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October 01, 2003, 9:36 a.m.
Quitting in a Huff
The final dynamics.
LOS ANGELES — Arianna Huffington has quit the California recall race. Instead of voiting Arianna, she urges three "No" votes and one "Yes" from her supporters next Tuesday. "No" on: the recall, Schwarzenegger, and Ward Connerly's Proposition 54. "Yes "on Arianna's future initiative for taxpayer-funded campaigns.
Huffington's withdrawal makes the race more partisan, and could wind up helping Davis. But defeating the recall will be tough. With each passing day, more pro-recall absentee ballots are mailed in. Absentees will comprise at least one-third the total vote. They are disproportionately age 45+ votes, more likely to be anti-Davis. At this point, Davis needs a stunning Election Day reversal to pull a stay in office off.
As for Bustamante, his continued presence confounds Davis. That's because the Cruzer does not motivate Democrats. Bustamante turns off African Americans, scares moderates, and ignores whites. Other than that, he has broad appeal. Still, Bustamante is the escape hatch for Democrats. He's currently short on campaign cash, but not going away.
The Davis hits on Schwarzeneggar may be too little, too late. For voters, Arnold seems a can-do, take-charge guy. In this fantasy of cognitive dissonance, few voters care about his nonvoting record or his flip-flops. The mega-endorsements of Arnold by Republican leaders make it is socially acceptable for McClintock voters to switch.
The pro-Arnold California Chamber of Commerce yesterday released its post-debate poll. Recall sentiment is unchanged, about 53 percent yes, 41 percent no. The same poll shows changes, over three weeks: Schwarzenegger, 28 percent to 35 percent; Bustamante, 33 percent to 31 percent; McClintock, 12 percent to 17 percent. Arnold's slim lead, plus Arianna's resignation, put new pressure on McClintock to leave. Perhaps that was the Chamber's intention.
But the McClintock folks yesterday sent two curious e-mailings. The first publicized the CNN-Gallup poll post-debate poll — Schwarzenegger, 40 percent; Bustamante, 25 percent; McClintock, 18 percent. The McClintock team argued that Republicans could now vote for McClintock, since Bustamante can't win. Twenty minutes later, McClintock's campaign sent another e-mail, spinning the CNN/Gallup poll this way: If Arnold dropped, McClintock would beat Bustamante by 56 percent to 37 percent.
And what about McClintock? A frustrated Bill Simon volunteer from last year's campaign writes me "outraged" at the "outrage" expressed by conservative talk-show hosts who harp on McClintock's intransigence. Where were these talk-show hosts, the 2002 Simon campaign operative asks, when "moderates sat on their hands"? Had the party united behind Simon, he argues, Simon would have won "even with all our mistakes." Did you ever see Congressman David Dreier, he asks, "admonishing everyone to unite behind Bill"?
Even so, this Simon loyalist tilts Arnold: "Arnold's best move is to disregard Tom and move ahead."
The Los Angeles Times poll out today (which shows Prop 54 going down) shows on the recall: 57 percent yes, 43 percent no. On candidates, it's Schwarzenegger at 40 percent; Cruz at 32 percent; McClintock at 15 percent. Without a seismic shift, we'll be talking Gov. Schwarzenegger at this time next week. Yet, Arnold has 58-percent favorable ratings and 39-percent unfavorable, yielding a net positive of only 19 percent. But McClintock's 62-percent favorable/25-percent unfavorable yields a net positive of 37 percent, nearly twice Arnold's!
There's more in this poll. A bare plurality thinks Bustamante has the character and integrity to be governor. By nearly 2-to-1, voters think Arnold does. But by more than 5-to-1, voters say McClintock has the necessary character and integrity.
In other words, on paper, McClintock is Mr. Universe, and Conan is the Barbarian. But does McClintock have a bright future? Perhaps, seemingly paradoxically, only if the recall itself fails. If the recall succeeds, consider this reality: Arnold's major domo is former Wilson chief-of-staff (get-mad-and-get-even) Bob White. Thus, if Republican Arnold wins over Democrat Bustamante, that means McClintock is history. And if Arnold loses to Bustamante, McClintock, not Arnold's campaign, will be blamed.
Regardless, McClintock gets no bonus points from Republican kingmakers for (a) not holding blockbuster news conferences confronting Arnold, or (b) giving Arnold a get-out-of-debate free pass. McClintock may not have had it in his power to win, but surely he had it in his power to destroy Arnold. Perhaps the two were inseparable. Whatever McClintock did, he did it his way.
— Arnold Steinberg is a California-based political consultant.
