Steve Hilton and Xavier Becerra are headed to a faceoff for governor in the November general election. 

The utterly unpredictable race for governor of California became utterly predictable late Tuesday when the Associated Press projected that Republican Steve Hilton had bested Democrat Tom Steyer for second place. 

That almost certainly means that barring some tectonic unforeseen event, Democrat Xavier Becerra will be elected governor in November. 

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Along the way, California had slew gubernatorial front-runners — presumptive, polling and actual — over the past year: former Vice President Kamala Harris, former Rep. Katie Porter, Sen. Alex Padilla, former Rep. Eric Swalwell, Hilton and Becerra. 

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It’s noteworthy that until late April, Becerra was languishing in single digits in the polls before Swalwell was forced from the race and had to resign his safe congressional seat because of revelations that would have proven even more disastrous for the Democrats had they not been revealed ahead of the primary. 

The Sacramento-San Francisco Political Anointment Machine discovered that maybe the barely vetted, stubbly, social media maven Swalwell was engaged in unwanted sexual advances, frightening encounters allegedly involving drugs, and unwanted photo exchanges with young women on his staff and off.

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With that, the same machine........

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