel Castro.  Yes, even in San Francisco that’s an insult.  Newsom’s strategist is a bit more optimistic. “By next year or two years from now, everybody will be doing this” he says.  That sounds awful.   [SF Chronicle]

The U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the city of Garden Grove’s appeal of a lower court ruling ordering the city to return marijuana to a medical marijuana patient.   Bottom line:  The guy gets his weed back and California police have to enforce state law, not federal law. [OC Register]

Los Angeles Mayoral candidate Craig X Rubin loses his appeal on pot-selling charges.  Rubin is a pastor at a church he started called “Temple 420.”  Temple 420 sold weed out of vending machines and claimed that it wasn’t selling weed as weed, it was selling weed as a sacrament.  Pastor Rubin tried to claim that his temple’s use of marijuana is the same as Native American tribes who are allowed to use peyote for their rituals.  Um. No.  It’s not really the same at all “Pastor” Rubin — and by the way, if you were serious about marijuana decriminalization you wouldn’t pull stunts like this, it does not help the cause. Oh well.   The opinion itself is a good read, even for non-lawyers. [Metropolitain News/California Courts of Appeal]

Jack-In-The-Box has a coupla new logos they’re testing and is moving from the NYSE to the NASDAQ.  Now being traded under the ticker “JACK.” [Fast Food Maven]

It took all of 24 seconds into the education “webisode” before Newsom tells viewers why his education plan is better than “some Mayors’” education plans.  The “some Mayors” is really one Mayor– LA Mayor and soon-to-be-candidate-for-Governor,  Antonio Villaraigosa.  Villaraigosa failed in his attempt to take over the Los Angeles Unified School District.  A failure which derailed most of his education reform plans. Newsom rubs it in his face.

And so begins the 2010 Governor’s Race. When things get ugly between Newsom and Villaraigosa over the next 18 months, just remember that Gavin shot first.

Here’s the clip.  Also noteworthy is the horrendous use of the powerpoint slides.  Ya know Gavin, we’ve cracked the technology to insert powerpoint slides into a video presentation so people can actually read them.  But perhaps they’re just a prop to convey gravitas and substance — if ya catch our drift.

But according to these “patriots”, elected officials in California are not legally holding office since nobody takes some goofy loyalty oath that they claim is required by the California Constitution.   [Free Enterprise Society]

At Phil Spector’s re-trial, his defense attorney admitted to the jury that Spector is, in fact, a misogynist gun-wielding maniac who occasionally points guns at men too.  Interesting strategy. [LA Times]

Get ready for paperless traffic tickets.  CHP is experimenting with an “electronic traffic citation tracking system” in parts of San Bernardino, Orange, and San Diego counties.  [Inside SoCal]

SF Mayor Gavin Newsom is planning a 7 1/2 hour state-of-the-city speech serialized on his very own YouTube channel.  Yes.  Seven and a half hours. [SF Chronicle]

Phenomenal sort-of-hard-to-find-never-officially-released 70s era Neil Young songs for legit free download, great stuff.  [Aquarium Drunkard]

Newsom allowed the opposition to scare him into believing he was a pariah, and he kept his campaigning against the measure on college campuses and liberal precincts. Unlike Mark Leno, who regularly goes on right-wing talk radio to promote gay rights, Newsom isn’t comfortable stepping out of his bubble – which is not a good sign if he wants to run for Governor.

Newsom hasn’t lost the LGBT community. They still love him, and will strongly support his gubernatorial campaign. But their liberal allies—like organized labor—will look for another candidate, because Newsom proved his weaknesses at assembling a “winning” coalition. I rarely agree with Phil Bronstein of the SF Chronicle, but his scathing analysis was fairly accurate. Newsom is so insecure that he can only campaign in front of favorable crowds.

Ouch.

Down here, the L.A. Times had this to say:

Newsom, 41, youthful and dynamic, helped trigger the debate over same-sex marriage in 2004 when he authorized marriage licenses for homosexual couples. He presided over gay and lesbian weddings and gave the speech that became notorious when backers of Proposition 8 ran a TV ad with a video of a wild-eyed Newsom crowing that there would be gay marriages “whether you like it or not.”

…Larry Gerston, a professor of political science at San Jose State University, agreed that video of Newsom’s “Howard Dean moment” could hurt him in a general election, but he said the mayor’s same-sex marriage stand might boost him in a Democratic primary.

Stay tuned…