Probably no one who attended or watched last Friday's funeral service for the four slain Oakland Police officers spent much time reflecting on the fact that two of these brave public servants died at the hands of a career criminal wielding a Russian-designed AK-47 assault rifle.

That's wholly understandable and appropriate. Friday's service, touching and poignant as it was, was rightly focused on the lives of these four fine men -- Officer John Hege, Sgt. Mark Dunakin, Sgt. Ervin Romans and Sgt. Daniel Sakai.

The bestidea coming out of Sacramento these days is actually coming from the Bay Area, where a group of business leaders wants tocall a constitutional convention to revamp California's government.

The governance equivalent of a quintuple bypass anddeep brain stimulation surgery performed at the same time, a constitutionalconvention is a notion that should send shivers down the spine of anyreasonable person.

It slicesopen the body politic and exposes its vital organs to all sorts of poking andprodding.

Scary stuff.

On theother hand, what do we have to lose?

Ina likely indicator of voter displeasure with all things Sacramentothese days, a recently released poll shows that a clear majority ofCalifornians support the idea of having an "open primary" which wouldallow the two top vote-getters (regardless of party) to advance to thegeneral election.

Well, so much for the idea that bureaucracy should be accountable.

The decision on California's attempt to reinstate control over its ownprison system is back, and from the looks of it, we're doomed to spendmillions more on ensuring that murderers who have the flu get their hotwater bottles.

Southern California Edison was recently given the green light by the California Public Utilities Commission to raise monthly rates. And on April 4, electricity bill rates may change noticeably for nearly five million Californians.

According to the AP, the approved rate hike will mostly add an additional $2-$4 on to the average consumer's monthly utility bill. The rate increase was cited as necessary to help update SCE utilities.

Lookslike actual bipartisanship can be a liability of epic proportions -- atleast, when you implicitly concede to the other party's agenda whilesimultaneously directly contradicting a strategy aimed at retrievingyour own party's political capital so that you can escape the albatrossof an unpopular public official.

Which is, you know, totally unprecedented.

Those wholove irony will appreciate recent developments in California's prison system.

Afederal judge refused to take the state out from under the thumb of areceiver who wants officials to spend $8 billion to build seven prison healthcenters and renovate several others.

With the passage of the bill calling for a 90 percent tax onthe AIG bonuses, the three-ring economic, political and media circuscentered around the AIG bonuses has now officially entered the realm ofabsurdity, and looks to be spending the remainder of its existencethere.

Inan action that will no doubt have a chilling effect on those seeking tokeep California government and school districts operating in thesunshine, an Orange County school district board has successfullyconvinced a California appeals court that it not only has the right toshut down and cover-up dissent but also financially punish thoseseeking to expose the illegal actions.

In the Tony award winning musical Les Miserables,the student Enjolras leads his fellow students in two triumphal songs,singing about how their planned uprising against the Parisiangovernment is "the music of a people who will not be slaves again" andhow "there is a life about to start, when tomorrow comes." The title ofthe more well known one is "Do you hear the people sing" and itsgeneral gist is something along the lines of "Students of the worldunite! You have nothing to lose but your books, desks and report cards!"