By: Mary Mostert, Analyst, Banner of Liberty (www.bannerofliberty.com)
August 13, 2003
The best way to tell what kind of public servant a candidate is apt to make is to take a look at what he or she was doing before becoming a candidate. Not what he or she is saying, or has said or what people are saying about them, but what they have actually done. I suggest this is particularly important in the California Recall Gray Davis Election, since time is short.
So, exactly what WAS Arnold Schwarzenegger doing before he decided to run for governor? I suspect just about anyone in America under the age of 30 could answer that question, better than I can. He was making movies. However, acting in movies was Schwarzenegger’s job, like being a doctor, or a lawyer, or a businessman, or a farmer – it’s just a job. What’s important when choosing a person to represent you in the Governor’s mansion is to look at what that person was doing with spare time.
I remember explaining that to a young woman when Gray Davis was running for governor in 1998 when I was a voter in California. Davis’ opponent at the time was Dan Lungren. The young woman, the mother of several children, who asked me how she should vote was primarily interested in a governor who would do something to improve the deplorable quality of education her children were getting. I had just started my website to post links to candidate websites so people could know what they were actually saying, so I suggested she look at Lungren’s and Davis’ websites.
First I showed her Dan Lungren’s website. Lungren was California’s Attorney General and his major concern for the state, not surprisingly, as its crime rate. As a congressman Lungren had been largely responsible for passage of the Comprehensive Crime Control Act, authored the Child Safety and Identification Act and was a major sponsor of the federal Anti Drug Acts of 1986, a major scourge in the lives of young people. He is married and has three children.
On the other hand, Gray Davis’ website gave his priorities as”improving public education, ensuring public safety, and expanding the state’s Healthy Families program. His track record, prior to being elected governor, was serving as lieutenant governor (1995 -1999), controller (1987 - 1995), assemblyman (1983 - 1987), and chief of staff to former Governor Edmond G. “Jerry” Brown, Jr. (1975 - 1981). Gray Davis is married, but has no children.
My young friend studied the two websites, and then said it appeared to her that Dan Lundgren was the candidate that was more interested in children and would have the best understanding of the education problem, since he had children himself. Gray Davis seemed only interested in the process of politics, i.e. “improving public education” compared with Lundgren’s sponsorship of the Child Safety and Identification Act, which centered on protecting children, not just the process of punishing kidnappers. She voted for Lundren, who was beaten handily in 1998 by Gray Davis.
Oddly enough, what has really angered the people of California is Gray Davis’ interest in process seems more or less the problems of people. So, how would the various 197 candidates in the Recall Election do in a comparison with Gray Davis based on what they were doing prior to announcing their candidacy for governor? Arnold Schwarzenegger, according to the polls taken a couple of days after announcing his candidacy, has 42% of the people of California ready to vote for him. Compare that with the 47% that voted for Gray Davis in the last election, after months of campaigning and millions of dollars spent and you will understand the enormity of Davis’ problem. It also probably tell us a little about the chance of the other 196 candidates as well.
So, taking my own advice, I decided to see if Arnold Schwarzenegger had a candidate website up yet. He does. It’s called www.askarnold.com but if you go to www.schwarzenegger.com it takes you first to the just up, but not finished website. It displays Arnold, his index finger pointing, saying, “There comes a point when we the people must demand more of our elected officials than just showing up.” The quote was dated June 2003, long before he announced he was running for governor.
The brief message also says, “There is an enormous disconnect between the people of California and the politicians of California. We the people, are doing our job--working hard, paying our taxes and raising our families. They, the politicians are not doing their job. They fiddle, they fumble, and they fail. It’s time we the people take back California.”
As one of the hundreds of thousands of owners of job producing small businesses, especially those businesses connected with building, lumber mills, logging, lumber companies, electrical and plumbing supply companies, restaurants, and other businesses that catered to thousands of employees in the construction trades who were run out of California in the past few years, I can certainly relate to that statement. I suspect many other Californians and former Californians will too.
What was Arnold Schwarzenegger doing before he decided to run for governor? The kids know. They also know that he likes them. Every public event we’ve seen him at since he announced he was running for governor was a pre-scheduled event involving doing something constructive, with his own time and his own money, for the children of America.
What is needed in California is leadership. I lived there for 25 years and politicians talked interminably about such things as its looming water problem, but never did anything to solve it. They talked about energy problems, then shut down the nuclear power plant in Rancho Seco that furnished electricity to more than a million people. Their only program seemed to be to run people who produced jobs out of the state.
Would Arnold Schwarzenegger, a mere actor, be able to turn things around in California? Well, he surely can’t possibly make any bigger mess than expert politician Gray Davis has made.
To comment: mmostert@bannerofliberty.com