Nuñez Drops $4 Million on Sweet AT&T Home Entertainment Center

In preparation for his upcoming appearance on MTV's Cribs, California Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez has constructed perhaps the most state-of-the-art home entertainment system that anyone has ever seen, using equipment exclusive to AT&T and costing a whopping $4 million dollars - in fact, exactly $4 million dollars, to the penny. Nuñez reportedly paid with a co-signed check.

"This system's got it all," said an ebullient Nuñez while introducing the system to reporters at his downtown LA condo. "There's complete wireless Internet throughout the place, unlimited long distance and cellular service through Cingular, an iPhone, IP television through AT&T U-verse (just OK'd by the state Public Utilities Commission), and we even threw a cell tower on the roof so we'd never drop a signal." AT&T doesn't currently make computers or television monitors or what Nuñez described as "kickass" speakers, but they made a special dispensation for the Speaker, creating limited-edition electronics and hiring some of the best engineers from Sony and Toshiba to do it.

Amazingly, the bill for this service came to precisely $4,000,000.00, coincidentally the same cost that the California Democratic Party refunded to Nuñez last fall after the 2006 elections. AT&T spokesman Donald Ralston denied that this home entertainment system was simply the final piece of some secret deal made between the company, Nuñez and the Party. "Hey, if I had a spare $4 million lying around, I'd get myself this same deal," Ralston said. "You can get Internet in the bathroom. Did you hear me? The bathroom!"

The home entertainment center may prove an asset in the upcoming statewide initiative over relaxing term limits for state legislators. Nuñez plans to offer voters free nights in his "tricked-out" Web-enabled condo, so they can obtain more information on the term limits battle and why state lawmakers need the wisdom of experience to negotiate the difficult straits of Sacramento. He also is using the AT&T deal itself as a selling point. "Do you think some rookie lawmaker could get himself this kind of setup? Did the spokesman tell you that you can get Internet in the BATHROOM???"

Other amenities in the condo include a Web-based kitchen with cooking timers and automated appliances "like the Jetsons," in Nuñez' words. The bathroom reportedly is also Internet-enabled. A text message from Nuñez' iPhone can also unlock the front door.

Fellow lawmakers in the Assembly have offered tepid but mildly jealous support, although Minority Leader Mike Villines claimed that the living room blinds with a giant representation of the AT&T logo on them was "a bit much."