Free Republic

LOS ANGELES - Once considered the GOP's best hope to defeat Democratic Gov. Gray Davis (news - web sites) in the fall, former Mayor Richard Riordan has lost his lead among Republicans and is running nearly even with a challenger, according to a poll out a week before the primary. Riordan and businessman Bill Simon, a conservative multimillionaire who has never run for public office, both have 31 percent of the vote among likely Republican primary voters, according to a Los Angeles Times poll published Tuesday. That compares with a January poll by the newspaper that showed Riordan with 34 ...

<p>Stockton -- Republican Bill Simon shrugged off a new round of attacks on his business dealings and voting record yesterday as he hustled to keep up the newfound momentum of his campaign for governor.</p> <p>On the same day that a new Field Poll showed the political newcomer with his first lead in Tuesday's primary, the Republican Leadership Council, based in Washington, ran a new 15-second TV attack ad directed at Simon, calling him ''too careless with your money."</p>

Simon passes slumping Riordan in GOP race, poll finds Davis ads contribute to gubernatorial surprise By John Marelius STAFF WRITER February 27, 2002 LOS ANGELES ? In an astonishing turnabout, political neophyte Bill Simon has rocketed past Richard Riordan to seize the lead in the race for the Republican nomination for governor in Tuesday's primary election, according to a statewide Field Poll. A month ago, Simon, a Los Angeles businessman and philanthropist, was a virtual political unknown while Riordan, the former mayor of Los Angeles, was the prohibitive favorite to win the GOP nomination and do battle with Gov. Gray ...

<p>Dick Riordan has made no secret of the fact that he hopes his campaign for governor will help create a new California Republican Party, one that, like him, is liberal on social issues while retaining its pro-business and small-government conservatism.</p>

PALM SPRINGS, Calif. - Chatting in a coffee shop with his wife and two reporters, Richard Riordan is asked if he's enjoying his unexpectedly rough run for governor of California. "I haven't had so much fun," he says dryly, "since my dog died." The 71-year-old Riordan, hammered from all sides by TV attack ads, has seen his big lead in the polls slip away. Suddenly, the former Los Angeles mayor is no longer a safe bet to survive next week's GOP primary election. A social liberal, Riordan wants to fashion what he calls a "new Republican Party" in the nation's ...

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Tuesday, February 26, 2002 Riordan Urged U.S. Senate to Pass Record Clinton Tax Increase Joined Liberal Democrat Mayor of Detroit in Criticizing Bush Tax Cut STOCKTON - With his campaign continuing to gain momentum just days before the March 5 primary, Republican gubernatorial candidate Bill Simon today offered more compelling evidence demonstrating the clear differences between his conservative positions and the liberal record of former Los Angeles Mayor Dick Riordan. "Since the day I began my campaign for Governor, I have run a campaign grounded in the basic Republican principles of smaller government and less taxes," Simon ...

NRA Must Face Truth in California—Now! by David Codrea February 26, 2002 "A house divided against itself cannot stand." — A. Lincoln, Republican My last report, "NRA Backing Wrong Horse in California—Why?" recommended that the NRA switch its endorsement from Bill Jones to Bill Simon, otherwise the conservative vote in the California gubernatorial primary will be split. There are several strong arguments for switching the endorsement. Fortunately, support for gun rights is not one of them since both men seem equally good. Jones has an outstanding pro-gun rights voting record, and Simon has an "A" rating by NRA-PVF, which also ...

<p>It looks as if the California Republican establishment may not succeed in winning the easy coronation of former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan as the party's nominee to challenge Gov. Gray Davis. Businessman Bill Simon, son of a former Treasury Secretary, has surged in his fight for his party's nomination for governor and is now tied with Mr. Riordan among Republicans in a Los Angeles Times poll. In a low turnout, Mr. Simon leads by three points.</p>

<p>LOS ANGELES (AP) - The Republican race for governor is ``an absolute toss-up,'' one political analyst said, as a new poll shows candidates Bill Simon and Richard Riordan in a dead heat a week before the March 5 primary.</p> <p>The Los Angeles Times poll found Simon, a businessman, and former Los Angeles Mayor Riordan tied with 31 percent support among people likely to vote in the Republican primary. A Times poll last month showed Riordan with 14-point lead over Simon.</p>

SACRAMENTO – The three major Republican candidates for governor yesterday assailed Gov. Gray Davis' latest effort to secure federal help to lower California electricity prices as the acrimonious race moved into a final hectic week of campaigning. Republicans Richard Riordan, Bill Jones and Bill Simon denounced Davis for trying to shift the blame for the crisis to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to cover for his own mismanagement. "Every time Gray Davis gets in a bind, he points a finger at someone. This is just his MO," said Jones, the current secretary of state. "Now he's going to FERC to ...

LOS ANGELES – Bill Simon, a political rookie who has touted his conservative credentials, has now moved into a tie with liberal former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan in the race for the Republican gubernatorial nomination, according to a poll released Tuesday. Simon's recent surge in the polls continued in Tuesday's Los Angeles Times survey. It gave the southern California businessman 31 percent of the vote, the same percentage of votes as Riordan, who has been the front-runner since the race began and who has had the edge over incumbent Democrat Gov. Gray Davis in some polls as well. Undecided ...

<p>Sacramento -- Bill Simon, the political neophyte in the GOP governor's primary, found himself yesterday taking the political heat that comes with being near the front of the pack.</p> <p>A new poll shows him in a dead heat with former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan, who was the front-runner even before he announced he was in the race last year.</p>

<p>SACRAMENTO, Calif. - With more signs that the Republican primary race for governor may be turning in his favor, Bill Simon Jr. barnstormed the state on Monday with his friend Rudy Giuliani, who called himself an "expert witness" on Simon's behalf.</p>

Simon leaps to credibility in GOP race 20-point jump in poll has some calling him 'Superman' By Timm Herdt, State bureau chief Anyone who happened upon one of the televised Republican gubernatorial debates while channel surfing might have paused, thinking he had stumbled into an old episode of "Superman." That earnest, mild-mannered fellow with the glasses and a square jaw? Was it Clark Kent? No, the name is Simon, Bill Simon. More formally, it's William E. Simon Jr., the namesake of a man who made a mark on Wall Street and the national political scene as President Richard Nixon's treasury ...

<p>It's been a year -- the exact date was March 5, 2001 -- since Gov. Gray Davis announced dozens of long-term electric power contracts and declared that they were "the bedrock of our long-term energy policy" and would guarantee Californians "affordable prices" for decades to come.</p>

Poll: Ex-mayor's big lead vanishes in barrage of negative ads by Gov. Davis. Low turnout could favor Simon, the clear choice of conservatives. Battered by a wave of negative advertising, Richard Riordan has fallen from the lead and now runs dead even with Bill Simon Jr. as the Republican race for governor enters its final week, according to a Los Angeles Times poll. Simon has emerged as the clear favorite of GOP conservatives, pushing Bill Jones into a distant third place. With his firm support among the party base, Simon could benefit the most if a low turnout next ...

<p>LOS ANGELES.</p> <p>Richard Riordan is about to discover what a lot of Republicans discovered before him. In politics, the high road can lead to oblivion.</p> <p>He may have discovered it already, and just in time. His commanding lead in the public-opinion polls, leading to the March 5 gubernatorial primaries, has shrunk dramatically in the face of a television blitz not only by his Republican rival, but by the incumbent Democratic governor, Gray Davis, who has no primary opponent.</p>

Even some supporters blame California gubernatorial hopeful Richard Riordan's arrogance for his ailing campaign. He was so sure he'd win the GOP primary that he ignored the party faithful and started campaigning against Gov. Gray Davis, the New York Times noted today. Even President Bush, who has stayed on the sidelines, seemed to confer victory on Riordan during a trip to the Left Coast last month. "He came up to me and said, `Hi, Governor!'" Riordan said. "That felt pretty good." But now it feels pretty bad, and "the White House officials who quietly recruited him to wrest back the ...

WOODRUFF: All right, another item from California: a tracking poll showing somebody in trouble on the Republican primary for governor. NOVAK: The Democratic pollster -- Democratic pollster -- Jim Moore (ph) taking a poll of people voting in the Republican primary. A Sunday night poll showed the latest tracking, stunning results: Bill Simon Jr., the son of the late secretary treasury secretary, never run for public office, in first place with 35 percent; Richard Riordan, the former mayor of Los Angeles, who was way ahead in the polls, 40 points ahead when they began, second place with 27 percent; Bill ...

olling Stone correspondent Hunter S. Thompson's self-description: He consumed enough drugs to float the economy of a small South American nation. His book, Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail 72, was about the Nixon-McGovern campaign. How did political reporters cover that campaign? Timothy Crouse wrote The Boys on the Bus (the press bus followed the candidate's car). Crouse, observed druggie-journalist Thompson, took &quot;a big bite out of the hand that feeds news to America.&quot; Thirty years later, California: reporters actually ride with (trapped?) Richard Riordan on his bus! Each day's free-for-all includes the same question for Riordan: &quot;When ...