One thing you can say about California politics: We get lots of great video spots. This one amuses me greatly. (Although the notion of Senator Fiorina does not.)

I’ve read many Founding Fathers biographies. Still, I learned a great deal about George Washington from this one. Much of this stuff should give the Tea Partiers pause.

Just like Christmas, Free Comic Book Day is a day that the kid inside us wishes came every day.

Click here to locate your nearest participating comics shop — and the list of free comics. And then do what I’m going to do:  Round up some kids — actual kids — and take them to a comics shop. Last year was a highly memorable occasion:  My daughter got to meet “Supergirl” and “Wonder Woman,” and got a sketch from a professional artist. That sketch still hangs in her room, and the memory of “Supergirl” and “Wonder Woman” lingers in my memory.

Back here I shared the story of a next-generation iPhone accidentally left behind in a bar, where it was discovered and ultimately sold to a site that shared its scoop around the world, generating enormous hits.

Since then, Apple sent the site, Gizmodo, a letter demanding the return of the phone, and sicced authorities on the web journalist, Jason Chen. San Mateo County investigators seized computers  and other electronics from Chen’s house (apparently overstepping their authority, in the process).

This is disturbing in a number of ways.

The idea that police operating under a vaguely worded warrant can scoop up almost anything they find in your home, regardless of its connection to a potential crime,  is, to put it mildly, not good.  And by taking his computer, they also in effect took his notes. Under state and federal law, journalists’ notes are protected.

But… is Chen a journalist? He seems to be a blogger, but does that qualify one as a journalist? If so, then is what you’re reading journalism? Early in my career  I was a journalist, and I do sometimes break news here; does that make me a journalist?

Recently I’ve been doing a lot of traveling and talking about a new social media tech startup that I’m involved with. At some point in one of the many wide-ranging discussions I’ve been in around the country I said, “The law is always reactive. It is always behind.” In other words, change comes first — changes in how we do business, in technology, in cultural behavior — and the law follows. The expansion of gay rights is only one recent example.

Whatever a “journalist” is in 2010, that definition is, I assure you, far removed from what it was 25 years ago when serving as one was how I made my living. Where once broadcast journalists went into the jungle with a field team, and later sent that footage to editors who reworked it and managing editors who helped reshape the narrative of all the coverage, now ABC News hires only “digital journalists” (translation:  one guy with his own camera, plus internet access). Ultimately, it will prove to be neither better nor worse — just different. The Internet makes news more now.

Here’s James Rainey’s think piece on the ethics of this case. It’s worth reading.  And here’s an editorial from the LA Times on the Apple/Gizmodo saga, highlighting the distressing implications for journalists. I would ask:  In an age when everyone has access to the tools of reporting, and millions of people use them daily, is everyone a journalist?

Forgetting that “the good ol’ days” weren’t really that good, and that “fictional” means it didn’t really happen.

Which kind of takes us to this sad story, in which an actress from “The Andy Griffith Show” gets robbed in the town that inspired Mayberry.

I just came across this headline:  “Massive Air Spill at Wind Farm Threatening Nothing”

Story to follow.

The good news: Some hoteliers in San Diego have banded together to commit a $500,000 inducement over five years to keep the Comic Con in San Diego.

The bad news:  The money is going to come from people who stay in those hotel rooms, in the form of a 2% tax on top of  the 10.5% hotel tax.

In other words, about 7,000 of us who stay in Comic-Con block hotel rooms will be paying 2% more to keep 126,000 people who come to the Con and spend their money in hotels and restaurants and on cabs and so forth.

That doesn’t sound like much of a contribution from the city — and, technically, it isn’t any contribution from the city. Moreover, it sounds suspiciously like a regressive tax.

At least this book is from someone who has read a book.

In addition to being a terrific actor, my good friend Darrell Kunitomi is an avid fly fisherman (and, to my family and me, a nature guide of sorts). Courtesy of the Sierra Club, here’s a slideshow of what he recently found while fishing in the Angeles National Forest. It involves spraypaint, and it isn’t pretty.

Take a look.

If you’re tired of hearing a patient or family member’s private conference with a doctor misconstrued as a “death panel,” you may enjoy this:

Public radio’s Ira Glass, on his show “This American Life,” devoted his show this weekend to a fact-based analysis of California gubernatorial candidate Steve Poizner’s book “Mount Pleasant,” which details Poizner’s semester as a volunteer teacher at a high school in  East San Jose. Here’s part of what he found:

“I’ve been in great schools, I’ve been in dangerous schools — urban schools, suburban schools. Mt. Pleasant is definitely one of the better public high schools I’ve ever visited. And I know it may seem like I’m belaboring all this, putting this book under a microscope point-by-point, but so many of the political discussions in our country seem so disconnected from reality. Every year there are egregious examples of politicians and commentators who believe if they repeat some non-fact over and over, it becomes true. And the more I looked into Poizner’s book, the more it seemed like one of those rare cases that’s so obviously and provably untrue. “

I’m looking forward to Poizner’s response to this. (And I’m surprised we don’t already have it.) Here’s my prediction: This is another example of “liberal media bias, made worse because this is public radio, funded by taxpayer dollars.” Or something like that.

Here’s the LA Times’ coverage of this fun episode, where you can download the transcript or click to listen to the broadcast.