Posted on 09/04/2006 10:19:40 AM PDT by NormsRevenge
I don't recall even being in a situation where the closer Election Day gets, the less likely I am to vote for the GOP nominee.
Yet, that is where I find myself vis-a-vis Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
I'm one of many conservatives who voted for Arnold in the recall, despite my preference for Tom McClintock. I found the prospect of Cruz Bustamante in the governor's office horrifying and wasn't convinced McClintock could win. The stakes so too high I though it prudent to back the Republican with the best chance of winning, and so I cast my vote for Arnold. Like other conservatives, I comforted myself with the rumor we'd heard for years that Arnold was really a libertarian. So, although he was squishy on the social issues, at least he'd be hard core on taxes, spending and freedom issues. After all, he was a Milton Friedman fan!
But ever since the Governor's nauseating policy of apologizing for the special election of 2005, it's been steadily more difficult to assembly a conservative Republican rationale for supporting his re-election.
He's signed a non-aggression pact with the government employee unions, promising he will never, ever again try to rein in their power. He talks a big game about building infrastructure, but is unable to just come out and support an infrastructure plan -- the 241 toll road completion in Orange County -- that has been EIRed and is ready to go.
This alleged acolyte of Milton Friedman signs an "anti-greenhouse gases" bill that will have no impact on the climate but will have negative impacts on California's economic competitiveness. And this is the same guy who tells every Republican crowd the same story about how he left Austria to escape its stultifying socialism -- even as he signs neo-Euro socialist bills like the emissions cap. I thought we elected a Republican as Governor during the rcall - not Al Gore.
Since being beaten by the government employee unions and adopting the Stoclkholm Syndrone as his political survival strategy, the Governor easgerly signs any minimum wage bill the Democrats send his way -- even though he knows they are job destroyers. He knows this, and yet signs them with a smile, anyway.
Old arguments employed to keep conservatives in line like "he's good on judges" hold no water when it comes to the Schwarzenegger Administration. Yes, he's appointed more Republicans than Gray Davis, but Republicans expect something more than appointing more Republican judges than your Democratci predecessor did. For example, how about no appointing public defedners who are proud of their qualifications to defend Serbian war crimninals at The Hague?
The Governor signed the latest in Sheila Kuehl's endless succession of "gay rights" bills -- SB 1441. Did the Governor actually read this bill?:
The bill would also expand the definition of discrimination under these provisions to include a perception that a person has any of these enumerated characteristics or that the person is associated with a person who has, or is perceived to have, any of these characteristics.
I would really love to hear the Governor affirm that he actually read that dangerous claptrap -- nothing is objectively real because reality is nothing more than perception -- and thought it was legislation that must be signed.
Everyday, I get e-mails from the Governor's re-election campaign. And I am trying to think of a single one that has, for even a moment, made me feeel proud Arnold Schwarzenegger is my party's nominee for Governor. And I can't think of a one. What I do remember are press releases bragging how Gov. Schwarzenegger is spending more money on education than anybody ever has in state history. Yessir -- that's why I became a Republican! To throw record sums of taxpayer dollars on failed government programs.
Perhaps the reader can detect the depth of my ever-deepening disenchantment with the Schwarzenegger Administration. Not that it really matters, because the Governor will be re-elected. He's blessed with a Democratic opponent who is a living caricature of the liberal excesses of his party and who gifted the Schwarzenegger campaign with his calls for billions in new taxes.
The Governor triangulates, buys off key Democratic special interests, adopts Democratic policies, and keeps enough conservatives in line by stoking their Fear of an Angelides Planet. He will win, and the Republican Party will find itself victorious in gubernatorial race but lacking a soul.
I think it was George Washington who said that a political party without principles is nothing more than a conspiracy to hold power. I'm afraid that is what is happening to the California Republican Party under the administration of Arnold Schwarzenegger, and that is why I have gone from being a unapologetic supporter of his election in the recall to being undecided about whether I'll vote to re-elect him.
Only 2.5 points for combining The S diversion and the CCW myth.
I extend a challeneg to the FO account. Combine any 5 ploys, myths or diversions in a single post for a total of 7 points.
Go FairOpinion!
Hey, wait a minute! Who told you I was female? ;-)
They are a busy (and well funded) bunch!
FairOpinion, you and I frequently agree on political issues facing our state, but this is one time I part company with you. I'm someone who didn't think the recall was a good idea, because it let the Democrats off the hook. Like the author of the posted article, once the recall made the ballot, I reluctantly decided to vote for Schwarzenegger primarily to keep Bustamante out of the governor's chair. I now regret my decision. I actually think we may have been better off in the long run if Bustamante had won.
Having Schwarzenegger in the governorship merely gets Republicans blamed for what the Dems are actually doing. Arnold is Lincoln Chafee/Jim Jeffords writ large, and he is a total drag on true Republicans in this state.
The automotive company, Nissan, moved its national HQ out of California recently, taking several thousand jobs with it. There is, of course, a ripple effect throughout vicinity where Nissan had its campus. I have a friend who owns a small mom and pop French-Vietnamese restaurant nearby. Stopped in for lunch Friday and he told me he's thinking of selling the place. The raise in the minimum wage just kills him. He and his wife put in long hours. They have one employee and will be forced to let him go, but the husband and wife just can't do everything on their own.
These kinds of stories are being repeated everywhere, but we have a Republican governor who signed the bill, so guess which party gets the blame. Most average folks in the state don't have a clue who controls the legislature, so the Dems are totally able to hide behind the nominally Republican Arnold. Sickening.
I concur. The unions and left-wing moneybags struck early and often, turning Arnold's name into a dirty word in their negative TV and radio ads. There were no responses in kind by the cipher-like CA GOP flunkies until very, very, late in the campaign, and they were -- at least they were in the San Francisco Bay Area -- mostly in the form of 15 second ads for one of the four measures played back-to-back.
Arnold was very GWBish in his far-between speeches on the measures, not being specific about the measures' goals and a seeming inability to answer the most biting criticism of the propositions. In concession speeches on election night, Shrivernegger telegraphed a major shift leftward. Then he hired Susan Kennedy, a CA Dem strategist, which completed his species-change operation from elephant to RINO.
There was some good analysis of the Special Election campaign included in the following interview with Arnold Steinberg:
http://www.flashreport.org/special-reports0b.php?faID=2005110202424596
Last I heard, all the downticket R-s are going down in flames, as they did in 2002.
--
I hope ya had Depends on as you posted that, it seems like you were almost gleeful to the point of relieving yourself as you were posting that...
Too bad he didn't think of them when he didn't allow any of their posters to be in the convention hall last month, and didn't bother to stop by the dinner event they held for all the rest of the down ticket candidates. Oh but wait, per you, They're just a bunch of losers tho, right?
But we all know, after all, it's all about aRnold and no one else. He has a team already in place, the dems. They love him, who needs PHILth when they have him onboard.
and we all know California will never survive if aRnold isn't re-elected ya know. I hear it here every day, the same old song.
Do you have any new conservative insults in the works or is that about it?
Oh, PS, the base isn't demoralized, it is tired of being jobbed and taken for granted while the Gub and crew continue to push the state further left , all the while boasting about how they are here to save us all from ourselves and global warming and God knows what else.
There you go again, misquoting me by omission.
Oh, I think I read you quite clearly.
aRnie's coattails are not meant for anyone but aRnie and his select few to benefit from.,,
Thank you for setting the poster straight, AM.
Yes. Clearly, I'm calcowgirl.
Because that would save money, and Mr. "Fiscal Conservative" decided it would be wiser to spend billions of dollars more and drag people out to the polls AGAIN for ANOTHER "special election". Great move, Arnie.
Incidentally, FairOpinion constantly blames rank-and-file GOP voters for Arnie's initiatives going down in flames, though on other threads she loudly points out that registered Democrats strongly outnumber registered Republicans in California. Since this is the case, trying to pass referendums during a "special election" is the WORST possible move, since turnout will be much smaller and only most hardcore members of both parties will turn out -- leading to an inevitable GOP defeat in CA. Since Arnie and FO consider themselves such experts on how to be "electable" in CA, they should have noticed such a "special election" was doomed to fail. Referendums can only win a majority with the support of independents, and they really don't feel like being dragged out to the polls every couple of weeks just to vote on one or two partisan issues. Oh well.
Given the results of all the "special elections" in CA lately, maybe the "leaders" should try to get things passed during the REGULAR election for a change.
Nah, that would make too much sense. I bet they have another "special election" in 2007.
Wow! You not only make smashing contributions to the debate quite frequently while setting things straight, you also provide some brilliantly astute analysis!!!
No, I'm calcowgirl.
That must make me Admin Moderator! ;-)
LOL.
Yeah, and it goes like this, over and over and over again ad infinitium:
"You can't ride in my red wagon, the wheel is broke and the axel's saggin... SAME SONG SECOND VERSE. A little bit LOUDER and a little bit WORSE!
You cain't ride in my red wagon, the wheel is broke and the axel's saggin... SAME SONG THIRD VERSE. A little bit LOUDER..."
Well you know the rest, right?
I was undecided, until this latest mini-kyoto gambit. Arnold lost my wife's vote when he signed the Kuehl bill.
In that case, I happen to have a little list...
This is the song that never ends.
Yes, it goes on and on my friend.
Somebody started singing it,
Not knowing what it was!
Now, we're stuck here forever
Just singing it because...
This is the song that never ends.
Yes, it goes on and on my friend.
Somebody started singing it,
Not knowing what it was!
Now, we're stuck here forever
Just singing it because...
No matter what Schwartz may WANT, or have SAID, the people of California made it CLEAR in the special Referendums that they WANT more Socialism, and they WANT unions to control thier futures....
Every time he has tried to hold the line, he has been beaten unmercifully by both the press, and the VOTERS....
It's unfortunate that Conservatives are a minority in California, but the residents seem determined to walk the path of debt and doom.
I say we need to cut-n-run from the unmanageable quagmire before it costs any more money and lives....
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