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Aquarian
Weekly 8/6/03
REALITY CHECK
CALIFORNIA SCHEMIN'
The
wife and I plan on moving out to northern California when I'm
closer to a natural demise; let that read, if I survive this daily
boogie with death I've fashioned into a career. But if or when
we get out there, we do not plan to vote. Voting does not count
in California. It's what the insiders like to call a "do-over"
state. And soon, if a Recall on its Democratic governor, the wildly
abhorred, Gray Davis goes through without a hitch, there may be
little reason to vote on a local basis anywhere on this continent.
Right
now California is broke. Its $38 billion gap between revenues
and expenses has crippled the state's economy to an all-time low,
a slow deflation that many economists believe started in 1978
with the infamous Proposition 13 that put a hard cap on the government's
taxing power. The rub is this nifty initiative did not stop subsequent
civic officials, including the doomed Davis, to spend freely on
schools, prisons and other expensive projects.
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People
hear Recall and think something is wrong with Gray Davis'
fuel system, like he's some kind of faulty vehicle sent
back to the plant for exploding on national television test
runs.
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California
has become a metaphor for the credit madness that currently engulfs
this nation; it has stretched itself far beyond its means. It
is also a glaring example of schizophrenic politics; a paradoxical
helter skelter of citizen rule that wants everything without paying
for it. Less government with more perks. Bold government programs
with healthy tax cuts. Few state regulations with a needy increase
in bureaucracy.
Thus,
California is a deadbeat debt fiend with a tattered figurehead
about to be shown the door.
People
hear Recall and think something is wrong with Gray Davis' fuel
system, like he's some kind of faulty vehicle sent back to the
plant for exploding on national television test runs. True, the
man is a condescending twit who used a $70 million smear campaign
to retain power, and a frighteningly easy scapegoat, but hardly
the sole proprietor of the disaster he now sits upon.
But
Californians are historically fickle with politics. In a bizarre
17-year period from 1967 to 1983, the state posted a gubernatorial
experiment in polar opposites the likes of which have been rarely
seen in the history of this republic. Ronald Reagan, a reborn
icon of hard-core conservatism smoothly gave way to the socialist
hippy dreamscape that was Jerry Brown, a collective Freudian episode
worthy of a straightjacket. So the Davis Recall, although a clear
manifestation of bad legislation and identity crisis, is hardly
unexpected in the Golden State.
Nearly
a century ago the concept of Recall was the reactionary brainchild
of California governor, Hiram Johnson, a Teddy Roosevelt reformer
nut who used the burgeoning "progressive movement" to weed out
the manipulation of special interest concerns. Under the guise
of preventing private conglomerates like banks or railroads from
sending puppeteer candidates to log jam mandates, Johnson's edict
meant to use the power of populist democracy to right election
wrongs.
But
the language in Johnson's law is vague. Grounds for Recall could
range from questionable hairdos to odd eating habits, a dangerous
legal landscape for the directionally challenged Californian.
Currently
18 states have some law allowing Recall, New Jersey is one, but
only six have specific grounds, with two of those states -Minnesota
and Georgia -allowing a judicial review of those grounds. California,
the broke schizo state, is not one of those.
But
enacting an actual Recall on a governor is rare. North Dakota
is the only state on record to have successfully booted its leader
from office. In 1921, Non-Partisan Party member, Lynn Frazier,
a well-known socialist with little ideas about handling farm budgets,
was also sent packing under the cloud of being a fiscal boob.
The
current California petition in question, now boasting well over
1.5 million signatures (easily eclipsing the approximately 900,000
needed), has delegated a Recall of Davis for 10/7. But many state
Democrats have been waging a predictable, if not futile battle
on its authenticity, mainly because Republican congressman, Darrell
Issa has used roughly $1.7 million to bankroll the petition efforts.
The
California Left has argued that Issa's strong connection to pro-life
filibusters has procured funds to oust an elected official because
of social, not economic woes. But although Davis is a staunchly
pro-choice advocate, the argument holds little water. Issa, who
has shockingly thrown his hat in the ring for governorship, is
a wealthy Californian entrepreneur known for using such pocket-change
to fuel grass-roots movement on ego alone. And, as stated above,
distinctions between social or economic reasons for canning a
governor is laughable in the face of such an ambiguous law.
Needless
to point out, the whole Recall thing, although gangbusters in
the wild, wild west, could set dangerous inroads nationwide, opening
a fun-filled can of worms that would define any election as merely
temporary, even within the boundaries of a term; hence, a "do
over".
These
kind of vacillating principles do not necessarily raise my personal
ire, except to provide more evidence that most of us don't know
what the hell we want from our appointed officials beyond blaming
them for a falling sky.
And
damn it, if that isn't democracy in motion.
The
wife and I like democracy. So, hopefully by the time our little
caravan shuffles off to Big Sur to sit on a cliff and contemplate
saner human aspirations, what is left of California's political
scene will include a mass council of weekly votes based on the
performance and likeability of state officials. I hear the elderly
love to hit the polls, if for nothing else but the laughs.
The
wife and I like to laugh.
Reality
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