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California's Missing Candidate, II
It's not who you think it is.
By Mickey Kaus
Updated Friday, August 8, 2003, at 4:08 PM PT
What's So Bad About Gray Davis Anyway? Part 3: Here's a Dan Walters column on why Davis is, too, at least partly to blame for the state's energy crisis. In particular,
[w]hen the crisis first arose in 2000 in the form of sharply rising wholesale power costs, Davis and other politicians refused to act decisively to nip it in the bud. California utility executives begged Davis and state utility regulators to allow them to raise rates and sign long-term supply contracts, but officials delayed for six critical months, until the utilities had their financial backs to the wall. Had they acted boldly in 2000, we would not have had such a severe energy crisis in 2001.
Davis, of course, was scared to be associated with something like a rate increase, even if it meant taking a large, longer-term risk. ... At least Davis didn't do something wacky like naming Steve Peace, the Democratic co-architect of the disastrous bipartisan energy deregulation scheme, to a high position as his administration's finance director! ... Oh, wait. ...
P.S.: Here's a March, 2002 Walters piece with a larger critque of the "leadership" style of Davis and the legislature's Democrats:
At every turn, Davis and legislators did what they thought would get them through the moment with the least political exposure, rather than confront the matter forthrightly.
[Note: I got the first Walters column in a Google search, which led me to the copy posted on a pro-recall site. I've linked to that version only because the March 4 column for some reason doesn't turn up in the Bee's archives . I have no reason to think the pro-recall people haven't posted a complete copy of the actual column--the versions on NEXIS appear to be identical, with only minor changes of the sort editors publishing syndicated columns sometimes make.] 6:25 P.M.
What's So Bad About Gray Davis Anyway? Part 2: Jill Stewart on Davis' latest gesture of friendship to a special interest:
In another horrifically ill-advised move, this one designed to attract massive campaign funds, Davis is expected to sign a Democratic bill giving rich Indian tribes say over the environmental impact of developments within five miles of burial sites---a law almost certain to put a nasty clamp on badly needed housing in California.
Five miles seems at least four miles too many, no? ... P.S.: Stewart also has chapter and verse on "Republican pigheadedness" on the environment, which included opposing a compromise bill to control potentially toxic, "bio-accumulating" chemicals used as in flame retardants. ... There's one mistake Schwarzenegger can easily avoid. ... 6:02 P.M.
What's So Bad About Gray Davis Anyway? Part 1: Daniel Weintraub with a thorough and even-handed piece on the unaffordable pension deal Gov. Davis let become law. Total cost only starts at $10 billion over 20 years.
The legislation began a wave of public employee pension increases at a time when private sector employees were seeing their own retirement benefits shrink or disappear entirely. And the bill relied on a fundamentally flawed assumption -- that state employees, not the taxpayers, were entitled to the fruits of the long-running boom in the stock market.
The law seems to have been predicated on the irresponsible assumption that there would be no stock market bust. Shouldn't politicians be punished for such misjudgments? ... P.S.: Yes, both parties went along with the bill. What does that mean--that the unions have bought both parties? Maybe that's why there's a rebellion against the system! ... P.P.S.: Yes, Davis' negotiator shaved a few dozen million off the total price tag. But it was way too little. And then Davis let legislators slip in an amendment that extended the pension boosts to local governments, at an additional cost of untold billions. No wonder labor backs him. ... Note to Arianna: How is this pension deal George Bush's fault? 5:48 P.M.
California's Missing Candidate, II: An update has been posted below. It turns out that one little-known (so far!) candidate, Joe Guzzardi, is raising the "border control" issue. ... This is exactly the sort of issue that would normally be suppressed in the structured, safe two-party campaign favored by the Al Hunts of the world, but that can be aired in a Hiram Johnson/American Idol recall free-for-all. ... Note to my friend Margaret Carlson, who said, on Capital Gang:
[This] election is an ugly election . It's begun ugly, it will be won ugly if Davis is recalled. And only a celebrity, perhaps, could win it, because you have 60 days, you have to start out with name recognition.
What's so "ugly" about the recall? There's been nothing very ugly so far. The voters are mad at Davis over legitimate issues (including some--e.g.,the excessive power of big campaign donors--that goo-goo types have long been begging national voters to get exercised about). It may get ugly, especially in the anti-Arnold attack phase, but so far it's clean and highly democratic. There were some nasty whispering campaigns but they haven't seen print. ... P.P.S.: 60 days isn't a short time. In the world of the Feiler Faster Principle, it's a long time. The news can be expected to move even faster in this election than others because California voters, perhaps conditioned by reality TV shows, now expect to be entertained! That requires continual plot twists, which the press will be looking for. There's plenty of time for, say, Schwarzenegger's poll ratings to collapse and then revive. Also time for an unknown (Psst: Uzzardi-Ga!) to emerge from the pack. ... General note to East Coast pundits: We're watering the tree of liberty out here. Give us some space! ... 12:35 P.M.
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