WASHINGTON — Candace Parker scored 21 points and the Sparks eased by the short-handed Washington Mystics, 95-62, in a WNBA game on Wednesday night.

Odyssey Sims had 18 points, seven assists and four steals for the Sparks (20-8), and Nneka Ogwumike also had 18 points. Parker and Ogwumike combined to make 17 of 23 field goals.

The Sparks shot 61.5 percent en route to their largest margin of victory this season. They led by 14 points at halftime after shooting 63 percent from the floor. Washington equaled its 12 turnovers-per-game average in the first half and finished with 20.

“I thought we shared the ball really well,” Sparks coach Brian Agler said. “Nneka and Candace were both really active with and without the basketball. Our guards were making good decisions. We forced some turnovers with our defense. Those things, to me, helped us play the way we did.”

Parker said the focus is taking advantage of second-chance points and turning defensive stops into transition baskets.

“We had eight or nine steals in the first half so when you have that type of defensive effort …,” Parker said. “Our main concern now is second-chance points and making sure we’re keeping people off the boards and we’re able to rebound, because when we’re able to rebound and get stops we’re at our best.

“We just have so many different weapons and so much athleticism, so many people who are able to spread the floor. When you have that, the team isn’t set defensively and we’re able to kind of take advantage of that.”

Emma Meesseman scored 20 points for Washington (16-11), which was without Elena Delle Donne and fellow double-digit scorer Tayler Hill. Kristi Toliver added 11 points against her former team.

The Mystics and Sparks stood side-by-side with locked arms during a moment of silence for victims killed and injured in Charlottesville, Virginia.

“I like the fact that players in our league have a conscience and are willing to express it,” Mystics coach Mike Thibault said. “Our team talked about it this morning and I thought they did the right thing. It was appropriate and it sent a positive message for what needs to be in our country.”

An innovative, off-stream water storage proposal northeast of Sacramento should be one of the top priorities for the state’s spending of Proposition 1 water-bond money.

The Sites Reservoir project would, in wet years, divert “excess” water from the Sacramento River into what would be the seventh-largest reservoir in California. It would hold some 1.3 million to 1.8 million acre-feet of water, which could be used to meet several of the state’s water-system goals, along with the needs of agriculture and cities.

The project would not dam the Sacramento River, but would divert some of its flow into the reservoir to be built in the nearby Sites Valley.

Water stored in Sites in wet years would be available in dry years, or in the late summer and fall, to improve salmon runs, replenish the San Joaquin-Sacramento River Delta and contribute flows to improve water quality. In a real emergency — say, collapse of an earthen levee in the Delta — Sites releases could even be used to hold back seawater from entering the Delta.

Basically, the Sites project is offering the state half of the water stored, which the state could use for those water-system sustainability and ecological purposes. Whatever the state does not use would be used to boost the water supplies of the local water agencies in the Colusa County area that make up the Sites Project Authority and of several Southern California agencies that have signed on. Those include the Metropolitan Water District — the wholesaler of State Water Project supplies to most local water districts in SoCal — along with the San Bernardino Valley Municipal, Coachella Valley, Santa Clara and San Gorgonio Pass water districts, which do not get their State Water Project supplies from Metropolitan. All those districts are working to diversify their water supplies, and Sites would play a part in that.

The Sites Project Authority submitted its application this week to the California Water Commission for Prop. 1 Water Storage Investment Program funding for the reservoir, which is projected to cost up to $5.8 billion. The application and a draft environmental review are both online; comments on the EIR are due by Nov. 13.

The authority is looking for $1 billion to $1.6 billion to come from Prop. 1 funds. It would be a good investment for Californians.

Not too long ago, people could walk into a diner and order the “blue plate special” — a low-priced, standardized meal with “all the fixin’s” for “two bits.”

But over time this fad wore off. You may like the meatloaf and have zero interest in the baked potato. Or be in love with the cherry pie, but turn your nose up at the dinner salad. And let’s be honest, everyone hates the broccoli.

Now, we prefer to pick and choose menu items tailored to our specific tastes.

Our options have grown, along with our waistlines.

And as it turns out, our taste in politics is just as varied and individualized as our taste in food.

Sure, the parties have clearly defined platforms on all of the hot-button issues facing the country, but very few individuals buy into all of those positions indiscriminately.

It’s possible to be the most conservative person in the world on the death penalty, and way to the left on gay marriage.

Americans tend to be a la carte with their politics.

It should be no surprise to us that our elected officials are the same.

But legislators can get in trouble when they hide or obfuscate positions they hold which deviate from the party line when they run for office, and then go to Sacramento and surprise their constituents with an unexpected vote.

That’s when all hell breaks loose.

Currently, the two top legislative leaders in the state Assembly are in the hot seat over this very issue. Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon, D-Paramount, is being targeted from the left for a recall after he killed a single-payer health care bill for the year.

Assembly Republican Leader Chad Mayes, R-Yucca Valley, is facing calls from the right to resign his leadership post by various county parties and members of the state GOP board of directors after he and seven other Republican legislators signed on to Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown’s highly coveted cap-and-trade legislation.

Many in the media are decrying these reactions as the elimination of the political center in the Golden State.

USC Political Analyst Sherry Bebitch Jeffe told Capital Public Radio, “As hard as it has been to compromise, it’s getting harder. The ideological splits are getting deeper, and the middle is disappearing. … Sure, we have seen it before. But we haven’t seen it quite so intense in both parties — at least, not that I can remember — at the same time.”

I disagree. Had Rendon run as an opponent of single-payer health care or Mayes run as a supporter of cap-and-trade legislation, their constituents would have been forced to live with their positions. But since they voted against what they implicitly campaigned on, voters are understandably angry.

If a politician has a change of heart, or “evolves” on an issue, it is incumbent upon them to go back to their district and explain it to their constituents before they cast a vote on an impactful piece of legislation. It’s not just smart politics, it’s common decency.

Because of California’s top-two primary system, a plethora of legislators could be facing very expensive, intra-party June and November contests that will require them to spend a lot of energy and money, and could, theoretically, result in them losing their seats.

The moral of the story for politicians is this — honesty is the best policy, always. If you deviate from the party line on an issue, don’t hide it when you run, otherwise it will become very costly and irritating down the road when voters feel like they were deceived.

We don’t vote for the blue plate special, we vote for representatives we can trust; and if we are surprised with political broccoli when we asked for cherry pie — look out.

John Phillips is a CNN political commentator and can be heard weekdays at 3 p.m. on “The Drive Home with Jillian Barberie and John Phillips” on KABC/AM 790.

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