The rumor mill about whether Dianne Feinstein, the popular Democratic senator, will run for governor heats up every now and again.
It began to simmer last week, after the San Francisco Chronicle's Matier and Ross published a private poll showing her beating another would-be Democratic candidate, Attorney General Jerry Brown, 50 to 24 percent.
Brown, who served two terms as governor before term limits were enacted, has been the early frontrunner among the politcal chattering class.
In fact, in that same published poll, Brown was the top choice when Feinstein wasn't included, besting San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Lt. Gov. John Garamendi and State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell in a potential 2010 Democratic primary.
Back to Feinstein. State Treasurer Bill Lockyer, who is sitting on a $10 million campaign account and could himself run for governor, told Capitol Alert last week that Feinstein "beats everybody."
In his new column in the Chronicle, former S.F. Mayor and ex-Assembly Speaker Willie Brown agreed.
"If she does get in, it's over, at least on the Democratic side. Everybody, and I mean everybody, else steps out," Brown wrote on Sunday.
Willie Brown even goes on to give a bit of political advice to Newsom, whom Brown first appointed to the city's Board of Supervisors.
"As for Gavin Newsom, he would immediately defer to Dianne and hope that she appoints him as her replacement in the Senate," he wrote. "In fact, Gavin should call and offer to be Dianne's campaign chairman if she runs. And he should make that call today, before anyone else beats him to it."
Frank Russo, publisher of the California Progress Report, however, warned against such "conventional wisdom."
"If this logic were followed by would-be candidates, Obama would not have run for President," Russo wrote.
(On a unrelated note, Brown's new column, which is great political reading, hasn't been received well in all quarters. The SF Weekly's Matt Smith reports that some within the Chronicle "are sickened by the new Willie deal," citing the fact that Brown is not a reporter and has close ties to many of his subjects.
For Chronicle staffers, reading it became a game of Where's Waldo, in which players sought to find the greatest number of violations of the paper's ethical code. Brown made the game easy.
In his debut column's first section, he makes an indirect case for the vice-presidential aspirations of the wife of his personal friend Bill Clinton. The second section touts the keen skills of political operative Steve Schmidt, with whom Brown does lobbying business. Next is an item declaring the end of the line for Jesse Jackson, Brown's former employer and longtime rival for the title of most important black politician in America. Brown weighs in on the supposedly excellent chances of his political progeny Gavin Newsom becoming governor, not long before jetting off to Newsom's Montana wedding. Brown touts the fine food and ambience of a Fillmore restaurant that was launched with a $1.7 million San Francisco Redevelopment Agency loan granted just as he stepped down as the city's legendary "juice" mayor. To finish with a conflict-of-interest bang, Brown brags about a freebie dinner, and gives a shout-out to Carmen Policy, who just helped him lead a successful campaign for a ballot initiative to allow for the construction of a new stadium at Hunters Point.)
@Nyx.CommentBody@