When Jerry Brown was unveiling his final state budget this month, a reporter asked him about the legacy of his record-long governorship.

In fact, one could infer that Jerry Brown’s entire second governorship has been, at least partly, an effort to bury the “Governor Moonbeam” image he acquired the first time around and compare favorably with the father he now embraces.

“While it faces its share of difficulties, we should never forget the bounty and endless opportunities bestowed on this special place — or the distance we have all traveled together these last few years.”

“All are big and very important to our future, and their passage demonstrates that some American governments can actually get things done — even in the face of deepening partisan division,” he said after one such list.

Later, he effusively plugged the two huge public-works projects that would be, if completed, comparable in scope to those of his father — tunnels to carry water beneath the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and a north-south bullet train system — and insisted that they will happen despite deep financial woes.