California recall: A footnote from Georgy

Georgy Russell's Weblog has a cute story about her late-campaign encounter with Cruz Bustamonte in the Castro district of San Francisco:

one funny story from the campaign trail involves my encounter with cruz bustamante. during the campaign finale, cruz came up with the brilliant idea of doing "polaroid photostops" around town. the idea was that cruz would cruise around, pop into shops and ask random people if they wanted to pose for a polaroid with him, because he is just so, well, dashing!
(i mean really, at least use a camera phone. polaroids are super 80's.)

Read the whole thing. It's good.

Former Nixon speechwriter turned conservative columnist William Safire said on Friday's PBS Newshour about the recall: "Big interesting thing is the Hispanic vote. The Republicans got over 42 percent of the Spanish, the Hispanic vote against a Hispanic who was running. Now that augers very well for Republicans all over."

Get a clue, Safire. Latino voters don't just say, "Gol-lee, this guy's got a Latin-sounding name, we better vote for him." Bustamonte was a corporate-centrist clone, who was known for being tight with the big growers who rely on truckloads of illegal Latino laborers but oppose every measure to protect their rights as people or as workers. Bustamonte was never particularly popular among Latino voters, and probably couldn't win a Democratic gubernatorial primary. Especially not now, after his campaign was so weak.

Bustamonte won a big Latino vote because he was the Democratic replacement alternative to Schwarzenegger. If anything, Schwarzenegger's embrace of the anti-immigrant Pete Wilson's team and his opposition to the driver's license bill reminded Latino voters about why so many of them tend to vote Democratic.

Tags: california politics, california recall, cruz bustamonte, georgy russell, recall election

California Recall: Schwarzenegger in Pleasanton

Schwarzenegger and Bush (2006 photo)

Following up a bit on the report in the previous post, I found this Oakland Tribune account of Arnold's Saturday rally in Pleasanton. It doesn't mention the Georgy Russell incident. But the article describes it as a "raring, sometimes fractious crowd of about 4,000." The event was a rally at the Alameda County Fairgrounds, which is publicly owned:

Hundreds of Bay Area residents clamored around that platform, most of them decked out in buttons, hats, T-shirts and signs distributed by representatives from the "Join Arnold" campaign.

Admittance to the park was free, and those who were emblazoned with such items had no problem gaining access, once they passed through the metal detectors.

But outside the main gate, the crowd's political spectrum was as colorful as the recall race itself - and some of the pigments clashed.

And it does sounds like something strange was going on. "Security guards confiscated items that read 'Vote No on Recall' and told some anti-Schwarzenegger supporters, including a large group from the National Organization for Women, that they couldn't come in at all." Since someone could be against the recall and still favor Arnold as the replacement candidate, that seems pretty weird that they would confiscate "No on Recall" material.

They even tried to block a Pleasanton City Councilwoman and the wife of the mayor from going to the rally, because they had "No on Recall" paraphrenalia. They were eventually admitted. The councilwoman, Jennifer Hosterman, said:

"This is public property. I have as much right to hold up my sign that says 'Vote No on Recall.' This is a public place. If they had wanted a private affair, they should have rented private property," Hosterman fumed. ...

"This is my city, this is my back yard ... I was given special treatment because I'm a councilwoman, but all those other people weren't," Hosterman added.

This certainly seems to be odd conduct for a free public rally on public property. Because a public rally is, well, public, which means that you may have someone next to you who doesn't agree with you on everything. And may even say so out loud!

Tags: authoritarianism, california politics, georgy russell, recall campaign, republican party, schwarzenegger

California Recall: Georgy Russell Protests (?) at Schwarzenegger Rally

Georgy Russell

Georgy Russell, as in Georgy for Governor, claims she handled rather aggressively by Schwarzenegger supporters at an Arnold rally in Pleasanton, CA on Saturday:

Gubernatorial candidate Georgy Russell was pushed, shoved, hit and kicked yesterday by supporters of Arnold Schwarzenegger at a rally in Pleasanton CA. She was repeatedly called a "bitch" and one of the Arnold Supporters wrote on her clothing with a permanent marking pen. The felonious abusers, who claimed to be provoked by remarks from Russell, were near equal numbers of men and women and no one during the incident came to Russell's aid. Schwarzeneggar and his wife Maria Shriver witnessed the attack and neither said or did anything to stop the abuse.

I've been on both sides of scenes like that (although I don't recall ever being physically attacked). My local Catholic parish a few years ago invited an elderly Jewish Auschwitz survivor to speak to the church youth group. The event was open to the public, and several 50-ish neo-Nazis showed up and basically tried to heckle him down. The adults from the church shouted them down, and they shut up and let the speaker continue.

They tried some heckling afterward, but eventually left the hall. They stayed outside arguing and shouting, until someone finally called the police. The representatives of the Master Race then scurried away before having to explain themselves to the local cops.

Now, my feeling in that case was that, dammit, if our Catholic parish wants to invite a Jew to talk to us about the Holocaust, we're gonna do it! And these guys were obviously a bunch of cheap bullies, trying to initimidate an old man. It would take a better Christian than I to think that they didn't deserve to be soundly thrashed.

But that's not what happened. We shut them up without having to push them around. And, even though it wasn't intended by the organizers, the kids wound up not just hearing a lesson about a long-distant case of hatred getting out of hand. They were seeing the same hatred played out in front of them.

But at a political rally, if Schwarzenegger isn't man enough to handle a lone 20-something female heckler (and that assumes she was even heckling) - or if his supporters can't do a little counter-heckling without getting physical, well, that's just pathetic.

Tags: authoritarianism, california politics, georgy russell, recall campaign, republican party, schwarzenegger

California recall: home stretch thoughts

Georgy Russell, California gubernatorial candidate

Some people reading this Weblog probably wonder why I haven't posted more about the California recall, since it's a unique event that's attracting a lot of national attention. The basic reason is that I just haven't had much to say about it. My basic perspective hasn't changed much in the three weeks since I first posted about it over a month ago. I still think the recall will fail.

And I still think that Cruz Bustamonte enjoys a heavy advantage in the current partisan line-up to be the leading replacement candidate for Gray Davis if the recall wins. Even though current polls contradict my prediction that he will be the strongest vote-getter of the replacement candidates.

I should also mention why I've had the Georgy Russell for Governor site in my list of favorite sites. It's not meant as an endorsement. (Sorry, Georgy!) But I've had it there as a kind of protest against the basically dysfunctional way both parties have approached this.

Georgy's campaign is a reminder that politics can be spirited and fun as well as serious. And her site shows some of the potential of the Internet for expanding grassroots democracy, as long as we can stop the corporate giants from finding ways to dominate it, too, when it comes to politics.

The fact that she was able to attract national attention to her campaign through her focused use of the Web is a tribute to her creativity. It's also good to see concerned twentysomethings get interested in politics, and her campaign is encouraging that. Jon Carroll gives her some well-deserved praise in this San Francisco Chronicle column.

Did I say national attention? Make that international, as in the BBC and Der Spiegel. Hopefully, she'll keep her Weblog going after the election. Whether she wins or loses.

Tags: california politics, georgy russell