Can Davis stay in office? Can Arnold go back and make "Terminator Four?" Does anybody give a shit?
washingtonpost.com
Calif. Voters' Support for Davis Shifts
Poll Shows Majority Favor Recall Even as Fewer Express Desire to Oust Governor
By Rene Sanchez
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, September 21, 2003; Page A05
LOS ANGELES, Sept. 20 -- One minute he is apologizing to voters, saying he has been aloof and deserves a scolding. The next, he claims to be the latest victim of a relentless Republican smear campaign that, if successful, would undermine democracy.
Gov. Gray Davis (D) is continuing to strike different poses as he struggles through the political whirlwind known as California's recall election, and as he enters what may be the homestretch of the historic race, there are signs that his strategy could be working.
Then again, it may be too little, too late.
"We're surging; we're going to win," Davis said late Friday, just hours after the federal appeals court that has postponed the Oct. 7 recall vote announced it would reconsider that decision on Monday.
The governor last month backed a lawsuit seeking to delay the recall until March, when a large turnout of Democratic voters is expected for California's presidential primary,. But he said Friday he now prefers the election to proceed as scheduled in two weeks -- a remark that suggests he is confident he can defeat the recall.
A poll to be released Sunday by the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California indicates that Davis has reason for optimism, but his campaign to stay in office remains an uphill battle that he may not have much time left to wage.
The poll found that while a majority of voters still favor recalling him from office, support for taking that nearly unprecedented step is declining: 53 percent of likely voters said they intend to oust Davis, down from 58 percent a few weeks ago. Only 5 percent of voters said they do not know where they stand on the recall; 42 percent said they oppose it.
The survey also suggests that the race to replace the governor if voters remove him remains volatile. It found Lt. Gov. Cruz M. Bustamante, the only major Democratic candidate on the recall ballot, is in a statistical dead heat with actor Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican.
Bustamante had the support of 28 percent of voters surveyed, while Schwarzenegger had 26 percent. GOP state Sen. Tom McClintock, under pressure from some Republicans to quit the race to help Schwarzenegger, had 14 percent.
Nearly 20 percent of voters said they had not decided whom to support in the recall, and nearly 70 percent said that a candidate debate scheduled for Wednesday evening in Sacramento -- the first and only such forum that will include Schwarzenegger -- will be an important factor in their decision.
The survey was conducted this past week, when a long line of the nation's most prominent Democrats, including former president Bill Clinton, traveled one by one to California to sing Davis's praises -- and to echo his charge that the recall is part of an ongoing GOP plot to overturn election results that began in Florida in the 2000 presidential election.
In recent days, Davis and top Democrats have tried to rouse the party's stalwart voters against the recall mostly by stoking the anger many still have about the events in Florida that led to the GOP winning the White House. On Friday, Davis went so far as to say that former vice president Al Gore, who was campaigning alongside him, "should have been president" and that the recall is the same political battle that Florida was.
"The election is being re-framed," said Chris Lehane, a Democratic consultant who worked for the Gore campaign in 2000 and is part of the party's fight against the recall. "Democratic voters are now seeing a direct connection between Florida 2000 and California 2003, and it's helping Davis."
Republicans scoff at that claim, and say that Davis's predictions of victory in the recall and his attempt to win by replaying the Florida saga are delusions of a desperate politician.
"What's happening here is not anything near what Florida was," said Sean Walsh, a Schwarzenegger spokesman. "No matter how many slick salesmen the Democrats bring out to talk about it, the fact is that Davis is still losing. They can't win on the merits of trying to keep him in office, so now they're trying to scare people."
Davis continued to enlist the help of nationally known Democrats today, campaigning in San Francisco with Sen. John Edwards (N.C.), a presidential contender. On Tuesday, the governor is planning to campaign in Orange County with Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (Conn.), another presidential candidate and Gore's running mate in the 2000 election.
The core message to Democratic voters in all the appearances Davis is making with his party's most prominent figures is the same. As Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.), another Democrat running for president, who toured with Davis this week, put it: "Don't let the Republicans monkey with the democracy of California."
But Davis will not have much time to keep making that case if the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit revives the Oct. 7 vote next week, which some legal scholars say is likely. A three-judge panel postponed the election last Monday on the grounds that the punch-card ballots six California counties plan to use could disenfranchise 40,000 mostly minority voters.
Davis needs 50 percent of the vote to survive the recall; he did not get that much in his reelection last year against a weak GOP opponent.
Political analysts contend that Davis may have but two ways to avoid being thrown out of office. First, they say, he will have to galvanize bedrock Democrats to vote in huge numbers. That will not be easy, since many Democrats are professing disdain for him. So, Davis may have to convince them that voting against the recall would foremost be payback to Republicans for their conduct in political dramas such as the one that engulfed Florida nearly three years ago.
Davis also needs less-partisan voters to think twice about recalling him. That is one reason he is staging a flurry of town hall meetings in which he is humbly accepting criticism of his performance as governor.
At one session a few nights ago, Davis conceded that during his five years in office he had isolated himself with aides, lawmakers and lobbyists and had rarely spoken to voters. "It was a mistake on my part not to consult with them on a regular basis," he said.
Davis's mix of anger and contrition may be giving his campaign momentum, political analysts say, but the obstacles he faces remain formidable. The poll to be released Sunday, for example, found that 27 percent of voters trust the state government "to do what is right." More than 90 percent of the voters surveyed said they are closely following the recall.
"I don't think Davis should do anything different," said Bill Carrick, a veteran Democratic strategist. "Support is moving in his direction, but the recall is still ahead. I think it's going to be very close."
Staff writer William Booth and special correspondent Kimberly Edds contributed to this report.
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