http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/08/08/recall.arnold/index.html


The popular actor said he is above reproach ethically because he is "rich enough" to be unaffected by special interests, enabling him to render decisions in the people's interests.

So far, Arnold is not impressing me. He needs to move beyond empty cliches very quickly, and the "being rich makes me ethical" angle is not going to play very well.

Time to show those evil spuds what's what

http://www.pigsflycd.com/devo.jpg

Do you have the papers that Chinaman gave you?

Originally posted by thesloppy
http://www.pigsflycd.com/devo.jpg

Do you have the papers that Chinaman gave you?

very good Booji Boy.

Originally posted by clintl
So far, Arnold is not impressing me. He needs to move beyond empty cliches very quickly, and the "being rich makes me ethical" angle is not going to play very well.

Clint, do you not followed national level politics? Enough money and the philosphy you just mentioned have made more than one person a President.

I don't know about him. Anyone who basically says, "I'll get back to you in the next month or so to let you know what I believe in, but support me now" is a bit suspect. I mean, I give him credit for being honest, but he's essentially admitting that his position on a number of issues is only going to be what his advisors tell him is the best position to take. That doesn't demonstrate that he holds many deep-rooted beliefs, such that I would be inspired to vote for him (if were a Californian). Or, if he does have certain beliefs but he's just taking the politically savvy position, that doesn't say too much about him, either.

Originally posted by Leonidas
Clint, do you not followed national level politics? Enough money and the philosphy you just mentioned have made more than one person a President.

Yes, I know that it often works. However, I don't think it can work for Arnold. Polls right now are showing that twice as many people are not inclined to vote for Arnold as there are people who are inclined, which basically means that Arnold has to prove himself. People are not going to just accept him because he has name recognition.

Originally posted by Ksyrup
I don't know about him. Anyone who basically says, "I'll get back to you in the next month or so to let you know what I believe in, but support me now" is a bit suspect. I mean, I give him credit for being honest, but he's essentially admitting that his position on a number of issues is only going to be what his advisors tell him is the best position to take. That doesn't demonstrate that he holds many deep-rooted beliefs, such that I would be inspired to vote for him (if were a Californian). Or, if he does have certain beliefs but he's just taking the politically savvy position, that doesn't say too much about him, either.

Dola...

The other explanation is that he is just not up to speed yet on policy issues. FWIW, it wouldn't surprise me if it's a combination of all of those things.

I love Arnold, but I can't listen to him talk for very long before I start cracking up.

FWIW, my problem with him is that he mentions he wants to get companies back in the State so that they can pay taxes to fund the social programs (that help put them in this hole to start). [shudder]

I can't say I'm glad that I don't live in Cali, however, because we here in PA are faced with Ed Rendell. Not sure which is worse. Davis or Rendell. It's like choosing how to die. Would you rather have your nuts chewed off by a laplander, or fall 20 stories onto a bike without a seat? [shudder]

Why is it that politics seems to bring out the worst (maybe I'm exagerrating, but you get the point). I dont know enough about Arnold yet, but the inexperience is very leary at this point. He is trying to say all the right things, but after listening to him for a few minutes you realize he's just spouting a bunch of cliches. I heard John Garamendi (spelling?) yesterday speaking on why we need to give all illegal immigrants a drivers license and I wanted to rip my hair out by the time he was done talking. I dont know much about Cruz Bustamante, but I get the feeling he's a Davis clone.

Whats a Californian to do?

I hear Vegas is nice.

it's not a tumor

Originally posted by clintl
Yes, I know that it often works. However, I don't think it can work for Arnold. Polls right now are showing that twice as many people are not inclined to vote for Arnold as there are people who are inclined, which basically means that Arnold has to prove himself. People are not going to just accept him because he has name recognition.

But the thing with this goofy campaign is Arnold can win with only 15-20% of the vote. He doesn't have to impress the majority, only a large enough group of those willing to believe in him (notice I resisted the urge to call them fools or any other such derogatory term).

Originally posted by Leonidas
But the thing with this goofy campaign is Arnold can win with only 15-20% of the vote.

Based on how the field is shaping up, I think it's going to take 25-30% to win. There just aren't enough major candidates in the race to dilute it more than that. And Bustamante has polled better than Arnold in approval ratings; whether that translates to votes when the time comes remains to be seen. Arnold certainly has a chance, but I wouldn't rate him as the favorite based on what we know now. And polls have been extremely volatile in recent California primaries for governor, so even the early polls may not mean much.

As for Arnold running in the first place, What is this election a popularity contest??

I think people forget that Arnold was tabbed as a potential governor candidate before the recall and was a possible for last year's race. Due to T3 and a few other movie contract things, he declined to run. The thought would be to hold out for 2006. Given the recall, Arnold probably figured now is a good time to make a run at it.

The guy is a brilliant businessman. And things like keeping jobs in the state and education are near and dear to many people's hearts (on both sides of the political spectrum).

You have got to be kidding me. He hasn't even made any attempt to put out a intelligent platform. Arnold may be a honest guy, but by no means does he have the political experience or intelligence to be governor of California. I know a lot of people will vote for Arnold because they like his movies, or they think it would be 'fun' to have Arnold as governor, but people should take a hard, hard look at what kind of potential governor Arnold would be.

So turning around blighted neighborhoods, revitalizing old malls, and taking an LA inner city afterschool program national isn't a nice resume. Stupid people don't do that.

As for political experience, neither did Reagan.

I think this letter to the editor in today's Sacramento Bee sums up the fact pretty well that Arnold is going to have some difficulties just holding on to the Republican vote:


"I will go to Sacramento and I will clean house," Schwarzenegger said. "As you know, I don't need to take money from anyone. I have plenty of money myself." So Schwarzenegger is going to buy California.
And again: "He spoke of drawing business back to California, but in the context of replenishing state finances so that more money could be spent on government programs."

He is going to buy California and then spend our money on government programs! This is a Republican? How can we even consider him?



http://www.sacbee.com/content/opinion/story/7190960p-8137815c.html

Democrats have two credible candidates to choose from, so Arnold needs to hold on to a big chunk of the Republican vote to win. And this is not the first time I've seen a Republican question his political intentions. The skepticism level is high, and Arnold has a lot of work to do if he's going to win. And he can't make any mistakes, or his candidacy will be dead.

Just remember who Arnold's campaign manager is. Ever heard of Pete Wilson?

I don't know that Pete Wilson is that much of an asset. He's not as unpopular as Davis, but he's still very unpopular, and he deserves to be for that sham of an electricity deregulation plan he inflicted on us.

Deregulation wouldn't have been so bad had it been done right. But like the telephone deregulation, it's seriously flawed.

The idea behind power deregulation was that you would choose your power company and have competitive rates. However just because you chose Green Mountain Energy didn't mean you were free from PG&E. Same goes for the phone service. I know people who picked MCI, only to have GTE come and take care of the lines. And there were still fees paid to GTE.

In essence, it wasn't pure. What the state needed to do was own the power and telephone lines. Than allow power and phone companies to pay to transmit through those lines. Or something to that effect.

And remember that at the time, power deregulation seemed like a great idea. I know many people who looked forward to being free of PG&E.

Also Wilson handled the state budget and kept us in the black. Davis took over from Wilson with the state in the black. In the time he's been in office, Davis screwed all of that.

I think Arnold's best bet though is to not play party politics at all. Everyone I know is sick of party politics. Just run the state dammit and leave your moral/immoral ideology at home.

Wilson had the same kind of budget deficit problems to deal with in the early '90s, and they were pretty big (around $12B). He didn't keep the budget in the black his whole term in office, and he also suffered a big drop in popularity because of the budget cuts and tax increases needed to fix it.

As far as electricity deregulation goes, yes, a good deregulation plan might have worked as promised. Unfortunately, that's not what we got, and what we did get was Wilson's baby.

Originally posted by clintl
Based on how the field is shaping up, I think it's going to take 25-30% to win. There just aren't enough major candidates in the race to dilute it more than that. And Bustamante has polled better than Arnold in approval ratings; whether that translates to votes when the time comes remains to be seen. Arnold certainly has a chance, but I wouldn't rate him as the favorite based on what we know now. And polls have been extremely volatile in recent California primaries for governor, so even the early polls may not mean much.

This morning CNN was reporting that polls had Arnald ahead with about 25%. Bustamante was second with 16%.