George Will: McClintock is the Medicine that California Needs
But Britain's revival was one choice away. In 1979 voters elected someone who lacked warmth but possessed a plan as radical as Britain's condition required -- Margaret Thatcher, who, it was said, could not see an institution without swatting it with her handbag.
Only one California candidate, State Sen. Tom McClintock, is, like Thatcher, a "conviction politician" prepared to discipline the nanny state. He has a Thatcherite charm deficit but -- perhaps these attributes are related -- determination to summon California, as Thatcher summoned Britain, up from infantilism.
He has her determination to revive what she called "the vigorous virtues" -- entrepreneurship, deferral of gratification, individual initiative, personal responsibility in making appetites conform to resources. Together these aptitudes can be called adulthood.