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And here are some facts and information that people may consider (it's from some of my posts): == Exhibit 1:

http://www.calvoter.org/parties.html

According to the above, up to date as of March 2003,

the number of registered voters breaks down as follows:

6.7 M Dems = 53% 5.3 M Rep. = 42% 0.67M "other" = 5%

53% DEMS!!!! That is 50% vote for Bustamante.

The only way to win, is to syphon off mod Dem votes.

There is no way McClintock can do that. Arnold could,maybe, IF almost all Republicans and a fraction of Dems voted for him.

====

Exhibit #2: Latest poll:

23% Arnold Schwarzenegger, Republican 18 Cruz Bustamante, Democrat

5 Tom McClintock, Republican 4 Bill Simon, Republican 4 Peter Ueberroth, Republican 3 Peter Camejo, Green Party 3 Arianna Huffington, Independent 8 Someone else (specify) 32 don’t know"

==

Considering the 3% margin of error:

-- Schwarzenegger and Bustamante are close -- IOW Bustamante could beat Arnold fairly easily, once the Dem machinery starts rolling

-- McClintock and Simon are running neck and neck with the Green Party candide

=====

Exhibit #3:

"His supporters keep saying that all he needs to get elected is about 25% of the vote. "

===

This is a MAJOR FALLACY. IF there were NO Democrat in the race, or if there were half a dozen prominent Democrats in the race, to split the vote, and NO other Republican were running, then someone could win with 25%, and it could be McClintock, not that that would be a real high probability, but at least theoretically possible.

But that is NOT the situation today. McClintock supporters totally ignore the CURRENT REAL situation, which is, that :

-- there is only ONE Democrat running, there are 45% Dems in CA, the Dem machinery is not about to let go of CA and will do EVERYTHING to make sure Bustamante gets elected. So Bustamante is highly likely to get 40-50% of the vote.

-- If ALL the conservatives would vote for McClintock (35%), it still wouldn't be enough to beat Bustamante.

-- The ONLY way a Republican can win is by getting most of the Republican, a good fraction of independent, and even some Dem votes. There is NO way McClintock (or Simon) can do that. The ONLY one, who has a chance at beating Bustamante, is Arnold, IF he gets most Republican votes and then some I & D votes, then, maybe Bustamante will end up with 35% and Arnold with 40%.

Otherwise it's Governor Bustamante.

McClintock supporters need to wake up and smell the very different REAL situation, which exists, which is vastly different from the scenarios before the candidacies were announced, when they made up their minds to support McClintock to the death. ===

And one more thing, I think the longer McClintock and Simon stay in the race and keep attacking Arnold, the more they increase the chances of fewer people voting for Arnold, resulting in more votes for Bustamante.

From the information above it should be clear to everyone that McClintock or Simon have zero chance of winning, but they could well keep Arnold from winning as well. Right now everyone is attacking Arnold, nobody is attacking Bustamante.

People hated Davis, and still enough Dems voted for him to reelect him. Now they will be voting for Bustamante, unless Arnold can get a few of those voters, which may not be possible, after the other Republicans keep tearing Arnold down. The Dems will just shrug and punch in for Bustamante.

Why in God's name, would any conservative support a liberal for California Governor? Not only is Arnold a liberal, he's a RINO too. Arnold says, he doesn't have to supply specific figures about where he would cut the budget, because the people don't care about figures. Say what?!

George P. Shultz

George P. Shultz is the Thomas W. and Susan B. Ford Distinguished Fellow at the Hoover Institution. He was sworn in on July 16, 1982, as the sixtieth U.S. secretary of state and served until January 20, 1989. In January 1989, he rejoined Stanford University as the Jack Steele Parker Professor of International Economics at the Graduate School of Business and a distinguished fellow at the Hoover Institution.

He is a member of the board of directors of Bechtel Group, Fremont Group, Gilead Sciences, Unext.com, and Charles Schwab & Co. He is also chairman of the International Council of J. P. Morgan Chase and on the advisory committee of Infrastructureworld.

He was awarded the Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor, on January 19, 1989. He also received the Seoul Peace Prize (1992), the Eisenhower Medal for Leadership and Service (2001), and the Reagan Distinguished American Award (2002).

His publications include Economic Policy Beyond the Headlines(2d edition), cowritten with Kenneth Dam (University of Chicago Press, 1998), and his best-selling memoir, Turmoil and Triumph: My Years as Secretary of State (Charles Scribner's Sons, 1993).

He recently authored the monograph Economics in Action: Ideas, Institutions, Policies (Hoover Essays in Public Policy, 1995).

He also authored Economic Policy Beyond the Headlines (1978); Workers and Wages in the Urban Labor Market (1970); Guidelines, Informal Controls, and the Market Place (1966); Management Organization and the Computer (1960); and Labor Problems: Cases and Readings (1953).

From 1981 until his appointment as U.S. secretary of state, Shultz was chairman of President Ronald Reagan's Economic Policy Advisory Board.

He became secretary of the Treasury in May 1972, serving until May 1974. During that period he also served as chairman of the Council on Economic Policy. As chairman of the East-West Trade Policy Committee, Shultz traveled to Moscow in 1973 and negotiated a series of trade protocols with the Soviet Union. He also represented the United States at the Tokyo meeting of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade.

In 1974, he left government service to become president and director of Bechtel Group, where he remained until 1982. While at Bechtel, he maintained his close ties with the academic world by joining the faculty of Stanford University on a part-time basis.

Shultz served in the administration of President Richard Nixon as secretary of labor for eighteen months, from 1969 to June 1970, at which time he was appointed director of the Office of Management and Budget.

From 1968 to 1969, he was a fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford.

In 1957, Shultz was appointed professor of industrial relations at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business. He was named dean of the Graduate School of Business in 1962.

He taught at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 1948 to 1957, taking a year's leave of absence in 1955 to serve as senior staff economist on the President's Council of Economic Advisers during the administration of President Dwight Eisenhower.

Shultz holds honorary degrees from the universities of Columbia, Notre Dame, Loyola, Pennsylvania, Rochester, Princeton, Carnegie-Mellon, City University of New York, Yeshiva, Northwestern, Technion, Tel Aviv, Weizmann Institute of Science, Baruch College of New York, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Tbilisi State University in the Republic of Georgia, and Keio University in Tokyo.

Shultz graduated from Princeton University in 1942, receiving a B.A. degree in economics. That year he joined the U.S. Marine Corps and served through 1945. In 1949, Shultz earned a Ph.D. degree in industrial economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

~~~

Arnold Schwarzenegger featured his advisor George Schultz at his roll-out press conference yesterday.

Ronald Reagan's Secretary of State.

That is a very cogent analysis. I think, though, that having McClintock sticking around to the right of Arnold for a while will actually help Arnold, by making Arnold appear more moderate. Appearing too conservative is death in California statewide politics.

You could hear it on these forums - "Arnold didn't promise to cut education spending, Arnold said he might raise taxes if the roof falls in, thus he is not a REAL conservative" - that kind of hard-line carping will actually help Arnold win over the center of the electorate by making him sound softer than he probably really is.

Joe Average SanFranciscoResident and Mary Average LosAngelesLady don't want to vote for someone the real conservatives support, that wouldn't be "cool" and would be counter to their hatred of conservatives for a host of reasons unrelated to this election. They will follow their media masters and pull the lever for anybody else. But a moderate/right candidate that the conservatives are dissing all over California - now him Joe and Mary Average might feel comfortable supporting.

McClintock isn't getting much more than the Green vote, and less than the combined Green/Huffington left-wing wacko vote, so he is not draining too many votes from Arnold - votes that might never go to nobody other than an uncompromising conservative like McClintock anyway.

There's absolutely no reason for Simon or Ueberroth to be in the race, though. They add absolutely nothing.

Quote of the Day by NortNork

calgov2002:

Gray Must Pay
Cruz Must Lose

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If Simon-Peter (biblical pun) drop out, in a 3 way race Tom has an excellent chance.

the number of registered voters breaks down as follows: 6.7 M Dems = 53% 5.3 M Rep. = 42% 0.67M "other" = 5%

Well here is one registered RAT who only did it because Reverend Al needs my vote in the RAT primary.

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I was impressed by Arnold's performance at yesterday's presser. Interestingly enough both of the Los Angeles Times liberal columnists thought he hit it out of the ball park. In particular George "Slumberin" Skelton, the Times Sacramento bureau chief panned Gray Davis' performance the other day. He wrote Davis was a dud, acted like a victim, and took no responsibility for what he did as Governor. Friends, if this is what the LAT's liberal columnists tell you, you better believe Davis is good as gone. The only questioning remaining is who is gonna replace him.

The hardcore social conservatives would rather Bustamante get elected than have a less then fire-breathing culture warrior Republican win the governorship. Even though the next governor, whoever he might turn out to be, won't exactly be banning abortion or incarcerating homosexuals, it's still important to these folks that Republican leaders strike the right meaningless pose. But by holding Republican candidates to these standards, the conservatives may just be enabling the continued rule of the state by truly ultra-liberal, gun-banning, pro-abortion Democrats.

Excellent analysis. However, I bet that many of those registered Democrats are illegals and/or duplicates since they tend to move frequently and you CAN'T take people off the voter list.

Why are you so intent on getting everyone besides Schwarzenegger out of the race? What are you going to do when Gray Davis goes nuclear? Say, ``oh well, let's pack it in.''

Conservatives yesterday indicated more support for Arnold Schwarzenegger's bid to become governor of California.

But they still stood ready to jump to one of two other major Republican candidates if the "Terminator" star stumbles badly in the campaign to replace Democratic Gov. Gray Davis.

I think that the above is a very sensible position to take, especially given some of the past events of Schwarzenegger's campaign:

1. Schwarzenegger made his candidacy announcement on Leno, dazzling us with his witty movie references. The fun continued the next day in other interviews, although some people became concerned that he didn't answer questions about his positions using much in the way of specifics.

2. Next, he largely absented himself from the media, and after a few days these consultants with "gravitas" were added to the campaign: Warren Buffett (a liberal) and George Shultz (a Reagan conservative). Rob Lowe (a Hollywood liberal) was also added to the team (he has "gravitas" of another kind, perhaps). Trouble struck soon afterwards, however, when the day after being hired Buffett made remarks which suggested that Prop. 13, the "third rail" of CA politics, is a Bad Thing. In response, a campaign spokesman stated that "Mr. Buffett doesn't speak for Mr. Schwarzenegger."

3. Then, after Schwarzenegger was "virtually silent for two weeks on substantive positions he would take as governor", his campaign announced that he would be holding an economic "summit" with some of his top advisers and would be subsequently interacting with the press. Rep. David Dreier, co-chairman of Schwarzenegger's campaign, said that at the press conference Schwarzenegger "will call for repeal of the tripling of the car tax that [Democratic Gov. Gray] Davis instituted." He added that Schwarzenegger "is going to be strongly conservative, clearly demonstrate that he is his own man and stand up to Warren Buffett." That Schwarzenegger supposedly needed to "stand up to" someone he hired seems strange to me. Stranger still, though, was the fact that the "call for repeal" didn't actually occur. Perhaps in this article Rep. Dreier didn't "speak for Mr. Schwarzenegger," however. It's hard to say, since at some point earlier Schwarzenegger stated that he would roll back the vehicle license fee.

Now, the summit+press conference was generally considered successful, since Schwarzenegger spoke well and got into some depth about his vision. Schwarzenegger sought to allay conservative fears about Prop. 13 once and for all by stating that if Buffett "mentions Prop 13 one more time, he has to do 500 sit-ups." He added, "I am in principle against taxes because I feel the people of California have been taxed enough." Yet, he said that he won't sign on to a "no new taxes" pledge because of the possibility of natural disasters or terrorist strikes. This led to much bandwidth being subsequently spent by conservatives parsing statements such as these -- in part due to the fact that the chairman of his campaign is former Governor Pete Wilson. Wilson is "regarded by many conservatives as a tax-and-spend Republican during his two-term governorship," as it says in the original article of this thread.

Schwarzenegger also tried to diffuse any "carping" about "25-point" plans for solving California's problems. This fit well with another part of his message: "No one ... could figure out or make heads or tails of the state budget. We don't know what is being spent and we don't know where." But, the NY Times notes:

Mr. Schwarzenegger said he would not provide specifics on budget cuts during the campaign. "The public doesn't care about figures," he said.

"What the people want to hear is, are you willing to make the changes. Are you tough enough to go in there and provide leadership. "

So, there is some question about whether any future vagueness on Schwarzenegger's part will be due to inability ("No one ... could figure out or make heads or tails of the state budget") or be due to unwillingness ("The public doesn't care about figures"). Nevertheless, at the end of the press conference, Schwarzenegger did promise that there will be many more opportunities in the future for the press to interact with him.

4. Finally, his tax policy came up again yesterday as well, when one of Schwarzenegger's spokesmen (Sean Walsh) was interviewed by Fox News. Fox reports:

Walsh told Fox News that the state's credit rating — which is barely above junk bond status now — is more important than preserving a "no new taxes" approach to governing. Walsh emphasized the campaign is "in no way, shape or form" considering tax hikes now, but was preserving its options if the state's fiscal crisis worsens.

But, soon afterwards he made a retraction:

"Arnold Schwarzenegger has stated clearly his intention to cut taxes to make California's job climate a competitive one. Regrettably, in comments I made to Fox today, I left the impression that Arnold Schwarzenegger could consider increasing taxes based on economic conditions. I misspoke," said spokesman Sean Walsh.

"I did not articulate my own intentions and certainly not Arnold Schwarzenegger's position. The impression I left is wrong. As Arnold stated yesterday, I very much believe that Californians have been over-taxed and over-spent."

Now, perhaps Walsh was ordered to do 500 sit-ups himself as penance. At minimum, however, this is yet another incident of someone on Schwarzenegger's staff apparently having difficulty speaking for Mr. Schwarzenegger.

These things being the case, it's still true that many Important Republicans have stated their support for Schwarzenegger. The talking point which says that this election should not contain a "Republican primary" is becoming more and more commonly heard, as pressure is being mounted to have McClintock and others drop out of the race. I think it would be wise for someone like McClintock to stick around for awhile, though. The first candidate forum of the election will be Sept. 3, and all but one of the major candidates have already committed to being there (guess who's the one). But, even if Schwarzenegger doesn't show up, he still almost surely will be at the Sept. 17 debate. Perhaps soon after one of these events candidates should start dropping out -- after Schwarzenegger has had a chance to make his case in this type of arena. We should know much more at that point, since presumably at least the candidate speaks for himself. After all, things might get rocky for his campaign.

I'll give this a bump.

I think Bustamove's going to win this, and with a pathetic vote total.

Numbers of registered voters by party means nothing. Nada. Zilch.

You have to look at turnout by-party in special elections.