Sacramento King
Readers ponder a Schwarzenegger administration.
If nothing else, Tuesday's very special episode of Decision '03 has incited several outstanding posts. Advise and Consent: Sissyfuss1, as "Sobbing in Sacramento," fires a Prudie riff in BOTF: Dear PrudieMy daughter California is a lovely girl. She is bright, vivacious and talented. When she was in school, she used to get all the lead roles in drama class, and her computer projects got high praise. My daughter was very popular with the other girls and boys, though you must know there are always the few jealous ones like Texas and Mississippi , who would bitch behind her back. Anyhow, she was going out with this guy called Gray—what a wonderful man! He is handsome, courteous, intelligent and financially independent, with twenty years' experience in his own business. They got married last year. But then she met this body builder called Arnold, and now she has filed for divorce, and says she wants to marry Arnold. Gray is heartbroken, poor chap. I don't trust Arnold at all—he is a smooth-talking sleazeball who I know has a lot of skeletons in his cupboard. He has cast his evil spell on my daughter. I think she will end up being very hurt. I don't know what to do. I feel like sitting her down and talking some sense into her head, but she seems to be in no mood to listen. Please advise. S1 then delivers mock responses from Prudie, ElboRuum and doodahman. Check them out here. PubliusToo gets in on the action here with his own response. Same thread, different tone: zinya, who "indict[s] the media as much as the people." Find out why here, as well as z's fear the consequence for many new voters will be a kind of fatal cynicism if/when they see their "hero" utterly prove to be less than Clark Kent ... which could further depress voter participation in the long-term. Hauteur weighs in on the Schwarzenegger win, first giving himself a gaudy blue ribbon for his prescience on the outcome. Why did the 'bot prevail? "Hero worhip." Hauteur then asks, "Will Arnold be a good governor of California?" Hauteur's answer: Yes, I think so. He will accomplish this goal precisely because it is a part of his goal set. He simply wants to prove that he can do the job, and he has never failed at anything that he has set his mind to since first his feet hit these shores. Since public relations and faux leadership skills are in his blood, he will be a genuine and capable promoter of all things Californian over the next two years. In short, he might legitimately win a second [full] term on his own merits. Ask 1-2-Oscar, and he'll tell you that " Arnold was never the issue in California." Oscar provides a fine post on the unintended consequences of California's historically muddled budgetary politics. A sampling: Since the late 1970s and the passage of initiative Proposition 13, the people of California have been buffeted with revenue shortfalls, They have had to restructure their tax system, so that vital services were no longer dependent upon real estate taxes. They have had to repeatedly choose whether or not to expand social services, and the costs of these added programs could not be met by new revenues, but were instead inadequately funded from existing revenues, which required cuts in school funding and other existing programs ... Who was to blame for all these shortcomings? There is plenty of blame to share, as politicians of both parties sought to reward their particular "constituencies," blithely ignoring the needs of the public at large. Gray Davis was among those who share the blame, but he was hardly a man who should bear sole responsibility ... Has Davis been a good governor of the state? I think not, largely because of his failure to lead the legislative majorities toward practical solutions. Given the choice, Oscar would've sent former Los Angeles Mayor Dick Riordan to Sacramento. O_Hellenbach adds to Oscar's post here with a firsthand anecdote on Sacramento's "asymmetric political problem." Finally, The_Bell muses: If upon finishing watching the schlockfest Conan the Barbarian in 1981, someone had turned to me and said, "I predict that Arnold Schwarzenegger will be elected Governor of California someday," one of my most likely retorts would have been, "Yeah, right! That will be the same year the Cubs face the Red Sox in the World Series." The first one has happened - oh, let them ALL come true! If only Mark Guthrie didn't have Arlo's breaking ball ... KA11:40 a.m.
—Sobbing in Sacramento.
Tuesday, October 7, 2003
NOAA on Recall: The presumably progressive bullmoose answers Kausfiles' casual, tongue-kinda-in-cheek suggestion that California gubernatorial candidate 'bot may have pulled an Eve Harrington from the outset ("Was he behind the recall all along?"). Describing the recall, as others have, as a "political 'perfect storm,' " bullmoose dismisses the theory:
the chance of Arnold coldly and correctly conspiring in the most Machiavellian way to set it up is nil.
Arnold took the risky plunge because it was the best and most likely only good shot he would ever get at high political office.
In bullmoose's view, the recall is such an anomalous political happenstance that it's surprising that others haven't used it as a means to reintroduce themselves to the arena:
I expected former Governor and now Mayor of Oakland Jerry Brown to take advantage of the "perfect storm" situation and make his big time political comeback. He is more than fed up with the open cash register style of the current administration to have fired up a "progressive" attack on the Davis fundraising machine.
JCormac, a California rez, was all set to punch a chad for the 'bot:
A week or so ago, I had convinced myself that Arnold, all of his obvious flaws notwithstanding, would go into Sacramento and give folks on both sides of the aisle a much-needed shakeup.
But after the bevy of allegations, JC decided that:
this recall stuff sucks. Both it and the initiative/referendum system should either be tossed out of the California Constitution or significantly reformed. Direct democracy is not a particularly American ideal, but it works if you're a small town in New England; it doesn't work for the largest State in the Union. If Arnold wins, mark it down here, he will be sued by at least one person in a Paula-Jones-type sexual harassment lawsuit. While Arnold is mired in depositions and discovery, nothing will get done in Sacramento, no one will work with him, and another recall campaign will begin, this time funded by some wealthy Democrat. Meanwhile, our State's economy will continue to flounder. Few of the needed legislative reforms will occur.
