Californians: Who'll Enter The Recall?

Great Debates
1

Well, it appears that there will be a recall election for Governor in California, though it isn’t certain yet when it’ll be held.

The question I put forward are as follows:

  1. Who’ll run in the election, and

  2. Who’ll win?

2

I’ve been following this story, even though I’m currently a New Jerseyan and am a native Pennsylvanian. (I’ve never even been to California.) But it’s an interesting story, to say the least.

It looks like the California Democratic Party isn’t going to nominate another Democrat to run for the office; they’re sticking with Davis. The Republicans are going to push their own candidates, but they don’t seem sufficiently unified yet. I’m not sure they will be. For all the fun it is to speculate about, I don’t see Schwartzenegger running. Simon will probably step forward, but he fizzled the last time, and he’d fizzle again. Riordan, if he wants to maintain respectability as a moderate in California, won’t do it. Which leaves Issa, the man behind the overturn of the election. I think he’s the most likely candidate whom the Republicans will get behind. The Democrats have already gotten behind Davis, and while Davis isn’t the best-loved man in California these days, my money would be on Davis to beat the recall.

I don’t know if Camejo will pipe up and run on the Green platform. The Greens would siphon support from Davis, but I don’t think they’d get enough to win the election. They’re the wild card in this.

3

Well, according to www.politics1.com, Camejo and Ron Gulke (the AIP candidate for Governor in the last election) have already announced that they are running.

4

As I noted in another thread, the threshold for candidacy in the recall is low: 65 signatures and $3500 to get on the ballot. Really.

I’m hoping there’s hundreds of candidates. Thousands.

Then maybe we’ll fix the recall laws to be less silly the next time around. I’ve no problem with recalls, but the CA statutes are royally screwed up.

5

Say…what’s that job pay?

6

If Richard Riordan runs (and I hope he does), I’d give him a very good chance of winning. I definitely think he would have won the governorship last year if the state GOP would have had the sense to nominate him.

If Schwarzenegger runs, I give him a decent shot at challenging Davis - not because he’s a particularly attractive candidate, of course, but because he’s NotDavis. He also undoubtedly has the best name recognition, and may even turn out to be more of a front-runner than Riordan. If he does win, though, I predict he will fall victim to the Jesse Ventura effect and suck in a big way.

If Issa and Simon really run, I will laugh long and heartily at their expense.

7

I want to know where to sign up to recall Darry Issa, myself.

8

I’m not sure. But if you head on over to your local Mercedes dealer, I’m sure they’d have some ideas.

9

You can’t. Federal officials (which include Congressmen) are not covered under recall laws.

10

I heard on the news tonight that according to California law, the Lt Gov has the option to take over as Gov with no election. I’m just wondering why anybody would want to be Gov of California, with all the problems to look forward to.

11

With my endorser, how can I lose?

12

Looks like the judge pushed up the date of verification of those signatures, so it could be tricky to get them verified in time.

13

As someone actually living in California, I have a bit of a vested interest in this recall (though I still have mixed feelings about it, in spite of my intense loathing of Davis). My thoughts:

  • Simon will run, but won’t fare well. He has the potential to be a decent enough governor, but he ran the worst campaign this side of Mondale, and people remember that. It’s a testament to how detested Davis is that he did as well as he did in the last election.

  • Riordan probably won’t run, but I think if he did, he would win. He would’ve won the last election, too, if Davis hadn’t orchestrated a masterful smear campaign against him during the primaries. I don’t particularly like the guy, as he’s the prototypical RINO - far more liberal than Davis is. But from what I can tell, he’s neither as inept nor as corrupt as Davis, so he would still be a welcome change.

  • I would like to see a Schwarzenegger bid, just because that would be cool. I don’t know if he would be great or not - my semi-WAG is that he would be competent, not wonderful, although generally likeable. I don’t see him suffering the fate of Ventura, though. Ventura is a showboating buffoon, with laughably idealistic populist notions, and no plan for seeing those notions come about. Conversely, Arnie hasn’t made his platform known, yet. We know he’s pro-choice, pro-gay-rights, pro-free-market, and big on education. Beyond that, it’s anybody’s guess. If he declares his intention to run, we’ll see his platform, and then we can more accurately peg the guy. For now, I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he’s at least moderately (no pun intended) realistic.

  • Issa has virtually no support. If he wins, I’ll eat my keyboard.

  • There’s been talk of McClintock running, too. His numbers look better than Issa’s and Simon’s, but worse than Arnie’s and Riordan’s. If neither of the latter enter the race, and the recall is a success, he’d likely win. Lots of ifs, though.

  • Generally speaking, I think if Riordan or Arnold enter the race, Davis is out. If neither do, Davis will squeak by yet again (and then refer to his 51% victory against the recall as “clear evidence that he has the overwhelming support of Californians”, or some such BS). If both Riordan and Arnie enter, I give Riordan the edge, but not by much. All things considered, I give the recall about a 35% chance of working right now.
    Jeff

14

Esprix for Guv’nor!

15

As far as I know, Riordan is the only candidate who could run who’d be worth a damn. The guy proved himself to be a capable leader during his tenure as mayor of Los Angeles. Of course, he did this largely by not playing the radical-right-party-line card, which is why he didn’t get the nomination last year, and why folks like ElJeffe won’t support him.

All I know is, if the recall does go ahead, I’d like to see Davis win in a landslide just so Darryl Issa will be proven to be the clueless dolt that he is.

16

So when Davis is recalled, he can’t be a candidate and be re-elected.

And Esprix is already running for Vice President in 2004. Sorry to burst that bubble.

17

Lord, I’ve made it into someone’s sig line. :smiley:

Esprix

18

Well, the following is official:

  1. The Governor has been recalled*, and,

  2. There will be an election on October 7th to determine if he will be removed or not.

*- To have a special election called is to be recalled; the loss of a recall election results in removal. It is therefore possible to be recalled without being removed.

19

If the Republicans don’t run a candidate who is a moderate, they’re doomed. Even if they were to remove Davis, they would replace him with an even more unpopular replacement if it’s somebody like Issa or McClintock.

I think it’s funny that only in California would somebody like Riordan, who served 8 years as mayor of the second largest city in the country, says he won’t run for governor unless Arnold Schwarzenegger does.

I can just see the entire East Coast laughing about that one.

It would be like Rudy Giuliani not running for governor of New York because he is worried that Nathan Lane might enter the race.

20

Question: What would stop someone from recalling the next Governor say, a week after the recall election? If the result is really annoying to a lot of people (say, if Issa wins), could a bunch of Davis supporters force another recall immediately thereafter?