Posted on 09/02/2003 4:21:28 PM PDT by socal_parrot
A Democratic plot to boost Tom McClintock’s candidacy at Arnold Schwarzenegger’s expense has recently come to light.
On paper, the recall election should be a cakewalk for California Republicans. A cursory analysis reveals a governor with an approval rating below Richard Nixon at his low point. The only serious Democrat candidate is the state’s uninspiring lieutenant governor, Cruz Bustamante, who unquestioningly followed Governor Davis through his mishaps with the budget and energy crisis. It should be a breeze for Republicans, right? Think again. Democrats are euphoric over Tom McClintock’s intransigence in continuing his long-shot bid for governor. This allows Democrats to divide and conquer their way into office. Democrats are attempting to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat and Tom McClintock is an essential part of their game plan.
For starters, Democrats know McClintock cannot win. They know that he has ran for statewide office twice before and lost both times. McClintock’s problem is not so much that he’s unknown but that Californians know about him and have rejected his candidacy time and again. Knowing this, a Democrat plot to boost McClintock’s candidacy at Schwarzenegger’s expense has already surfaced. According to the Sacramento Bee’s Daniel Weintraub, “Ever since Cruz Bustamante entered the race, it's been assumed that California's Indian tribes were going to pool their money and do independent expenditures on his behalf, expensive ads that get around the $21,000 limit on contributions. Now I am hearing rumblings that the Indians might think about helping Cruz in a more creative way as well. If they spent, say, $4 million on behalf of state Sen. Tom McClintock, the most conservative Republican in the race, they might pump McClintock's numbers up while hurting Arnold and not harming Cruz a bit. Remember, Cruz needs a split GOP vote to win. That would be one way to get it.” The reliably Democratic Indian tribes, loyal to Bustamante, would essentially throw their weight behind McClintock to chip away at the support of Arnold Schwarzenegger, the GOP front-runner. The Democrat strategy with regard to Tom McClintock is: “If you know you can beat ‘em, join ‘em.”
McClintock is unfazed by this conniving scheme and is more than happy to play along. His actions suggest that he’s willing to make allies with loyal Democratic groups under the logic, the enemy of my enemy (Arnold Schwarzenegger) is my friend. On August 28th, McClintock and Bustamante went together before the California Nations Indian Gaming Association to pledge their support. Needless to say, money will follow. Whether McClintock knows it or not, he’s being used by the Left. If Democrat allies can keep McClintock in the game, they can put a cap on Arnold’s support. A recent Los Angeles Times poll shows Bustamante with 35% of the vote and McClintock with 12%. The poll indicates that McClintock will lose decisively but more importantly, his vote will ensure that GOP front-runner Schwarzenegger loses as well.
It doesn’t have to be this way. McClintock could see the light and do what’s best for the party – as Bill Simon did by bowing out of the race. Other than his new Democratic support, the picture continues to grow bleaker for McClintock. The Washington Post and Sacramento Bee are reporting that there will be a record turnout for the recall election. This invalidates the early calculus by McClintock supporters - that in a low turnout election, grassroots could carry the day. Further, the base is growing more familiar with Schwarzenegger’s conservatism – Arnold came out against partial-birth abortion, against gay marriage, and for a constitutional spending cap.
There comes a time when personal ambition must be set aside and self-affirming but false justifications for one’s candidacy need to be reexamined. If McClintock stays in the California Senate, and assuming Arnold wins the governorship, he and Arnold could play the good-cop/bad-cop routine to perfection, mirroring President Bush and Tom Delay’s efforts at the national level. Additionally, McClintock may be well positioned to challenge Barbara Boxer in next year’s US Senate race. However, if McClintock persists with his spoiler campaign and throws the election to Bustamante, it is doubtful he will have any political capital for a future race.
But assuming things stay the way they are, with McClintock’s help, Bustamante and the Democrats may well pull off an upset of a lifetime on Election Day.
Calling any Freeper a RINO is childish and immature in my opinion. I sometimes wonder if FR is recruiting from the third grade playground.
Kid1: You're a RINO.
Kid2: Oh Yeah? Well you're the RINO.
Kid3: You are both RINOs.
Teacher: Come on kids. Recess is over.
McClintock supporters don't have any standing to complain about "personal attack," since that has been their MO from Day One of the campaign.
Then apparently you aren't reading this thread.
"If I were Tom McClintock, I'd register on FR just to tell my alleged supporters to quit screaming at the people I want to vote for me."
I'm just bugging the trolls and the Roman Polanski Republicans. ;-)
"The McClintockites started in with their "We are pure conservatives, you heathen scum," and then wondered why nobody liked being told that."
We are real Republicans. Ah-nold is not. Truth hurts, most especially to liberal 'Rats and liberal RINOs.
Be very scared, because the GOP is about to learn something extremely critical here, which will shake up electoral politics in a lot of places. The GOP can win without you, and the louder you are, the sweeter it is going to be - because that means that y'all won't get to wield the sort of influence you had in the past, and will sit there rampaging about how nobody listens to you or takes you seriously anymore.
The delicious part will be that you folks will have done it to yourselves, with no prodding from us.
Ok, let me give it a shot.
There are two candidates on the right, but they draw from vastly different pools of voters.
Arnold draws from moderate Republicans and people on both sides of "moderate." These voters are not True Believer conservatives who have as their credo "my way or the highway." In other words, Arnold is drawing from a very large pool of voters who have varying degrees of moderate, conservative and, yes, even some liberal positions on some things. Since they tend to be toward the center, they can find things to like in major candidates who have some positions that they may not totally agree with because, well, they don't demand any straight-line adherence to positions. As Ed Koch liked to say, "If you agree with me on 7 of 11 issues, vote for me. If you agree with me on 11 of 11 issues, you need to get some analysis."
They are willing to compromise on a few things in order to elect the best candidate.
Mr. McClintock, on the other hand, is drawing from a completely different and vastly smaller pool of voters. They look for down-the-line conservative positions in a candidate. Many on here have said that not only will they sit out this election if their candidate is not ahead, they actually will, in effect, vote for the worst possible candidate to make their point and perhaps have their views prevail at some distant time in the future. This suggests many McClintock voters are not in Arnold's pool of available voters in any event - they would just stay home or in effect vote Democrat as a perverse way to "make a statement." Arnold might get a small fraction of them - but not enough to matter except in an extremely tight race, which I do not foresee.
Arnold draws from the left, center and right. He has a much broader cross-section of the population who might be willing to vote for him as long as he keeps his nose clean. He will attract Democrats from Wilson/Bustamante like a magnet - some, not all, but enough. This was exactly how Reagan built his coalitions. Democrats are in the majority in California - have you noticed? He can afford McClintock bleeding off the uncompromising conservative voters because McClintock's scary presence makes Arnold look that much more safe and appealing to the hordes of people in the vast middle - particularly the Democrats who hate hard-line conservatives but can stomach moderate Republicans, especially if they cause the hard-liners grief.
So, I think it nets out not just even for Arnold if McClintock stays in the race, but actually a net positive, though it could go either way (but not by much). I don't care if McClintock draws 10% of the vote (and I doubt he will). Arnold will get that 10% and maybe even more from centrist voters who are scared of fringe candidates from both the left AND the right.
I doubt any McClintock True Believers will buy this reasoning, and that is ok. But McClintock is not splitting any kind of monolithic Right vote because that simply does not exist in California.
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