 |
|---|
| Lighten Up, Francis! |
| Fundraising posts only happen quarterly, and are gone as soon as we meet the goal. Help make it happen. |
Posted on 10/02/2003 2:16:40 AM PDT by JohnHuang2
The Sept. 24th debate among the five major contenders to succeed California Gov. Gray Davis if he is recalled was probably the defining moment of the campaign – and highly educational. Those California voters who didn't know their state's finances are in a mess know it now.
Schwarzenegger frankly surprised me. His knowledge of California's problems is probably very recently acquired and fairly superficial, but he is not the total airhead I feared he was. The post-debate polls indicate he probably did his candidacy some good.
State Sen. Tom McClintock was once again the class of the array – a deeply principled conservative who knows California government like the back of his hand and proposed a series of constructive steps to rescue it. He is probably too conservative on social issues like abortion to appeal to most California voters, but he too, according to the polls, impressed many viewers favorably, because of his transparent integrity and his candor.
Arianna Huffington, according to those same polls, was the night's big loser – a living reminder of just how obnoxious a loud-mouthed person can be. She couldn't stick to any topic, and was the only candidate to engage in personal attacks – mostly aimed at Schwarzenegger. She spent so much time railing against President Bush that Schwarzenegger mildly suggested she ought to be campaigning in New Hampshire rather than California. But she probably nailed down the support of a good many militant feminists who might otherwise have voted for the sole Democrat, Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante.
The evening's biggest surprise was provided by Peter Camejo, the Green Party's candidate. He turned out to be a rabid leftist, who didn't bother to conceal the streak of hatred so typical of leftists. Camejo's ire is directed at corporations and "the rich," and his whole solution to California's budget problems is to tax both groups till the pips squeak, while increasing spending and lowering taxes for everybody else. We are going to have to watch the Green Party a little more closely hereafter. If Camejo even mentioned the environment, I missed it. If he truly represents the Green Party, maybe it should be renamed the Red Party. (But Camejo appealed powerfully to some of the militant liberals in the audience, and hence – like Huffington – may draw needed votes away from Bustamante.)
As for poor Bustamante, his performance was so pathetic that not even the liberal media could bring themselves to praise it. (With McClintock and Schwarzenegger the evening's best performers, the media were forced to declare the winner was ... Gray Davis!) The porky Democratic lieutenant governor, who was, of course, complicit in producing the state's $38 billion deficit, was forced to admit "we overspent." But he couldn't overcome a lifetime in Democratic politics and call for less spending. So he proposed new taxes on everything but San Francisco's famous fog, and called the result (which would wreck the state) "tough love."
For whom, then, should a conscientious conservative vote? Certainly not against recalling Gray Davis – an insipid, incompetent disaster. But a vote for McClintock reduces the otherwise very real possibility that Schwarzenegger (who, according to most polls, is respectably ahead of McClintock, and only slightly behind Bustamante) might win, and keep Bustamante from replacing Davis. Is Schwarzenegger conservative enough, or even Republican enough, to justify a California conservative to vote for him over McClintock?
This is an old dilemma in politics – a familiar example of being between a rock and a hard place. It's basically a question of when it is time to rise above principle and vote pragmatically for victory. And this, it seems to me, is one of those cases in which reasonable men and women can differ.
|
|---|
| Lighten Up, Francis! |
| Fundraising posts only happen quarterly, and are gone as soon as we meet the goal. Help make it happen. |
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.