Can You Recall a Better Day?

#126, October 1, 2003

(on vacation September 17)

 

Citizens of Rohnert Park have a rare opportunity: they can support active campaigns to oust their elected representatives at the city, county, state, and national levels (see votetoimpeach.org). A Total Recall!

 

What’s fueling the recall fire? Here at home, it’s the casino. Supervisors Kerns, Smith, and Brown oppose the casino, but apparently with insufficient gusto. The local recall forces say no amount of gambling money, promised to the City and County by the tribe, can buy back the safety and sanctity of our communities. The gambling issue adds heat to the state recall race, too, as stakeholders either collect huge contributions from the Indians or blast away at those who do.

 

The gubernatorial recall is yet another symptom of what I’ll call “monecrocy”, where money smothers the power of the people. But while some say the Davis recall was simply the work of reactionary Republican Darrel Issa’s $1.6 million, that’s only half true. Issa’s political ambition provided the spark, and his fortunes fanned the flames, but Gray Davis’ provided much of the fuel. There are good reasons to have not elected him last year, and to not re-elect him in three more. Still, does Davis’ behavior warrant a recall? And will that solve the problem?

 

In the first chapter of “Master of the Senate”, the thick bestseller about Lyndon Johnson’s pre-presidential career, Robert Caro describes how the 1868 US Senate rejected impeachment conviction of President *Andrew* Johnson for vetoing popular legislation (which punished the post-war south.) Senator Lyman Trumball, a supporter of that same legislation, nonetheless opposed conviction: “Once set, the example of impeaching a President for what, when the excitement of the hour having subsided, will be regarded as insufficient cause, no future President will be safe… What then becomes of the checks and balances of the Constitution?”

 

Davis is an unlikable outcome of our cash-powered political ecosystem. But his recall is something much worse: part of an escalation of right-wing attacks on democracy. Jeb Bush’s voter purge removed tens of thousands of legitimate and likely Gore voters from the Florida voter rolls, falsely suspected as felons, just months before the 2000 election. This, more than the Supreme Court or hanging chads, handed the Presidency to brother George. This year, Republican Texan legislators have staged an unprecedented attempt to prematurely redraw Congressional district boundaries, again disenfranchising Black Democratic voters in order to consolidate Republican Congressional power (see savetexasreps.com.) If you think Republicans wanted Davis recalled for serious ethical or managerial failures, why did Issa (on September 23rd) urge Republicans to reject the recall if it appeared that a Schwarzenegger-McClintock split would hand Bustamante a victory?

 

I’m voting No on the recall, to help stop the unraveling of democracy all across America. But if you, like I, want your No Recall vote to be more than a Yes Davis vote, more is required. If you want to reject the “win at any cost” approach that has infected even our City Council elections, you need to look further down the ballot. Arianna Huffington and Peter Camejo understand what has diseased the governance of this state, and have the independence and strength to cure it. Camejo, for example, showing the depth of his knowledge, pointed out how a Governor not beholden to Big Energy could use the power of state pension funds’ stock ownership to renegotiate those expensive energy contracts.

 

Huffington’s long transformation from Republican to independent populist came from her first-hand experience, as a community service volunteer, with the failures of trickle-down economics. She’s launching a “Clean Elections Initiative” for the November 2004 ballot, patterned after the successful public campaign funding programs in Maine and Arizona (see votearianna.com.)

 

If I end up voting for Bustamante over Camejo or Huffington, it’s primarily to avoid a repeat of the Presidential outcome, especially environmental impacts of the Hummernator. But without leadership for thorough campaign finance reform, based on public funding, we can expect more of the same in Sacramento (and Petaluma), regardless who wins the recall battle.