News is suddenly moving so fast that it's becoming hard for me to keep up; that's why we're not finishing the story today that we just began Tuesday. You know, the one about Titan Cement suing two North Carolina residents who appear to be doing nothing more than speaking the truth.
Unfortunately, other important news has forced itself to the front of the line, and it's going to demand that we break schedule, whether we like it or not.
That's why today we're going to be talking about Wisconsin, and how workers there are fighting back against the State's Republican legislators and Governor, who seem to have gone out of their way this past three weeks to govern without the consent of the governed.
It's kind of chilly today in Wisconsin...but I can assure you, things are heating up fast-and it ain't because of spring.
Oh, the heady days of 2003; there was a perfect storm brewing that Gray Davis could do nothing to stop. Darrell Issa was busy tossing around his car security cash around in order to be elected governor in the recall election. Of course, that never happened, as Arnold Schwarzenegger jumped in to the race, and the rest is history. But what is the CW on that?
Well, if there is a source of Sacramento CW, certainly George Skelton is your man. And today, he declares that the recall was folly:
One thing should now be evident as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger packs up his office: It was a mistake to recall Gray Davis.
Davis didn't deserve it. He had just been reelected the year before. He would have been out of office in three years anyway.
Schwarzenegger wasn't an improvement except for, briefly, providing entertainment. He didn't make the state's money mess any better. In fact, it has gotten worse. (LA Times)
Of course, seeing where he is now in the polls, and the position the state is in right now, this takes no great source of conventional wisdom. During the last seven years, Arnold made some pretty important moves. But, ultimately, he was a failure because he didn't understand the system, and his only attempts to change it were at the margin where it is safe and cuddly.
He billed himself as a reformer, and the only reforms he could get through were do-nothing reforms like redistricting and Top 2. He billed himself as somebody who could sweep away the debt and deficit, but really, he was in no position to do either. And he never even seriously tried to work for real change on the budget system. He was content to further aggrandize the Big 5 system, making the system even more closed than it was in the past.
Gray Davis got rolled, but as we learned from Prop 8, the voters of this state can make mistakes. Some they learn quickly, and others it takes a few years. It seems with the Mistakinator, it took about 6 years.
(An extremely valuable insight into the Republican war on public education - and how the public does not want it. - promoted by Robert Cruickshank)
Our Public School System is under attack, not just in Florida or San Diego but in Orange County as well. There are experiments happening all over the US to test exactly what the best means would be to destroy our public schools and right now, the easiest seems to be from the inside out.
In the Capistrano School District in South Orange County, California, we have a board of Trustees hell bent on not only using the "evil" teacher's union to paint the schools as ineffective, but to utterly destroy the parent's faith in the system, driving children from the schools and force a strike.
The recall that took place in 2008 is documented in a film entitled, Not as Good as You Think: The Myth of the Middle Class School. And it's been show to GOP leaders all around the Country, it's their baby of how they can tear apart a school district and right now, we're on the edge of them succeeding.
Back in the February budget battle, notorious right-wing SoCal talk show hosts John and Ken put the heads of Republican legislators who voted for the tax increases on sticks as a threat of grassroots wingnut revolt. Their primary enemy became GOP Assemblymember Anthony Adams (AD-59), who they targeted with a recall effort, gathering and submitting signatures to put a recall on the ballot. It was to be the biggest demonstration yet of the power the KFI duo have over California politics - and the Republican Party.
Except they failed.
We learned today that the recall effort will fall 11,000 signatures short of qualifying for the ballot, according to the random sampling projections. John and Ken turned in 58,000 signatures but the sampling projects less than half - about 24,500 - will be valid, short of the 35,825 they needed to make the ballot.
Chalk this up as a pretty big FAIL on the part of John and Ken and their own SoCal version of the teabagger movement. Armed with one of the West Coast's most powerful radio signals and one of the highest rated shows in the region, they still couldn't muster the signatures to even get this before voters.
It is time to recall Arnold. The only reason he feels free to do what he is doing is because he doesn't face another election. So let's recall him. I do not care that he has only another year and a half. The budget situation is intolerable.
Bakersfield Senator Roy Ashburn is facing a recall by some right-wing anti-tax zealots after voting for the budget deal last month. The funny part of the whole situation is that if the proponents of the recall do end up gathering enough signatures, it probably won't actually reach the ballot until his term is almost over. Given that he's termed out in 2010, it seems kind of pointless.
But having a point isn't necessarily a big deal for the right-wingers, and so on they trudge. By law, the politician who is the subject of a recall petition getting 40 valid signatures responds. Here is (a portion of) Ashburn's response:
Without that budget, California would have faced a financial disaster with thousands of workers suddenly unemployed. Construction of roads and highways would have stopped, and lost funds for hospitals and medicine would have crippled local governments.
An eminently reasonable response, all things considered. At any rate, the recall effort doesn't seem to have any experienced political types behind it, as the petitioners gathered 20 signatures from outside of the district when they initially turned in their notice of intent last week. Unless somebody with money hops into the effort, it seems unlikely they will gather the necessary 42,376 valid signatures necessary to recall Ashburn.
"So, Jeff Miller of Orange has the fatwa issued against him."
Assemblyman Jeff Miller, whose gerrymandered district includes parts of Orange County, has been targeted for recall by heads-on-a-stick radio shock jocks, Ken Dumb and John Dumber.
We were delighted to see them launch this campaign, because it's going to show how impotent they really are. Just as Rush Limbaugh is now the default leader of the national Republican party, these drive-time blowhards are the true spokesmen for the California Republicans.
Here's their plan as it unfolds:
1.) Hold a live drawing on-air to choose a human sacrifice.
2.) Issue a fatwah!
3.) Call for a taxpayer revolt to rise up against Jeff Miller.
4.) ..........
5.) Crickets
Their egos were inflated when their ranting fueled the taxpayer revolt against the car tax, the recall of Gray Davis and the election of the Governator.
While they gave these campaigns massive free publicity, the heavy lifting, signature-gathering, and election were all funded with huge expenditures by millionaires like Darrell Issa and other skippers from the Yacht Party.
Without the big money and their hired guns, this effort is rapidly becoming a sad little joke, nothing more than a website, forum, and Facebook group.
The Jeff Miller Recall attempt will show that these savages, who have adopted the language of Muslim extremists, are just as out-of-touch and irrelevant as Limbaugh.
Californians hate their politicians these days, but they hate the Legislature more strongly than they do the governor. Today's Field Poll showed Arnold has record high disapproval ratings but still fares much better than the Legislature, as the table at right suggests.
The poll also shows little appetite for the prison guards' proposed total recall. Whereas at this stage in the process in 2003 46% of voters backed a Davis recall, only 29% do today. Even Democrats oppose a recall, 40-52.
What this means is that the Legislature and the Legislature alone is on the hook for this budget. And as the budget is getting panned by virtually every stakeholder in the state, it's likely that the Legislature's standing is only going to be damaged further by this budget, to the point where one has to wonder from a purely political standpoint whether the Dems were better off prolonging the fight.
This budget, then, represents a BIG political gamble on the part of the Legislature - that the public will hate them less for this deal than they would a further budget delay. A spring 2009 special election on the budget is almost certain, and it may include SEIU's effort to repeal much of this current deal alongside fundamental budget reforms from eliminating the 2/3 rule to the GOP's long-sought spending cap, perhaps even a constitutional convention.
For Democrats to prevail in those struggles they need public support, and ultimately, some level of trust that if the Legislature is given new powers or an easier time of making a budget they will use those powers wisely. This budget deal may make that more difficult.
Dems can still win the 2009 budget war - but to do so they're going to have to be smarter than they were this year. Perata in particular seemed to have no plan or strategy at all, and wound up cutting and running just as he did with the Denham recall. With new Senate leadership we can hope and we will expect better. The state's future hangs in the balance.
UPDATE by Dave: It's worth noting that this budget will require the voters to weigh in just to get it enacted. The provisions on the rainy-day fund and the borrowing against future lottery revenue (which is dumb, dumb, dumb) need voter sign-off. So we could see a special election as early as January. I don't know if there would be time to piggy-back 2/3 or the SEIU proposal or anything else to that election.
SACRAMENTO - California's prison guard union decided officially late Monday to attempt to recall Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger from office.
After getting a big media ride from a small news item appearing in Sunday's San Francisco Chronicle, the 31,000-member strong California Correctional Peace Officers Association confirmed that they will attempt to knock the Golden State's celebrity governor from office.
"Despite the mystique that the governor's political machine has drummed up about being this big bad union, the reality is quite different," CCPOA spokesman Lance Corcoran told PolitickerCA.com. "We are a union that has gone without a contract for two years. The governor's actions toward us have been unconscionable."
I'll believe it when I see the signature gatherers out and about. But this is a significant move. Arnold has been a failure as governor, a fact brutally revealed to the public this year. Arnold is directly responsible for the current budget shortfall . Other failures include his refusal to sign legislation, his illegal and immoral demand to slash worker pay to starvation levels, and his unwillingness to provide the necessary budget leadership - including campaigning against Republican hostage-takers in their districts. This all suggests that the recall will have legs if the CCPOA is serious about it.
The 2003 recall of Gray Davis began early that year when a group of Republican gadflies, including Ted Costa and Howard Kaloogian, took out recall petitions. Only when convicted arrested car thief Darrell Issa poured $1.6 million of his money into the recall did it take off.
Recalls are inherently unpredictable things. This one could fizzle, as countless other recalls have - or it could go viral and, with a cash infusion, reshape the state's politics as happened five years ago.
Personally I am going to wait and see before taking sides. And I want to see answers to specific questions, like those Meteor Blades asked:
could a recall truly succeed against the governor? And, if it didn't, would it damage him or help him should he decide to take on Senator Boxer. The answers to those questions would cement my support or opposition.
My own questions are "will this help us fix the budget in 2009 and 2010?" and "is this the best way for Democrats to approach winning the governor's office, including ensuring that it's a progressive Dem that we put in that office?"
The moment we see paid signature gatherers roaming the streets and strip malls of the state, we will need to begin seriously discussing how we will answer those questions.
Well-placed Sacramento sources tell us the state's politically powerful and well-financed prison guards union has lawyers drawing up language for a recall initiative.
Word is, the union will decide within the next couple of weeks whether to hit the streets with petitions....
Asked about the recall rumor, union spokesman Lance Corcoran said, "I can't comment other than to say we are taking a very hard look at it."
I'm not surprised this is being considered - given that Arnold's governorship has been a complete failure, and that he still has over two years left in office, it makes sense that someone would try to replace failed leadership with something better.
On the merits alone Arnold deserves to be recalled. His failures as governor have caused the state worse pain than anything Gray Davis did. Arnold's tax cuts and borrowing to pay for core services have broken our budget. He was nearly AWOL on the budget this year, and when he did get involved, it was to petulantly refuse to sign any new bills, breaking government even further. He wanted to make state workers suffer instead of doing the hard but necessary work of pushing Republicans to agree to a budget.
But a recall is a political act and has political consequences and it's on those grounds that we need to assess it. A recall vote would likely take place sometime in 2009, with the next gubernatorial race taking place just one year later. That would entail a lot of campaigning and perhaps not so much governing.
A recall, as we saw in 2003, is unpredictable and even more personality-driven than normal. It also lacks a party primary, which is especially important for the Democrats. Given the number of big names showing interest in the 2010 nomination, a primary is the best way to not only choose from those candidates but to provide a referendum on the future of California Democrats - whether we'll embrace a progressive future or remain mired in a corporatist past.
The recall by contrast doesn't offer that opportunity. Because of the open field Dems would have to unite early around one candidate, who might not be the best Dem around. Democrats might well be better off waiting until 2010.
It's also not clear whether a recall alone would accomplish significant change. The 2003 recall clearly didn't solve California's problems - instead it brought into sharper view the real issue - the 2/3 rule and Republican exploitation of it for their far-right purposes. Getting rid of Arnold has its value, but it wouldn't necessarily make the 2009 or 2010 budget cycles any easier.
None of that is to say it's a bad idea to pursue a recall of Arnold. But neither does it deserve our knee-jerk support. I'd be more interested in constructing a coalition to fix our state government and help California weather the worsening economic crisis, through fundamental structural reforms. That needs to be our focus, and we should consider an Arnold recall if it will get us closer to those goals.
In the first day A.M. (After Marriage), amazingly enough not every couple in California spontaneously divorced as a result of city clerks handing out licenses with "Party 1" and "Party 2". There actually are still married people out there, and now they've been joined by thousands of LGBT couples. And here are some of the highlights from today:
• It seems like every couple has an accompanying news article chronicling their wedding, but I think it's a good thing for now (though I long for the day when this is unexceptional and not a news event). Putting a human face on what can often be an abstract discussion about legal rights seems to me to be vital. There's a great series of videos featuring couples in the LA area at this link.
• There are of course detractors, although most of them are staying quiet for now. One group who isn't is the LA Archdiocese, which posted a statement denouncing "redefining marriage, which has a unique place in God's creation." Maybe this is just me, but after the events of the last decade, I don't think the Catholic church should be making any statements about sexuality whatsoever.
• True Majority and The Human Rights Campaign are but two of the organizations delivering petitions in support of marriage equality. I expect many more.
• In Bakersfield, where Kern County clerk Ann Barnett has halted her office from officiating all weddings, an under-the-radar recall campaign has commenced. By the way, there's nothing new about such actions; historian and author of "Nixonland" (which you all need to read) Rick Perlstein reminds us that this is exactly what school districts in the South did after the Brown v. the Board of Education of Topeka decision, shutting down entire school systems rather than integrating them. They called it Massive Resistance.
Of course, the people who thought like that then-here's an excellent article on one of them, Lester Maddox-are now looked upon as history's losers, as monsters, as embarrassments, and have no defenders. Now, every conservative claims to have always been on the opposite side of the Lester Maddoxes of the day. The people who think like this now will look just as bad to history as Maddox did then. I try to mention this every time I speak to a conservative audience: that I pity them. They should take care to stay off the record when they oppose basic human rights, because it will eventually come back to bite them on the ass.
But ultimately, I'm not worried about them (though if I were a Christian, I'd worry for their immortal souls), because, twenty years down the road, most will successfully maintain they were for marriage equality all along. Moral relativism has its advantages.
Don Perata has no ability to end the recall, mind you, but in his mind he's done it.
First off, let's say that I'm happy to have been on the right side of Prop. 93, the outcome of which will send Don Perata into the sunset. What a laughable bit of incompetence this is.
Let's start with the fact that he doesn't get to say what's on the ballot and what's not. The authoritarian style of "what I say goes" is the only thing that would've doomed this otherwise perfectly justifiable recall of a legislator who forgot his district and went along with an obstructionist GOP that is harming the state to a severe degree. A real Senate leader would have broadened the race into a referendum on state Republicans and would have done very well. You either do something like this full-speed or you never start it in the first place. This half-step just furthers the narrative of Democratic weakness.
Combined with the stab in the back on SD-15, where Perata demanded that nobody contest Abel Maldonado in another winnable seat, the Senate Pro Tem has assured that there is no way we reach a 2/3 majority in 2008. It's still possible by 2010, but this is a wave election, a realignment year and we're waving the white flag in two prime Senate races. That's just stupid politics. I appreciate the need to speed along the budget; the state is broke. But this recall is over by June 3, and it's not like everything's going to be wrapped up by then. And the stupidest part is that Perata RECOGNIZES that the threat of the recall was helping provide leverage for the Republicans.
In a statement, Perata credited the recall for recent legislation that passed out of the Senate:
"The vote we couldn't get last year to close the tax loophole for yacht owners -- we got that vote," he said. "The vote we couldn't get to help homeowners facing foreclosure - we got that vote. You put everyone here on notice -- and I don't think people are going to forget that anytime soon."
No, you now let everyone off the hook because you've proven you can be bullied by a Republican hissy fit and tut-tuts from the conventional wisdom crowd in the media. No Republican will EVER take a Democratic threat seriously in the near future, crippling the leadership of Darrell Steinberg. And all the leverage on getting legislation passed in the Senate just ended.
Great friggin' job, Don. If you want to just go ahead and quit now and let any stray cat from Berkeley finish out your term, that'd be just fine with me.
...the thought has crossed my mind that Perata is just taking his name and aura off the recall because it'd be easier to pass without him, but if any organization associated with him donated a dime there'd be an even bigger hissy fit cry of "hypocrite," so his dropping the recall really signals a drop of any financial infusion, and I'm not seeing how Simon Salinas or the Dump Denham group will raise the necessary funds (especially considering that Denham is not restricted by any fundraising limits in a recall).
The intellectual inconsistencies are impossible to miss in this story on the Denham recall. It'd be a lot more effective to cry and whine about a power grab and unfair tactics, for example, if you DON'T tip off that you're planning on doing it yourself.
Jon Fleischman, vice chairman of the California Republican Party, said Perata was misusing the recall process, which is meant to boot people from office for serious misconduct. Fleischman and other activists in Orange County said that if the Denham recall succeeds, a similar campaign might be launched against Lou Correa, a Democratic state senator from Santa Ana.
Actually, the right answer is to reform the recall process, not to vow to "misuse" it again, if you want to remain on the intellectual and moral high ground.
But that's not surprising, of course, since the same people whining about the recall today are the ones who benefited from it in 2003.
Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who supported the budget Denham refused to vote for and even traveled at the time to Denham's district to pressure him, has disparaged the recall that's on the June 3 ballot.
"Obviously, it is political," Schwarzenegger said when asked about the effort at a recent Sacramento news conference, adding that the budget vote as "a reason for recall I think is ludicrous."
Riiiight, because Gray Davis wasn't recalled because of a budget deficit.
Like Fleischman, Denham says Perata was abusing the recall process, which is meant to remove from office people who act illegally. But backers of the recall effort note that Denham contributed $17,000 in 2003 to the Republican-led effort to recall Gov. Gray Davis, who was under criticism for the budget mess but had not been accused of criminal conduct.
It's just so hard to keep things straight, and figure out which are the RIGHT recalls and which are the WRONG ones. So good that we have honest brokers like Jon Fleischman and Jeff Denham to set us straight.
It's also a bad thing, we're told, that people in Sacramento and abroad are telling the good people of the 12th District what to do. Good thing there's none of that happening among Denham supporters:
Denham has raised $1.1 million to fight the recall. Major contributions include $50,000 from the Los Angeles Casinos Political Action Committee and $25,000 from the Pechanga Band of Mission Indians, which has a casino in Temecula.
Most of the members of the Los Angeles Casinos PAC, we all know, live in Stanislaus County.
Yesterday I noted that even Dan Walters was coming around on budget solutions that addressed the revenue problem. Today there's news that Republicans in the State Senate crossed party lines to pass a mortgage relief bill.
SB 1137 would give notice to property residents that the foreclosure process has begun, provide tenants additional time to move from a foreclosed property, and mandate maintenance of foreclosed properties to diminish the impact on the value of neighboring homes.
A previous version of this bill, SB 926, failed on the Senate floor in January when it fell one vote short of passage and faced opposition from the financial services industry. Since then, Senator Perata has addressed industry concerns and produced a more workable bill that has broad support and no known opposition.
One of those Senator who voted for the bill? Senator Scared as a Chicken in a Fox Cage Jeff Denham. He actually spoke on the Senate floor in favor of the bill. That's no accident: two of the worst-hit counties in terms of foreclosures are in his district (Stanislaus and Merced). Cox, Maldonado and Wyland joined the majority as well. The final vote was 28-10.
This is a compromise bill, to be sure (only loans from January 1, 2003 and December 31, 2007 are included), but would provide more transparency and the ability for homeowners to get help before foreclosure, as well as increased notification for renters whose property heads into foreclosure, which is an increasing problem.
What's notable here is the Republican support, which suggests that they're starting to feel pressure on issues like the mortgage crisis from their constituents. The old saw in California politics is that these Republicans are so gerrymandered into their seats that they can't be moved by public outcry. I'm not sure that's true anymore, and it's something to be recognized as we head into the budget fight.
As for Denham, I think he's got a bigger problem with his racist campaign manager, but clearly he's trying to radically backtrack his Senate history and come off as a nice moderate. Since this week is the deadline for bills to move from the Senate to the Assembly, we're going to see him tested on a lot of votes in the coming days.
Senator Jeff Denham knows he can't win on his record. He knows that the state's budget is screwed, he was and remains part of the problem and people are smart enough to put it together. And since he can't resist a recall on his actual performance as a legislator, he's left bitching and moaning over ticky-tack stuff that only matters if you're scared of being judged on your merits.
So today, Denham filed two criminal complaints against Senator Don Perata. They object to some pretty innocuous and obscure actions- like a Senate staffer translating a transcript- which, while worth being looked at, have nothing to do with the actual substance of the recall election. It's misdirection, it's obfuscation, and it's a refusal to take responsibility for the crisis that the state is facing. Par for the course these days from the Yacht Party and it's preference for party loyalty over productive governance.
Senator Denham continues to base his entire campaign on the notion that his behavior is no business of anyone outside the district. He complains that Perata shouldn't be involved, outside activists shouldn't be involved, that the eyes of the state have been unjustly turned to his record and district. But when Senator Denham obstructs a workable budget, it isn't just his district that suffers. Kids are losing teachers in every corner of the state because of the budget shortfall that Denham helped create. Vital services are being slashed across California because Denham refuses to deal in fiscal reality instead of partisan obstinacy.
We're all in Jeff Denham's district, and if he's going to whine about it, maybe he should find a different line of work.
Update: Just received a press release (full text below the flip) accusing Denham's campaign of using state email accounts to solicit state employees for campaign purposes. State resources should, it seems, be used to protect his own hide but not to provide basic services to Californians. Presumably the resources in question do not exclusively come from his Senate district. We're all in Jeff Denham's district.
The recall was launched against Sen. Jeff Denham for one reason only.
He refused to vote for a budget billions out of balance. But then the non-partisan Legislative Analyst proved him right, forecasting an additional $10 billion in red ink.
Local newspapers label this recall an "Abuse of the ballot box." (The Monterey County Herald 2/17/2008)
-- a "sham." (The Madera Tribune, 3/21/2008)
"Petty politics" (Hollister Freelance 2/19/2008)
And "Unjustified" (Fresno Bee 3/20/2008)
Saying this recall is "Just plain wrong." (Merced Sun-Star 2/11/2008)
Simón Salinas has pulled papers to run in the Denham recall. He has until 5 p.m. tomorrow to turn in papers and signatures.
One Republican has also pulled papers, but there is a question about residency which may disqualify John Nevill, a Monterey County health care compliance officer.
I'm sure there will be a few stragglers on the ballot, but if Salinas is it that would significantly increase the chances of the recall, since Denham is not on that part of the ballot. It's an expansive district and no candidate has a power base throughout it, but between Salinas' stronghold in the Monterey County area, and the new report that Stanislaus County has turned blue, with a 5,000-vote registration shift between 2006 and today, there is obviously a lot of movement here, and if Denham continues to whine about the process than his record, his days are numbered.
[UPDATE by Robert]Hank Shaw is reporting that Anna Caballero's brief flirtation with a run has ended, clearing the field for Salinas.
Assemblywoman Anna Caballero, D-Salinas, said Thursday that she may jump into the race to replace Sen. Jeff Denham, R-Merced, if he is recalled by voters.
Caballero had indicated she wouldn't enter the race, but said she's reconsidering because of calls from Democratic activists in the San Joaquin Valley, part of the sprawling 12th Senate District.
"These are cold calls, from people that I don't know," she said.
It would be quite interesting to know who is making these calls. Caballero might well be a strong candidate - before taking her seat in the Assembly she was the Mayor of Salinas, and has a good organizing presence in the Salinas Valley. Of course, most of the district is over in the San Joaquin Valley - hence these calls.
Caballero's profile is also VERY similar to the other potential candidate, former Assemblyman Simón Salinas:
Caballero joins Monterey County Supervisor Simón Salinas as a possible candidate. Salinas again said Thursday that he is considering whether to enter the contest, which will go before voters at the time of the June 3 primary.
"Frankly, it comes down to (whether) we can get enough resources to get our message out," Salinas said. "It is such a big geographical area."
The filing deadline for candidates in the hurry-up election is 5 p.m. Saturday.
As Randy Bayne explained yesterday, Salinas was believed to already be planning a run at Denham's seat in the 2010 election - which, if successful, would let him stay in the seat until 2018. But if he took Denham's place through the recall, he'd have to step down in 2014. Caballero, on the other hand, is only in her first term in the Assembly, and could presumably return there in 2014 if she chose.
Again, the filing deadline is Saturday at 5pm, and I'll bring you updates as I get them.
[UPDATE by Dave] I just want to add right at the top so he can see it that Denham flak Kevin Spillane is a worthless hack, and his little press release he wrote about me based on a recent blog post couldn't be more distorted and wrong. The media is buying in to his stupid hissy fit, apparently unarmed with any institutional memory that goes back to 2003, that any recall election against a Republican is an abuse of power. Grow some cajones, Kevin, and defend your candidate instead of inventing a boogeyman in the most hypocritical way possible. There will be a Democratic candidate, he'll come from the Central Valley, and he'll be a damn sight better than the unthinking automaton rubber stamp Jeff Denham turned out to be. If you can't defend your candidate you'll lose. Period.
Lots of news today on the Denham recall, including Randy Bayne's pessimistic view over in the recent diaries list. And here is some more: two new ads backing the recall are going to begin airing locally, paid for by the CDP. The TV ad is called "Sleeping":
We sent Jeff Denham to Sacramento.
So how did he wind up with jet lag?
He spent thousands on travel - while the Senate was in session.
Airline tickets. Trips to Vegas. And a Sedona spa.
When he does show up, he's sleepwalking.
Denham held up the budget, hurting our schools
Denham said he wasn't taking raises - then secretly raised his pay by 20 percent.
The Fresno Bee called it "not quite honest."
Don't you deserve better?
Vote yes on the recall
A radio ad will also be aired - the copy of it, also provided by FDR, is over the flip.
Poor planning may be what ultimately spells disaster for proponents of recalling Senator Jeff Denham. They were so gung-ho about collecting enough signatures to place the recall on the ballot, they seemingly forgot part two of the plan - a candidate to replace Denham if the recall was successful.
Of two seriously mentioned candidates, Merced County DA Larry Morse and Monterey County Supervisor Simón Salinas, only Salinas remains, and he has not committed. Morse has declined to be a candidate.
As I was discussing this with someone else, I realized that a significant problem this campaign had from the start was planning for the gathering of signatures while not planning steps if the recall actually qualified. It leaves me wondering if they really thought they would get enough signatures in the first place.
They should have understood that a recall is really two questions. First, should someone be recalled. Second, who replaces him or her. Proponents seem to have focused on the first without thinking much about the second. Now they are left scrambling to meet a Friday deadline to get a candidate.
Further complicating matters is term-limits. Since Denham has already served two years his recall replacement will only get the remainder of his terms, six years, at most. Sources tell me Salinas was going to challenge Denham in 2010 anyway. He would then be eligible for the full eight years, or until 2018. If he wins in the recall he can stay until 2014. Salinas, or any candidate, will need some kind of assurances into the future if they are expected grab the immediate six years rather than wait another two to get eight. Make sense?
Recall proponents have little time to find a candidate who would be willing to come in for the short term. It would have to be someone willing to just give Democrats an extra budget vote this summer, one that perhaps will be the difference. It will truly have to be someone who has little, if any, interest in remaining in politics, and possibly someone who is willing to just fill out the remain two years on Denham's first term then step aside in favor of a party favorite.
Underlying the lack of planning on the part of recall enthusiasts, is the question of out-of-state signature gatherers involved in the petition collection. Hank Shaw notes:
What is highly amusing is that the Denham folks are asking local law enforcement to investigate the matter. Why is this amusing? Because the man who would be responsible for such an investigation would be none other than ... Larry Morse, the Merced County District Attorney. Yes, the same Larry Morse who would have clearly been Denham's most formidible opponent in the recall, had he chosen to pull the trigger. For the record, he didn't.
There seems to be evidence a plenty to get signatures kicked, but that may not be needed. Poor planning and a lack of a candidate may be enough to doom the recall.
