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Republican state Senator Jeffrey Denham will face a recall election later this year after the secretary of state certified the petitions seeking the vote. Denham's 12th Senate District includes all or parts of Madera, Merced, Monterey, San Benito, and Stanislaus counties. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger will schedule the recall election, which will be held between 60 and 80 days from Tuesday. Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata, a Democrat from Oakland, has supported the recall effort. He has been critical of Denham for refusing to support last year's state budget during a lengthy deadlock. Opponents needed to collect 31,084 valid signatures...

The same grass-roots group that launched the successful recall of Gov. Gray Davis turned its attention to the Legislature on Thursday and kicked off an initiative drive to reconfigure legislative districts so that politicians face tougher competition on election day. Ted Costa, chief executive officer of the conservative antitax group, People's Advocate, has taken the first step toward putting an initiative before voters next November that would take redistricting out of the hands of the Legislature and give it to a panel of retired judges. Costa does not want to wait eight years to get rid of the district boundaries...

The fires are giving Arnold Schwarzenegger a golden opportunity. They're allowing him to quickly choose the kind of governor he wants to be: practical or political. Flexible or rigid. We're talking taxes. Schwarzenegger can opt to be the "never-say-never" pragmatist on taxes that he was when his gubernatorial campaign began — the candidate who declared, after a ballyhooed meeting with economic advisors: "You can't ever say never [on tax increases] because we could have next year an earthquake. We could have a natural disaster. We could have a terrorist attack or something like that." Or Schwarzenegger can stick with the...

Re "Bush, Schwarzenegger Agree to Agree for Now," Oct. 17: President Bush's California visit with our governor-elect Thursday highlighted the rock-and-a-hard-place situation in which state Democrats find themselves. Arnold Schwarzenegger's landslide election as a moderate Republican demolishes the belief in California as a Democratic monolith with 55 electoral votes for next year's presidential election. It is a political impossibility for a Democrat to win the White House without California's electoral votes. For that reason, state Democratic leaders cannot allow Schwarzenegger to succeed or even begin to turn around the state's fiscal nightmare. Should he succeed, his coattails could possibly wrap...

LOS ANGELES -- Now that Arnold Schwarzenegger has been elected governor, California newspaper editors are scratching their heads over the daily challenge of squeezing his 14-letter last name into a headline. Copy editors, given large headlines to work with during the recall election, are likely to have smaller spaces for daily stories on state government. "There were copy editors across the state who were dreading the prospect of Schwarzenegger becoming governor, not because of politics but because of the fit," said John Armstrong, editor of the Contra Costa Times. Editors at the newspaper briefly discussed using Schwarzenegger's three initials, like...

When The Los Angeles Times published articles just days before the California recall election detailing reports of inappropriate sexual behavior by Arnold Schwarzenegger, its editor steadfastly defended the timing. "It is a paper's job to disclose anything it knows that bears on a candidate's fitness for office — before Election Day, not after," the editor, John Carroll, said. But Republicans on talk radio, the Internet and some cable television talk shows accused the newspaper of shilling for Gov. Gray Davis. And many voters agreed. "This is a Davis ploy — he's the king of dirty tricks," one Schwarzenegger voter said,...

In the wake of California's recall election, the temptation to draw far-reaching conclusions is strong. Despite 11th-hour allegations against Republican Gov.-elect Arnold Schwarzenegger, the final results were decisive. Schwarzenegger, a political novice and outsider, overcame accusations of sexual harassment, past drug use and alleged admiration for Adolf Hitler, and he did so while offering precious few specifics about what he will do as governor. He ducked all but the final debate among the major candidates, and he relied heavily on the so-called soft media, with appearances on Jay Leno's and Oprah Winfrey's shows. Does this mean that celebrities, immune from...

<p>On the first day of his campaign for governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger did two things that were crucial to his victory Tuesday night. One of them got worldwide attention. The other, while just as important, was known only to a handful of people. The first was his appearance on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno.</p>

Before we get rolling on this week's column, a point of personal privilege: I held off this column for one day to include the results of the California recall election. Almost two months ago I predicted the results of this election in "Nuts and Bolts in California." It turned out exactly as I expected – Davis got a lower proportion of the vote running against himself than Schwarzenegger got in the 135-person race to replace Davis. Even with the third candidate, McClintock, still in the race. And both elections were decided by a landslide. The voter drop-off between the recall...

They're baa-a-a-c-k. The exit polls, that is. After embarrassing misfires in predicting election results in 2000 and 2002, the and five major television networks disbanded the Voter News Service consortium that had administered exit polls in both of those votes. But they didn't abandon the idea of exit polls themselves, and they returned to the field with a new polling service for yesterday's California gubernatorial recall election. "There is nothing unreliable about exit polls," says Warren Mitofsky, a consultant who helped usher in surveys of voters leaving polling places more than three decades ago at CBS News. Mr. Mitofsky's firm...

Latest News on Schwarzenegger's Campaign for Governor of California Poll: Over 62% Believe Arnold is Being Smeared by Gray Davis ! New Poll: Arnold is Being Smeared by DavisLatest USA Today Poll Shows Arnold on Way to Victory Bully for California! Arnie on Course for Victory: Davis Orders Shredding Machines Why Davis Needs Document Shredders: Fund Raising Felonies ? Jews in Arnold's Hometown Dismiss Hitler Flap as "Election Propaganda" Arnold Accuser Coached by Davis Operative Arnold Fights Media Revelations with a Smile Jewish Community in Arnold's Hometown Refute "Hitler Lies"L.A. Times Caught Lying Again: Davis Hack Behind AttacksArnold Wins Backing...

As for the allegations that Schwarzenegger groped women, Evans dismissed the reports "as a ploy to get him to lose supporters." "If it really was a big deal, it would have come out at the time that it happened," he said. For many of these Democrats, their distaste for Davis has overtaken most other concerns. Bill Klein, a public utility manager, said the charges against Schwarzenegger are problematic but said he is more disturbed by the way Davis has handled his job. "I'm a lifelong Democrat, but the man has no leadership ability," said Klein, a local school board member...

Is anyone else curious why there are 133 candidates in the California Recall gubernatorial race? As a Californian, I was wondering what all of these candidates have to say about the issues and what they feel they can offer California. A lot of them haven't been included in the televised debates, so it has been hard to determine how serious they are and where they stand on the issues. Today, I discovered that Taco Bell just launched a site where the public can ask several of these candidates questions directly. There are answers from Gallagher, Mary Cary, Trek Thunder Kelly,...

Recall High Anxiety By Tammy Bruce FrontPageMagazine.com | September 26, 2003 Earlier this week a disturbing tune had begun to infiltrate my conversations with friends. Both Republicans and Democrats (yes, I have pals who hail from both camps), began to express something which I can only describe as Recall Fatigue. Even though we’re being bombarded with messages by people who do not have our best interests in mind, it’s too important a time to tire. Many of my Democrat friends, most of whom had signed the recall petition and were looking forward to voting “Yes” on the ballot, began to...

<p>I have often said that the two people who have most profoundly impacted my thinking on economics are Milton Friedman and Adam Smith. At Christmas I sometimes annoy some of my more liberal Hollywood friends by sending them a gift of Mr. Friedman's classic economic primer, "Free to Choose." What I learned from Messrs. Friedman and Smith is a lesson that every political leader should never forget: that when the heavy fist of government becomes too overbearing and intrusive, it stifles the unlimited wealth creation process of a free people operating under a free enterprise system.</p>

California gubernatorial Candidate Bob Todd called on Governor Gray Davis to declare Trinity County a disaster area after a fire, allegedly set near the east end of his property and at the west end of Del Loma, has so far burned more than 1000 acres into the Shasta-Trinity National Forest. The fire is under investigation by federal authorities. "I think the fire was set because of revenge over the recall, or by some criminal individuals within and without of select government agencies that have been allowed to make my family homeless on three occasions and would like to see it...

CALIFORNIANS FOR SCHWARZENEGGER RADIO:60 "TAX" JON COUPAL: THIS IS JON COUPAL, PRESIDENT OF THE HOWARD JARVIS TAXPAYERS ASSOCIATION. TWENTY-FIVE YEARS AGO WE SENT THE POLITICIANS A MESSAGE WITH PROPOSITION 13. THIS YEAR WE CAN SEND ANOTHER MESSAGE BY RECALLING GRAY DAVIS AND REPLACING HIM WITH ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER, A STRONG FISCAL CONSERVATIVE. HE WILL REPEAL THE CAR TAX AND STAND AGAINST MORE TAXES. ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER: I STRONGLY SUPPORT PROPOSITION 13 AND WILL FIGHT ANY PROPOSAL WHICH SEEKS TO CHANGE IT. I AM IN PRINCIPLE AGAINST TAXING, BECAUSE I FEEL THAT THE PEOPLE OF CALIFORNIA HAVE BEEN PUNISHED ENOUGH. FROM THE TIME...

Caption this Photo: Original Caption

Bustamonte won't renounce ties to racist group Posted on Friday

I know: Let's have dictionaries with erasable print! That way, when words are changed to suit political or ideological purposes, we can just make the corrections and move on. Wouldn't want being correct to get in our way, now would we? Note, I said "correct." Not "politically correct." A rose is a rose is a rose. Yeah, sure it is. We are careening past the day when words have accepted meanings. If we keep on at this rate, dictionary makers will be faced with three choices: either publish volumes twice the size they are now, print the books with erasable...

WEST HOLLYWOOD, Calif. (AP) -- Gov. Gray Davis defended his offer to give tribes with casinos a key role in selecting members to a commission that regulates gambling. Davis said the proposal made last week in a meeting with tribal leaders was no different from past practices he employed to find the most qualified people for state boards and commissions. "We are looking for good people with regulatory experience," Davis told reporters Saturday after recording a Labor Day radio address in West Hollywood. "I think it's perfectly appropriate." Davis and Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, the only prominent Democrat on...

In both radio appearances, Schwarzenegger portrayed himself as a Reagan disciple. "We have the same philosophy and approach to things," he said at one point. In another line, he said his agenda of keeping taxes low and improving education "is exactly what Ronald Reagan stood for." He even incorporated Reagan into an oft-repeated anecdote about being an immigrant who is grateful to America and California for the opportunities they gave him. "Remember what Ronald Reagan said, 'America is the shining city on the hill,' " said Schwarzenegger. "I have experienced that thing firsthand." Schwarzenegger also endorsed Bush ("I'm all the...

Barbara Simpson Tweedle Dem ... and Tweedle Dumber The rest of the country – maybe the world – can call it a circus, but for Californians, it's as serious as death. Whatever it's called, it is the recall of a governor who thought he was "Teflon." Wrong. Slippery, maybe. Thin-skinned, yes. Mercenary, yes. Focused and power-hungry, without doubt. All of those describe Gray Davis. But "Teflon"? Sorry, no. The reality of the recall and its momentum are the proof. Californians on both sides of the aisle are sick of the state's dismal financial situation. Under Democrat control, it has only...

Viva! Viva California!" With those words last week, Gov. Gray Davis launched operation "Please Don't Fire Me." His speech opening his anti-recall campaign was short, and its complete text has been available at a number of sites on the Internet, so you may have read it. However, it begs for translation and interpretation, which we happily provide below, in italics: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Viva! Viva California!" That ought to nail the Hispanic vote. "I came here tonight to take responsibility ..." ... and pass it on to the Republican Party. "My friends, last Friday, 50 million Americans lost power for 29 hours....

Yet Steve Moore, president of the Club for Growth, said many conservatives were still in a "wait-and-see mode" about Schwarzenegger. "We want to believe in this guy ... [but] he does have this one kind of annoying habit of trying to appease everybody, and I don't know if he can get away with that," Moore said.

You know, Maria and I, we teach our kids basic principles," he said, referring to his wife, Maria Shriver. "We teach them: Don't spend more money than you have.... I promise you that's what I would teach Sacramento." "Sacramento has overspent, overtaxed and over-regulated our businesses," he said.

An amazing thing happened on the way to the California recall: Someone spoke the truth about the state's financial predicament. Billionaire investor Warren Buffett, ballyhooed as a top economic advisor to Arnold Schwarzenegger, told the Wall Street Journal that property taxes in California are ridiculously low. He's right. Thanks to Proposition 13 in 1978 — an initiative no less stupid than the current recall and also put on the ballot by Republican conservatives — the state lost its most reliable tax base. Voters capped annual property assessment increases at no more than 2%. The property is reassessed at market value...

But Prop. 187 would pass again today, pollsters and strategists say. A 1999 Times poll found that 60% of registered voters would support another Prop. 187. Moreover, 75% of Republicans said they'd back it — a sentiment that's bound to help Schwarzenegger, since the recall election could be tilted to the right by an unusually large turnout of GOP voters. "The worst thing for Democrats to do is rerun Prop. 187," says political analyst Tony Quinn. "It helps Schwarzenegger where he needs the most help: among core Republicans." Beyond that, Democrats shouldn't be demagoguing on illegal immigration — or any...

A key to Arnold Schwarzenegger's prospects in the coming recall election is one that few have taken notice of: His campaign is being run by the most brilliant California Republican campaigner since Ronald Reagan. Former governor Pete Wilson, who is chairman of the Schwarzenegger campaign, shares Arnold's centrist brand of Republican politics, which is the only kind of Republican politics that can win at the state level. Even Ronald Reagan left issues like abortion on the back burner when he led California Republicans to victory. This is a state, it should never be forgotten, that has a million more registered...

Conservatives are upset with Arnold Schwarzenegger. Cal Thomas writes that Arnold "is a social liberal and is bound to disappoint conservative Republicans." George Will states that Schwarzenegger "could hardly be less like Reagan." Mona Charen derides the leading candidate for California governor as a Ross Perot clone. Thomas, Will and Charen are right. But I'm voting for Arnold anyway. Schwarzenegger is the best thing to happen to California politics since Ronald Reagan. Which isn't to say that his positions resemble Reagan's -- they don't. Reagan was staunchly anti-abortion, while Schwarzenegger is pro-choice. Reagan was obviously an opponent of same-sex marriage,...

THE VOICE OF REASON HUGH HEWITT This Conservative Is Voting For Arnold Last week Arnold declared his candidacy for governor of California. I was broadcasting at the time, immediately endorsed him, and immediately began to receive a steady flow of mail from Tom McClintock and Bill Simon fans. Tom and Bill are fine guys, and both have been my guests on countless occasions. I endorsed Bill over Dick Riordan last March and stand by that choice. When it comes to elections, I am a single-issue voter: I support the most conservative candidate who has the most realistic chance of...

<p>No Cakewalk Schwarzenegger faces obstacles en route to Sacramento.</p> <p>Arnold Schwarzenegger's political debut last week would have made any politician envious. He went from one event to another trailed by adoring fans and dozens of cameras without having to provide detailed answers on his views. What's more, a new Gallup poll shows that 42% of Californians say there is a good chance they'd vote for him, versus only 22% who said that about the lone big-name Democrat running to replace Gray Davis, Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante. Meanwhile, Democratic surveys show the recall of Gov. Davis is almost inevitable with over a third of Democrats backing his ouster.</p>

<p>A CNN story about speculation over a Hillary Clinton or Al Gore presidential bid contains this odd quote from Sen. John Kerry, the haughty, French-looking Massachusetts Democrat, who by the way served in Vietnam: "I've never not seen a presidential race during which people are not speculating about people who are not in the field."</p>

Bustamante Must Not WinDemocrat Strategy The recall candidates are all filed and set. The democrats have held solidarity as much as possible with Cruz Bustamante, the incumbent Lt. Governor as their only candidate. They have decided on their campaign: Recall No, Cruz yes. Their strategy is to urge a no vote on the recall combined with a vote for Bustamante for Governor in the event Davis is recalled. As Lt. Governor, the dems have determined that he “has dibs” on the Governorship, as Frank del Olmo put it in an op-ed piece in the LA Times. The dems came to...

<p>The list of candidates gets longer and still has not been set. Worries arise about whether balloting equipment will be up to the test.</p> <p>As the list of candidates seeking to replace Gov. Gray Davis grew to nearly 200 names, officials warned Sunday of election night gridlock, with the outcome likely to be unclear days after the Oct. 7 vote.</p>

The newly emerging Arnold Democrat is as socially liberal to libertarian as the Reagan Democrat was socially conservative. He or she may well be an immigrant or the child of an immigrant. But one thing seems certain: The Arnold Democrat poses every bit as much of a threat to the California Democratic Party as the Reagan Democrat did decades ago.

While many celebrities prefer passive and extremely conservative investments, Schwarzenegger's 100-plus ventures — 19 of which are valued at more than $1 million — include individual stocks, managed stock accounts, private investment funds, venture funds, bonds, a number of direct stakes in operating businesses, and even a high-end mutual fund company overseen by Nobel laureates.

This is a cool site.

The following AP story is excerpted from this morning's Washington Post: 'Terminator' in Calif. Recall Race By ERICA WERNER The Associated Press Thursday, August 7, 2003; 7:55 AM LOS ANGELES - With a surprise jump into California's recall race, actor Arnold Schwarzenegger touched off the heaviest tremors in the state's political earthquake to date, saying he wasn't afraid of attacks sure to come from Democrats and conservative Republicans alike. But the aftershock from a day of topsy-turvy developments in the drive to recall Gov. Gray Davis came just hours later, when Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante broke party ranks to...

For Gov. Gray Davis, who has endured budget crises, sinking approval ratings and a fast-moving recall drive, Wednesday morning's announcement that Sen. Dianne Feinstein would not run against him offered something rare: good news. But the celebration was brief. By day's end, a multimillionaire actor known simply as "Arnold" had uncorked a surprise. He was running. And within hours, the fragile Democratic consensus behind Davis had begun to crumble as Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante announced he would enter the race and Insurance Commissioner John Garamendi, said he was considering doing so, as well. Davis now faces a two-front battle: a...

Still, blaming the recall on anyone but Davis and his party misses the point. We would not be in this sorry place had the governor paid more attention to his duties than his ambitions. Conducting the people's business with fingers crossed behind one's back has diminished confidence in government and stripped old-fashioned terms like "voter choice" of their meaning. As a liberal, I am appalled. For myself and the many others who felt misled and cast an uninformed vote, and for those who must suffer the consequences of political gamesmanship, the recall hardly seems an assault on democratic values. On...

Do too many candidates spoil a ballot?As California descends into campaign mayhem, it's part comedy, part agony, part rush to a hazy future. LOS ANGELES – Let's call it the speed-chess version of American politics * * * < -- Snip -- > Now, candidates must rush to decide whether they're in or out by Aug. 9. The result could be an election of unprecedented chaos. * * * < -- Snip -- > For the moment, both parties are digging in for a short, intense contest - and candidates are waiting to ricochet off one another's announcements. Democrats are...

RECALL OF DAVIS SET FOR OCTOBER 7, 2003

Leaders of a campaign to oust Gov. Gray Davis ended their signature drive Monday, saying they had gathered more than enough to put the Democratic governor's fate in the hands of voters in what would be California's first statewide recall election.

On Thursday, the anti-recall group Taxpayers Against the Governor's Recall held a news conference in Los Angeles, where they produced boxes that they said contained more than 1 million signatures on a nonbinding petition against the recall. "They say they have a million signatures and that means Californians want to dump the governor," said spokesman Nick Velazquez. "But we say, 'Well, here's a million Californians who don't.' "

Ryan lost his own community in early returns Tuesday Hales Corners Village President Jim Ryan lost his own community as early returns Tuesday night showed Scott Walker leading in the race for Milwaukee County Executive. Ryan lost Hales Corners by a margin of 50 votes with 47% of eligible voters in the community turning up to vote. Early results showed Walker, a Republican member of the State Assembly from Wauwatosa, with a nearly 300-vote edge over Ryan. As of 8:30 p.m. River Hills, West Milwaukee and Hales Corners all went for Walker. With 10 of 463 precincts reporting, Walker had...

Supervisors voted without cost analysis of lump-sum benefit, McCann claims Milwaukee County's controversial pension changes should be declared void because the County Board approved them improperly, according to District Attorney E. Michael McCann. County supervisors voted on the benefit improvements without a formal analysis of the cost impact of the "backdrop" lump-sum benefit, McCann claims, in a motion filed Friday in a lawsuit over the benefits. McCann is seeking to have his claim heard as an intervenor in lawsuit in which Milwaukee County sheriff's deputies and a group of retirees are asking to have the lucrative pension changes extended to...