Welcome.
I don’t recall him saying that; my google-fu isn’t producing a quote to that effect, but perhaps someone else on the thread can fill in…?
Statewide 71% reporting
San Diego County 56.4% reporting
Orange County 57.8% reporting
Riverside County 82.0% reporting
Fresno County 97.8% reporting
Placer County 100% reporting
Los Angeles is still only reporting 21%
No way any of these turn around.
Arnold = :wally
Update: at 11:44pm, props 73 and 75 are 1.2 and .8 points apart, respectively. All other CA initiatives look headed to defeat. I’m guessing 73 & 75 will be resolved sometime Wednesday or Thursday, but we’ll see.
I would be just stunned to see all of the intiatives nuked. I’d guess that would a) be seen as a huge slap to Schwarzenegger, and b) a huge slap to a costly special election.
You’re probably right, but it’s best to be cautious…
Sizeable and very liberal Alameda is also at ~30% reporting and dumping everything hard ( except 79 and even that is losing ). I’m inclined to agree this might be a sweep.
- Tamerlane
81% reporting, still (cautiously) looking like a sweep. Definitive numbers on Wednesday.
Propositions Yes Votes Pct. No Votes Pct.
73 N Minor's Pregnancy 2,632,074 48.5 2,785,015 51.5 Map
74 N Teacher Tenure 2,530,419 46.3 2,927,366 53.7 Map
75 N Public Union Dues 2,641,042 48.4 2,809,872 51.6 Map
76 N Spending/Funding 2,139,899 39.3 3,304,821 60.7 Map
77 N Redistricting 2,272,831 42.0 3,133,631 58.0 Map
78 N Rx Drug Discounts 2,240,598 41.7 3,124,777 58.3 Map
79 N Rx Drug Rebates 2,052,110 38.5 3,267,023 61.5 Map
80 N Electric Regulation 1,782,839 34.0 3,449,095 66.0 Map
They all failed. Interestingly, all but one of the Ohio measures failed, including all the “reform” measures, and by wide margins. Here, it was Democrats taking on the task of being reformers.
It would seem that the public didn’t want to “reform” much of anything. I get a sense of “leave us the hell alone” in this… 
The biggies for Schwatzenneger were 75 and 76. Looks like 75 was pretty close, but 76 was just clobbered. Well, Arnold, the people have spoken…
Hey, but I hear he has “people power” behind him. :smack:
The people have indeed spoken; I think that they’re saying:
Leave us alone.
Go to Sacramento and try governing, and legislating. That’s what you were elected to do.
(At least, that’s what I hope they’re saying.)
I said exaclty that to someone this morning with whom I was discussing these results. Don’t come crying to us because you can’t work out your issues. Just do your job, and leave us the hell alone!
He didn’t say we were making too much. He called us a “special interest group” and suspended a law to lower nurse/patient ratios, calling them a “tactic” of our union to get more nurses in the field, and that it would cost too much.
I’m not surprised that they all went down the crapper. Many of the “NO” votes were likely cast not just because of the propositions, but because of the whole special election itself, Arnold, his attitude, his strategies, and especially his rhetoric.
I was a pollworker in a local precinct yesterday, handing ballots to people as they went to the booths. I worked there for fourteen hours! I’m sure glad A-hnold’s pet project fizzed out.
He seems to be as popular now in California as a cactus in a nudist colony. 
Every one of the proposals was defeated. Arnold road in on a wave of anger and resentment against Gray Davis (anyone but Davis was the refrain). There was a fresh memory of ENRON, rolling blackouts (which were deliberate) and sky high energy costs, which had been “facilitated” by deregulation. There was cronyism and there were constant reports and scandals of fat contracts for Gray’s buddies, and a “pay to play” kickback scheme. There appeared to be lots of money vanishing into a black hole somewhere. Nobody knew where, and nobody was responsible. When we elected Arnold, through a recall, our message was pretty clear - clean up the state, stop cronyism, fix the budget.
What did we get? More of the same. Teachers, firefighters etc became the new whipping boys, not the various contractors who got fat off the system.
Then, the initiatives came out.
One was about union dues being used for lobbying and mobilizing. It was an attempt to hobble the unions, while it did nothing to limit anyone else - management, politicians, companies were not limited at all. We voted it down as “just more cronyism”, and as a one sided deal.
Another was about abortion and parent notification. Some saw it as interference by religious groups. I did. Some saw it as not being any business of the state, whether someone needed to notify parents or guardians - we told the state to butt out of personal matters. Some saw it as an invasion of privacy. Finally, some saw the real possibility that the parents might use pressure to “call off” an abortion.
Just about all the Arnold props were about getting more power, either for himself, or his big money pals.
Then there were Prop 78 and 79. Prop 78 was backed by the pharmaceutical companies and had no teeth. It was voluntary, and nobody could be compelled to comply. A point was rightly made, that it has been voluntary all along, and this prop would do nothing. Its title sounded cool, but we saw through the bullshit.
Pro 79 would have been more worthwhile, since it would have required the Pharmaceuticals to comply, but it was voted down.
Lastly, Pro 80 was a reaction against ENRON, Ken Lay, the blackouts, and all of that. It would have brought back regulation.
Anyway, I only voted for 79 and 80.
Well, after seeing what Dopers posted here, I wasn’t surprised to see everything voted down. I knew Arnold meant well with his props, but he totally mishandled the campaign to push them through. In a year to a few years, some of the decisions here will come back to haunt us…especially 75, 76, 77 and probably 80.
The unions totally played Arnold on 75 because his earlier saber-rattling (poorly chosen rhetoric) backfired and he became villified by the unions, which was already and easy thing for them to do. Opt-In should always be the system for anything dealing with money. From sales pitches by phone and fax, to credit card billings, to dues, etc…everything should be primarily controlled by the person who is paying or buying (or considering to buy). The unions are the top lobbyists in the capital and are totally against change, even if the change is for the betterment of the state as a whole. I’ve seen this happen with companies that went bankrupt and closed down because the labor costs made the company uncompetitive. This can also happen with the State.
Prop 76 would have been a great tool to pound out a state budget on time, and balanced. It would have gotten the state legislature to get off their ass and do something instead of playing chicken with the governor, like in past years. The unions played Arnold again on this one, since they control the majority of the state budget’s costs and will not relinquish the cost increases that may outstrip revenues which increases our debt. This will definitely come to an unfortunate situation within 3-5 years and we will be forced into some type of draconian cutbacks of services…mark my words. The business I own will probably be directly affected, and I will have to choose whether to move out of state or just shut down and retire early. Don’t cry for me though…just cry for 150 disabled adults and 60 employees.
The campaign against 77 was built just upon one idea that 3 judges held ultimate power that went unchecked and omitted several key elements that made this prop very useful in a fairer representation of the voting public. I fault Arnold for not coming in and telling the public EARLIER to combat this nefarious tactic (which was more than likely funded by incumbants using an advertising agency as a front). What they deceptively didn’t tell voters was that the proposed new districts would still have to be approved by the voting public that created a check and balance system against the 3 judges, and that the current system is gerrymandered by the legislature themselves. Arnold…you idiot! This was such an easy strawman to burn…months ago! Dare I go to the Daily KOS for some supportive editorial?
As for 80, I’m still not sure of which would have been the better outcome, but I do know that the governor and legislature will end up doing another bandaid approach which will be costly like last time, when we get squeezed like an orange every summer until we outlay billions more to upgrade our electrical transmission and generation system, which of course, we can’t afford. Just a matter of time before air conditioners are viewed as Hummers in this state. Tell that to the frail and elderly who will be dropping like flies (when they can’t afford to run them)…comparable to the frail and elderly dying in 100+ degree July heat in Chicago.
In closing, I realize that most of the votes were just to spite Arnold blowing $80M on an elective election (say that 5 times), and most people decided to just vote on The Man and not the actual proposals. I didn’t even vote for Arnold in the recall, but I took each prop put forth seriously by him and others because there is a dire need for reform. But when you have a state with an unpopular governor and even a more unpopular legislature [pdf] with opposing viewpoints, I fear the worst is still yet to come. [HTML version] $80M will be a drop in the bucket compared to the unnecessary costs that we allow to remain in place to burden us in the years to come.
Prop 75 was an idiocy only a hack political neophyte like Arnold would make.
Let’s see, right now, people can opt out of political contributions, which every union member can do anytime they expend the mental energy to think about it for more than half a second and decide that’s what they want to do. Sure, the decision only gets made when they renew, but then again, a lot of things are like that: You follow your best judgement, and if you miscalculate, you get stuck with the results for a little while until decision time comes around again. The California recall election comes to mind.
Prop 75 would have forced the unions to hold some sort of vote everytime they wanted to mount a political endeavor, and you can be sure good state tax money would have been spent suing them if they didn’t. Other politically active organizations would not be restricted in this fashion. It would have slowed down only union political activity, and possibly reduced their available funds for that purpose.
So, Arnie, given the possibility that the political funds might slow down if you prevailed, what exactly did the unions have to lose by spending every political dime they had to stop you?!?
Schwarzenegger = :wally
Hey Scotandrsn- That’s exactly how I interpreted that one too. I voted against it. I made a special point of voting against that one.
That’s not fair to the other :wallyes!
But if he’d actually thought through the ramifications of Prop. 75 (not to mention some others) ahead of time, we would have missed out on all the fun.
(To Arnold: :rolleyes: Oh, and: :wally too. )