Mock the Vote
What's the case for recalling Gray Davis?
"He won. Get over it." It's tempting to apply this Bush/Gore/2K catchphrase to the mounting drive to recall the governor of California.
At a glance, Governor Gray Davis makes a singularly unpersuasive test case for the extraordinary step of recalling a sitting executive. The arguments against him—his alienating, drippy personality, his deep attachment to special interests, even the general outlines of his fiscal negligence—were all well-known and very much in the foreground back in November, when California voters (ably assisted by an almost criminally incompetent state Republican party) re-elected him, warts and all.
Proponents of the recall—which is currently being promoted in a statewide petition campaign and has apparently gathered more than half the 900,000 required signatures (12 percent of the number of voters in the last election)—note, correctly, that none of these objections matter. The recall provision in the Golden State's constitution does not establish any legal or structural criteria for mounting a recall, and states that "sufficiency of reason is not reviewable."
"You're not gonna recall somebody just because you don't like their looks," says Ted Costa, a political consultant in Citrus Heights. Costa ("The REAL Taxpayer's Friend!"), who wrote the recall petition against Davis, notes that this is the state's 32nd recall effort since the recall mechanism was instituted in 1911, and says the simple fact of its popular success shows we're living in extraordinary times. "This governor has gone too far," he says. "Our organization, People's Advocate, had the opportunity to get involved in the recall of [Davis' Republican predecessor] Pete Wilson, but we didn't. When Wilson raised taxes, we were hoppin' mad, but we didn't think it rose to the level of recall. But the current governor lied to the voters about a $38 billion state budget deficit, and even now he continues to do nothing about it."
This is a theme sounded by other recall supporters, and it's a compelling one. "This [recall] is a law that's been on the books for like a hundred years," says Monica Getz of the Issa For Governor campaign. "It's not like we just said, 'Hey, let's overthrow the government.'" Republican Congressman Darrell Issa last month breathed new life into what was generally seen as a moribund recall campaign, with a $500,000 contribution, and intends to be on the ballot of alternative candidates. (His total support for the recall is now estimated around $800,000.)
More seriously, opponents of the recall appear incapable of arguing their strongest point. "What offends me is that Darrell Issa is a very wealthy guy, who has found a constitutional loophole designed to recall individuals for egregious acts," says Philip Muller, political director of the California Voter Project. "Definitely you've got to do something very bad to be recalled. Whatever you think of Gray Davis, that's not the case… What we have in California is a high percentage of households that have cable TV, a broad spectrum of right-wing talk radio, an unpopular governor, vast voter files, and consultants who know how to use them. Without those tools, this recall would have failed like the 31 previous ones."
In other words, if the situation were completely different we wouldn't be in this situation. It's hard to imagine anti-plutocrat sentiment or fear of the rightwing media gaining much traction when polls show 51 percent of Californians supporting the recall (with 43 percent opposed). And as is often the case with such invective, the nasty stories now being spread about car-alarm king Issa end up making you like him more. His teenage arrest for stealing a red Maserati indicates pluck and ambition. The tale of Issa's pulling a gun on an employee shows he's a hot-blooded manager, just the thing for voters ready to spew out the lukewarm Davis. The California Voter Project decorates the front page of its Stop Issa site with a menacing photo of a gunman, for which Muller makes no apologies. "There's an attempted coup d'état going on," he says.
The clash of left and right ideologies is familiar turf, and the prospect of a gubernatorial free-for-all in the nation's most populous state (more on that in a moment) is exciting. But what makes the recall an important matter outside the state of California is the long-term impact a successful recall will almost certainly have. If California truly leads the nation in structural political changes, then there is a disturbing, exhilarating one at work here: the steady dissolution of representative government.
A recall would be the third prong—along with ballot referenda and term limits—in the movement toward mob rule in the state. Every election year, Californians must sift through more costly ballot initiatives. Term limits have also played an unacknowledged role in the budget crisis. The irresponsible budgets Davis is (deservedly) being blamed for signing were in fact written by representatives whose limited time in office strongly encourages the kind of popular short-term decisions on spending and taxation that would drive even the most robust state's budget out of whack in a few years (by which time the same officials will be out of office).
Whether mob rule is necessarily a bad thing is a legitimate question, and there is certainly value in any event that prevents the government from functioning, passing laws, writing budgets, and so on. Unfortunately, California, a state populated largely by people who moved here expecting to get something for nothing, doesn't work that way. Proposition 13, the famous 1978 ballot initiative that sharply restricted the state's ability to raise taxes, has encouraged not spending cuts but an endless number of bond issues, duly passed in public referendums. Last year, for example, the state's grossly mismanaged public schools got bailed out by Proposition 47, a bond issue that totaled, by this writer's recollection, about a bazillion kajillion dollars.
With all due reverence to the constitutionality of a recall, it's naïve to imagine that the Democrats will not find or invent appropriate cause to recall Governor Issa two years down the road. "Let's say Issa does get this," says the Voter Project's Muller, "and he does become governor. People are going to realize we just elected an anti-choice, pro-gun, pro-offshore drilling goon, and he got elected with only 15 percent of the vote. What do you think they're going to do next time? You're going to see more recalls."
Recall advocates dismiss such concerns. "The polling that's been done shows that people are very reluctant to use the recall," says David Gilliard, a consultant at Rescue California. "They understand how extraordinary this is. The bar for a recall is set so high that it really can't be abused. This will succeed only in cases where the governor is so unpopular because of something he's done." To the argument that Issa's deep pockets have distorted the current recall drive, Gilliard responds that well-heeled labor unions funded the effort to recall Pete Wilson. "This is not only money," he says. "The people signing these petitions are angry because they see their state going down the drain."
"I've had several people call my office and ask about recalling their local officials," says People's Advocate's Costa. "For a short period you might see an increase. Every citizen in California has the right to use the recall process. It's a straight knock on the front door—'Hi, we're the public.' It's very straightforward."
Still, the 4-minute mile was once scientifically known to be impossible. Liberals are fond of ruing the evolution of once-progressive reforms: The independent prosecutor law, passed with such high hopes by Democrats in the 1970s, was used to hamstring Bill Clinton in the 1990s. The powa-to-the people institution of ballot referenda made conservative dreams come true with Prop. 13 and Prop. 187. The recall mechanism, signed by Governor Hiram Johnson to save the state from Southern Pacific, is now poised to place a pro-business conservative in Sacramento. You might call these political ironies, but if the same thing happens every time it's no longer an irony. It's a law of nature.
It's also a law conservatives might think twice about setting in motion. Understandably, recall proponents are at the moment more intrigued by the electoral prospects the chaos of a recall will let loose. The maverick Issa has taken a great gamble with his money and reputation, pulling a trigger the rest of the Republicans were too embarrassed to pull themselves. Given the large number of Republicans expected to be on the ballot (with The Terminator thrown in for comic effect), it's unlikely he'll win the governorship. Either way, however, a successful recall would put him at the front of a state party that desperately needs a leader. The potential impact for President Bush's efforts to win California in 2004 is obvious.
This, however, presupposes a successful recall, and Gray Davis' ability to thrive in days of acid and vitriol should never be underestimated. Already, California Democrats are showing confidence in him, with three prominent candidates refusing spots on the ballot should the recall work. (The lone likely holdout is lieutenant governor Cruz Bustamante, best known for uttering the n-word in a speech to the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists a few years back.)
Right now, Davis appears to have accepted that the recall will come to a vote, and is shifting to an effort to delay the ballot until next spring, when Democratic turnout will be higher because of the Democratic primary. It's not beyond possibility that the singularly uncharismatic Davis could emerge from the recall campaign a Democratic hero—the moderate, tough-on-crime governor who survived a Borking and an attempted overthrow by the vast rightwing conspiracy. Comical or horrific as the idea of a Davis presidency seems, it would at least give us the chance to see whether impeachment—another extreme measure made acceptable by use—is becoming as popular as it seems.
Nor do even the recall's supporters show much faith in the people who would take Davis' crown. "I haven't seen the great Schwarzenegger plan to solve the state's budget crisis," says Ted Costa. In this sentiment, he is echoed by the Voter Project's Philip Muller, who notes, "Darrell Issa is not telling us which programs he wants to cut, or God forbid which taxes he wants to raise, which universities, hospitals, or schools he wants to close."
But will that really matter? Populist measures like the recall haven't just chipped away at the separation of governmental powers; they've made such specific campaign issues increasingly irrelevant. Whoever emerges from the recall war as governor of California may find that there is less and less to govern.
