They touch our lives in so many ways, and now Reason.tv acknowledges those who tell us that if it looks good, tastes good, or feels good, it should be illegal.

Live (to tape) from the fourth floor of the Sepulveda Center in Los Angeles, California—it’s the 2010 Nanny of the Year Awards!

Over the past year, Reason.tv has recognized plenty of busybodies who relish minding other people’s business, but who deserves to succeed 2009’s winner (Meddlin’ Mike Bloomberg), and take home the 2010 Nanny?

Will it be the heartland mayor who sacked the Lingerie Football League? The Peach State pol who sued a man for growing vegetables in his own yard? A member of the food police?

Remember, it’s a dishonor just to be nominated. So get your awards season started off right, and tune in to the only black-tie ceremony that delivers busybodies, bikini babes, and bacon!

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They’ve targeted bottled water and the selling of all kinds of pets, er, “animal companions.” And now, with the soda scold who’s yanking sugary beverages from vending machines, the City by the Bay pulls off the first-ever Nanny of the Month trifecta!

Presenting Reason.tv’s Nanny of the Month for July 2010: San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom!

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The passage of the Arizona border illegal immigration law is causing virtually unprecedented reactions around the Country.  The top California Senate Democrat (he of the state with huge deficits and serious unemployment) wants to ignite a trade war with Arizona.  San Francisco’s Mayor has cut “official” travel to Arizona.  Staged protests on the Left have turned violent (in contrast to the peaceful tea parties) and the White House is considering court actions in lieu of an immigration bill, i.e. they would rather sue than legislate.

Much Ado? It is worthy to note that the law passed by Arizona “merely echoes federal immigration statutes” – at least according George Will and PoliticalFact.com.  Existing federal law requires:

“Any alien required to apply for registration and to be fingerprinted in the United States who willfully fails or refuses to make such application or to be fingerprinted, and any parent or legal guardian required to apply for the registration of any alien who willfully fails or refuses to file application for the registration of such alien shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and shall, upon conviction thereof, be fined not to exceed $1,000 or be imprisoned not more than six months, or both.”

According to Arizona’s Governor : “”Despite erroneous and misleading statements suggesting otherwise, the new state misdemeanor crime of willful failure to complete or carry an alien registration document is adopted, verbatim, from the same offense found in federal statute.”

So why are some on the Left going so far overboard?  It may well be it is because they have no issues to run on this Fall.

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No surprise: Jerry Brown is running for office again.  In Jerry’s words, “I’ve run for more offices than any other candidate that still is alive.”  This time, he is the lone Democrat candidate running for Governor in California.  Since his belated announcement last week, Jerry has done his best to sound reasonable as a candidate.  Surely, California voters should know it is only an act.

In running for those many offices, Brown has taken countless liberal positions.  As Governor, Brown empowered public employee unions, strongly opposed the death penalty and appointed judges who strongly opposed it.  He opposed Prop 13 before he was for it – but only after the voters passed it. When he ran for President, in 1980, he was for universal health care and said his economic agenda was based, in part, on Buddhist Economics – followers of which endeavor to measure “Gross National Happiness.”  In 1992, when he ran for the Presidency a third time, he touted “living wages,” fought free trade agreements and said he would consider Jesse Jackson as a running mate notwithstanding Jackson’s controversial if not anti-Semitic remarks.  Such is the life of a career liberal like Jerry Brown.

In 2009, while still in the race for Governor, liberal Gavin Newsom said of Jerry Brown’s candidacy: “We’re not content to relive history. We’re going to keep making it.”  To ensure that Brown’s latest history would not include a loss to Newsom, Brown resumed his liberal ways.

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And that’s the point, I guess. Watch this ad for a “clean diesel” car by Audi, and good luck getting this slightly modified version of the Cheap Trick classic “Dream Police” out of your head. I couldn’t get it out with a lobotomy. It’s been playing off and on in my brain since it first aired during the Super Bowl.

But beyond the diddy, I also can’t get the vision of a fascist “green” future out of my head — even if it’s portrayed with a heavy dollop of of “Reno: 911“-style cop-show parody. Good comedy has to have a grain of truth in it to work, and this spot has plenty. It’s not just a peek at a ridiculous future, but a look at our “be green or else” present. An overreaction? Tell that to the chief of America’s Green Police, San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom, who Tweeted:

“Ok .. That ‘green police’ Audi commercial hits home..”

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The Communications Director for California Attorney General Jerry Brown resigned last week after admitting he regularly taped telephone conversations with reporters without their permission.  Under California state law, the recording of private telephone conversations without consent is illegal.  Although the Attorney General’s Office worked to shut down the story by calling it an internal personnel matter, the potentially illegal behavior of a senior staff member to California’s top cop raises some serious questions.

Here’s one: How can one of the most powerful law enforcement officials in America not know his communications director routinely engaged in activities that may have been unlawful?

Or, how is it that only this senior member of the staff knew this was occurring as they currently claim?

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