Last week, former eBay (EBAY) CEO Meg Whitman officially launched her campaign for governor of California, hoping to clinch the Republican nomination.

Also last week: News broke, thanks to proceedings in a London court, of a worldwide scam involving potentially millions of dollars and thousands of customers duped into buying counterfeit golf clubs, of all things, as well as clothing, airline-lounge passes and other luxury goods sold on eBay.

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There were a flurry of stories over the weekend about the electoral dreams of former eBay (EBAY) CEO Meg Whitman and former Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) CEO Carly Fiorina. Whitman is the current Republican front-runner in the race to be be the next governor of California. Fiorina has formed a committee to mull a run against Barbara Boxer for a U.S. Senate seat. Both are supposed to bring financial savvy to the government roles they seek, although both left amid serious questions about their job performance.

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Ashton, Oprah, Britney, when will it end?

Now Twitter is taking on a distinctly political bent, with San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom using the service to announce his bid for governor of California. On Tuesday, he wrote: “It’s official- running for Gov of CA. Wanted you to be the first to know. Need your help. Check out video: http://tr.im/iOCN and ReTweet.”

How do his tweets stack up to the musings of the would-be Republican candidate, former eBay (EBAY) CEO Meg Whitman?

For starters, Mayor Newsom has more than 290,000 followers, while Ms. Whitman has about 940 (point for Gavin).

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While former eBay (EBAY) CEO Meg Whitman mulls a run for the Republican nomination for governor of California, eBay Chairman and founder and venture investor Pierre Omidyar has cropped up in an SEC filing listed as an executive for a secretive start-up officially known as Peer News Inc. but operating a service under the name Ginx. PE Hub blogger Dan Primack dug out the SEC filing that mentions Omidyar, which also notes that the company has so far raised $2 million.

There’s not much info on the Ginx.com Web site; the blog ReadWriteWeb.com theorizes that Ginx is “a Twitter management service that recommends news items and other users you should meet, based on your interests.” He notes that Ginx is being used as a URL shortener on Twitter by some people, including Omidyar himself.

You can find hints of what’s happening here by searching for Pierre and Ginx.com on Google. For instance, here’s an example where Omidyar points people to how a Google (GOOG) search for “chimp” triggers a link to a site called BushorChimp.com.

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Former eBay (EBAY) CEO Meg Whitman has resigned her seats on the boards of Procter & Gamble (PG), eBay and Dreamworks Animation (DWA), The Wall Street Journal reports, increasing speculation that she may be planning a run for governor of California. The WSJ reports that sources say Whitman will announce her plans in the next four to six weeks.

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When the e-commerce giant eBay emerged from the last recession seven years ago with an aura of invincibility, its chief executive, Meg Whitman, boasted that “eBay is to some extent recession-proof.”

As the online auctioneer’s revenues and stock price kept climbing, one of its primary rivals, Amazon.com, just limped along.

How times have changed.

Ms. Whitman, now co-chair of Senator John McCain’s presidential campaign, retired from eBay earlier this year as the company struggled with stagnation. Amazon, meanwhile, has emerged as one of the most vibrant and reliable retailers in the country.

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Having been passed over as the running mate on the Republican presidential ticket, former eBay Inc. chief executive Meg Whitman seems to have now set her sights on the California state capitol. Call it Meg 2.0.

Whitman has been increasingly active in the Republican party since retiring from eBay in January. She initially spent her time helping raise money for Mitt Romney, her former boss at Bain & Co., in his failed presidential campaign. More recently, she has been helping run Sen. John McCain’s presidential bid. She was a contender for the VP slot before McCain selected Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin.

On Tuesday night, Whitman all but announced her candidacy for governor of California at the Commonwealth Club.

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This is what we know about eBay’s current state of affairs based on recent news: a) CEO Meg Whitman is apparently following Mitt Romney on the campaign trail; b) John Donahoe, head of eBay’s marketplace division, has been fingered as a potential CEO successor, and he’s complaining to anyone who will listen that the site looks like a flea market; and c) eBay users are mad as hell and they’re writing to the New York Times to complain about it.

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