He was a neophyte, but a decent and capable man. He made mistakes for which he is responsible, but did he ever have help. Rove put Gerry Parsky in charge of GOP dollars in California. Parsky has a personal vendetta against both the conservative wing of the CAGOP and the Simon family. He never raised the money he promised and starved the GOTV effort. He made stipulations that Simon take advisors and campaign people who were behind the most serious mishaps, particularly Ed Rollins. Despite all that, Somon lost by only four points, and a decent GOTV effort would have carried the day.
It was a screw job, and it cost the GOP statewide offices across the board, especially Tom McClintock.