The Bee's Jim Sanders reports that
Jim Brulte acknowledges that he and another Republican leader
bluffed to get Democrats to support a status quo redistricting measure in 2001.
The deal was actually considered a "best-case scenario" for Republicans, considering they were powerless to stop a Democratic gerrymander of the state. Among the chief concerns was that Democrats could take control of Congress. "Brulte said he talked with
Karl Rove, President Bush's political adviser. 'He wasn't pushing us; he just told me, 'If you can deliver 19 Republican seats, we'll hold the Congress of the United States,'' Brulte said."
"'So (Assembly Republican leader)
Dave Cox and I basically ran a bluff,' Brulte said. 'We threatened to 'referend' redistricting.'"
"'Having said that,' he added, 'we had participated in a conference call with the leadership of the state Republican Party prior to this, and they had assured us there was absolutely no money for a referendum.'"
And that
Arnold Schwarzenegger was just an actor.
Then-Speaker
Robert Hertzberg acknowledges being persuaded by the bluff. "'I was anticipating a significant legal challenge,' Hertzberg said. 'I'm a constitutional lawyer. I did not want to be a term-limited speaker and be embarrassed by having my plan overturned.'"
Meanwhile, the governor
was shopping for votes for Proposition 76 in Roseville yesterday, while his opponents were attacking the measure's impact on education. "The debate took place 20 miles apart and across county lines, with Schwarzenegger posing with a half-dozen teachers in the checkout line of a Roseville school supply store.
He whipped out a credit card to buy their students $478.02 worth of pencils and notebooks and the like - saying that the state can't and won't provide them."
Hey, that's one way to deal with the Prop. 98 shortfall.
"'What is important is to vote yes on Proposition 76 because then they do not have to go out and buy school supplies any more, because we will do it,' Schwarzenegger said, unloading a shopping cart at the GW School Supply Store while the teachers beamed."
"'Because any time you get one-time money and we have good revenues, we will be able to fund school supplies and pay for all those things. ... Under the current system, we don't do that. One-time money is not being used. We use it for other things, but not for these kind of things where it ought to be used, which is for education and for school supplies.'"
This is now the new sales pitch for Prop. 76 -- that it will benefit school funding.
"'If anyone tells you Proposition 76 is good for schools, they're wrong,' said
Bob Wells, executive director of the Association of California School Administrators and a board member of the Alliance for a Better California, which is leading the fight against Schwarzenegger's special election package. 'If you look at what Proposition 76 does, it wipes out most of the voter-approved protections of Proposition 98. And in case anyone's forgotten, voters put Proposition 98 into the state constitution for a reason: They got tired of governors and legislators balancing the state budget on the backs of schoolkids.'"
Meanwhile, the voting is already underway, via absentee ballot, and counties are reporting a
surprisingly high number of absentee ballots being returned for the special election. "I think there's more interest now then there was in last year's presidential primary,'' said
Candy Lopez, assistant registrar of voters in Contra Costa County.
"'I think there's interest out there,' said
Alma Rosas, a spokeswoman for the Santa Clara Country registrar. 'It's not like a governor's race, with a 50 percent turnout, or the 70 percent that turns out for a presidential race, but we're looking at a 40 to 45 percent turnout, like for a primary.'"
Reports from a number of California counties suggest the worst-case scenario of an election decided by only a handful of voters isn't likely to happen. Early absentee figures from Los Angeles County, for example, are running ahead of the March 2004 primary and the October 2003 recall elections.
With the president's poll numbers dropping, the state Republican Party
doesn't seem terribly interested in having him here before the special election. "'Unless President Bush is coming to California to hand over a check from the federal government to help us with the financial challenges we face, the visit seems ill timed,' said
Karen Hanretty, a spokeswoman for the state Republican Party.
Ouch.
The L.A. Times's Michael Finnegan writes that
labor groups have shifted the focus in at least one of their campaign ads, with a new ad that directly attacks the governor, rather than his ballot measures. "The spot opens with Schwarzenegger speaking on Leno's show in August 2003. 'I do not have to bow to any special interests,' Schwarzenegger says in the ad. 'I have plenty of money. No one can pay me off. Trust me.' A firefighter interjects: 'But now he's taking millions from developers and big business.' 'And pushing their agenda with his special election,' adds a police officer in front of a squad car."
Don Sipple, Schwarzenegger's media strategist, said unions' resumption of direct attacks on the governor could undermine their battle against his special election agenda.
"'I think the vitriolic effort to go after the governor hurts their credibility generally on everything else they're saying,' Sipple said."
"Union strategist
Gale Kaufman described the new ad as part of labor's effort to publicize what she called Schwarzenegger's 'lack of leadership.'"
"'He called the special election; this is all about him, and they think somehow we shouldn't be talking about him?' she said."
Meanwhile, Robert Salladay reports in the Times that the
governor and Tom McClintock are allies this time around. "McClintock, the only major Republican to challenge Schwarzenegger during the contentious recall effort in 2003, ended up getting 1.1 million votes, or 13.5%. Further frustrating Schwarzenegger, he signed the ballot arguments opposing the governor's budget initiatives last year."
"But McClintock has produced an ad for talk radio stations supporting the governor's special election agenda. And he is expected to show up again in conservative areas, such as Redding, the seat of a county where he and Schwarzenegger received nearly 80% of the recall election votes."
The Legislative Analyst's Office is out with a new report that finds that the
benefits of California's "three strikes" law are inconclusive, writes the Times's Jenifer Warren. "[T]he study found that one-quarter of the state's prisoners — or about 40,000 men and women — are serving time for a second or third strike. Most are in prison for nonserious or nonviolent crimes, the report's author,
Brian Brown, said Tuesday."
California Advocates for Nursing Home Reform sued the state this week, charging that "[t]he state Department of Health Services
fails to investigate most complaints about nursing homes within the 10-day period required by law, exposing thousands of vulnerable, elderly Californians to harm..."
Could the Democrats be
making a run at Richard Pombo? Maybe not, but the congressman got some more bad news yesterday, according to the Stockton Record. "The Washington D.C.-based Center for Public Integrity released a report Tuesday accusing Pombo of failing to pay taxes for two trips he took while serving as the honorary chairman of a natural resources think-tank funded by fur trappers, agribusiness and chain restaurants.
Meanwhile, federal campaign finance reports released Monday show that Pombo's opponent, Danville pilot
Steve Filson, has raised more than $100,000 in two months, including a contribution from House Minority Leader
Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco.
Another day, another $250,000 for the governor from William Robinson, the Idaho recluse who is one of Schwarzenegger's top funders. The guv also got $500,000 from
Texas oil man Boone Pickens.
Election track has the details.
Finally, the Roundup would like to congratulate
William Kersey for being nominated in the Roundup's
Parent of the Year Award competition. According to the Associated Press, Kersey "called police to report his car missing, but
did not mention that his 4-month-old son had been left inside it, authorities said."
Both car and child were found a couple of hours later, and "officers arrested Kersey, who was with his 4-year-old daughter, on two counts of child neglect and on an outstanding warrant.
Porter County Child Protective Services took custody of both children. Kersey was being held Tuesday in the Porter County Jail without bond."
But who's taking care of the car?
