Opinion: Will the GOP attack its own in Sacramento this weekend?

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If you think the budget process was nasty, imagine what this weekend’s Republican Party convention in Sacramento will be like. I mean, they’ve probably hired Jack Bauer for comic relief.

At least some of the six Republican lawmakers who voted ‘yes’ on a state budget that raises taxes will be in attendance -- unless they’ve already gone into the federal witness protection program.

One party official already vowed to move to censure any legislator who crossed the aisle to vote ‘yes.’ And right-wing radio talk-show hosts in L.A. have been waging their own kind of political fatwah against any Republican who breaks the Grover Norquist No-Tax Pledge by voting for the budget. Never mind that to some voters, legislators’ oath to the California Constitution may take a teeny bit of precedence.

The Republicans have enough battles ahead of them already without eating their own. Meg Whitman is running for governor. Will she be shredded as ‘too liberal’ by the formidable conservative wing that often decides on the party nominee -- resulting in a candidate who promptly loses statewide office because he is too conservative for the general-election voter? And is the party that has lost ground among minorities really going to ostracize and demonize its sole Latino senator, Abel Maldonado, because he cast the final GOP vote necessary to pass the budget?

Yep, the state Republican Convention is gonna make a prizefight look like ‘Swan Lake’ -- unless the Republicans keep their oath to that other pledge, the Eleventh Commandment, about not speaking ill of another Republican.

In which case, they may save it for the primary elections, a year from now.