PRESTOPUNDIT -- "must readings" says Nick Schutz

Space aliens endorse Schwarzenegger.

Schwarzenegger has lazy bureaurcrats in Sacramento very nervous.

Kevin Murphy scoop -- Is Bustamante after the illegal vote?

Here is Bustamante on Univision television:

"I could win solely with the votes of the immigrant communities. If every person in the immigrant communities went out and voted, I could succeed just with their votes. That won't be the case. But I think it's important for them to know that they have the power. In our political system, in a democratic system, the power is in the vote. If they don't want to make themselves heard, then they don't have to vote. But if they want to say that it's important to have someone in a position of power who has experience as an immigrant, who has an understanding of our lives, someone who can improve the life of our community, it's important that they get out of the house and vote."

Some things to note here. First, and most obviously, Schwarzenegger himself has "experience as an immigrant". So why wouldn't Schwarzenegger count in Bustamante's conception of the community of immigrants? Could it have something to do with the fact that Schwarzenegger isn't specifically seeking to put the interests of non-citizens ahead of those of actual citizens?

Second, Bustamante has never called aliens illegally in American anything but "immigrants" full stop -- in fact, Bustamante attacks the idea of distinguishing between citizens of America and non-citizens. So when Bustamante talks about the "immigrant communities", one of those communities is the illegals community.

Finally, it isn't going to far to say that what Bustamante is doing is calling upon all non-natives -- including non-citizens -- to rise up, take the power, and out vote native born Americans living in California. And it's hard not to see in this an echo of 1970s identity politics, with Bustamante putting out the call for something like a pan-foreigner "MECHa revolution" against the native born American population in California. And if this isn't the politics of division -- a call for political allegiance based on racial and national identity -- I don't know what is.

California Insider had the Bustamante on Univision scoop first -- according to Weintraub, "Cruz has played the race card". Read the whole thing.

And here is Fresh Potatoes take.

Native born Americans would have to get Mexican, African or Iraqi citizenship to receive benefits to match those being given to non-Americans, both at home and abroad. George Bush and state governments are basically saying "screw you" to the citizens who actually own the country and pay the bills.

It's 40 - 32 Schwarzenegger over Bustamecha -- with Tomakaze stalled out somewhere over the Pacific at 15 in a brand spanking new LA Times poll. Quotable:

The shift in voter support toward Schwarzenegger is dramatic: Since the last Times Poll, he has made double-digit gains among Republicans, independents, whites, senior citizens, women and other major voting blocs. The September poll had Bustamante in the lead with 30 percent, followed by Schwarzenegger at 25 percent and McClintock at 18 percent. Bustamante had also led Schwarzenegger in an August poll, 35 percent to 22 percent.

Times pollster Susan Pinkus said a televised debate last week, the only one that Schwarzenegger has attended, appeared to firm up support for the recall. Voters who were dissatisfied with Davis -- and with career politicians in general -- seem to have concluded that Schwarzenegger was a viable alternative.

See the details in PDF here.

Below the margin of error and falling, the crazy lady quits the race to replace. And she'll be throwing her margin of error to ... well, you all will just have to keep on listening to her unending caterwaulling to find out. Don't look for the news here.

Crazy Lady blogger Mickey Kaus has all the crazy lady gossip and analysis you could possibly want.

UPDATE: "At "less than 0.5%," she brings nanotech to polling." -- Kaus this morning on the crazy lady.

Another historic Schwarzenegger endorsement.

The Road to Recall -- Schwarzenegger's "We're Not Gonna Take It" Tour:

Thursday, October 2nd
8:00a.m.
San Diego Convention Center, Hall A
San Diego, CA

11:30 a.m.
Orange County Fairgrounds
88 Fair Drive
Costa Mesa, CA

Friday, October 3rd
7:30 a.m.
Los Angeles Arboretum
301 North Baldwin Avenue
Arcadia, CA

1:30 p.m.
The Marketplace
9000 Main Avenue
Bakersfield, CA

Saturday, October 4th
9:00 a.m.
P-R Farms
2917 East Shepherd
Fresno, CA

1:30 p.m.
10th Street Plaza
Modesto, CA

4:00 p.m.
Alameda County Fairgrounds
4501 Pleasanton Avenue
Pleasanton, CA

Sunday, October 5th
12 noon
California State Capitol
Downtown Sacramento
(South side of the Capitol, corner of 11th and N Street)

Twisted Sister frontman Dee Snider to perform ‘We’re Not Gonna Take It’ live Sunday in Sacramento at final stop in the Schwarzenegger California road trip. Song is named "official anthem" of the Schwarzenegger campaign.

Calblog, ace reporter, bringing you race to replace news, on the ground, with actual real people working in the Schwarzenegger campaign.

Schwarzenegger Road Trip:

The bus tour is to consist of six buses, each taking the name of a Schwarzenegger movie ... The candidate himself will ride on "Running Man" ... Schwarzenegger's VIP supporters will ride on "Total Recall" ... The four press buses will be called "Predator 1," "Predator 2," "Predator 3" ... and "True Lies."

Priorities & Frivolities has the new Chamber poll numbers and some analysis. Worth noting -- Schwarzenegger's big gains are coming from Republican voters.

Lefties rally around Bustamecha -- Camejo and the crazy lady step back to make room for Cruz -- seeRough & Tumble for the stories.

Details of the USA Today / Gallop recall poll.

Xrlq has a "free Weintraub" blogosphere update / roundup.

In an historic first the California GOP endorses Schwarzenegger for governor.

A remarkable interview with war correspondent Bob Arnot from Iraq:

ARNOT: I think the most interesting point about this bombing, Joe, is that people talk about terrorism. There’s nothing terrifying about it. Some guy blew up a bomb. Nobody was scared. Nobody was even particularly anxious. It is just something that happens every day. The thing that makes it a terrorist event is that you have then 100 cameras that come over and cover it. And that is the frustration, is that it is a very low-level, nickel-dime terrorist war here. There is no civil war. There is no mass insurrection. And it really obscures the truth, which is, there is very steady, day-to-day progress, in terms of getting electricity, water, opening schools, the clinics, more hospitals than Saddam ever had open ...
SCARBOROUGH: Have you heard any suggestions that you may have been the target of this bombing?
ARNOT: Well, the best suggestion was, the bomb was right underneath my window. At this point, honestly, we don’t know whether we were being attacked as NBC or it was local revenge killing of some kind of another or whether just because there are a lot of Western cars out front there.
But the important thing is, if you have been through a lot of wars-and I have been through over 20 of them, lot of history-every war has a lot of chaos after it. Look at Germany after World War II. Look at Kosovo. You expect a lot of chaos. And I think the perspective is, you cannot get caught up in that. France for a year after 1945 was a mess. Germany, the Marshall Plan did not even start for three years afterwards.
This thing, to put it in perspective, has gone like grease lightning compared to all those other wars. You have a plan in four months, instead of four years, like the Marshall Plan. You got the schools open. You have a provisional government in here. They are going to write a constitution in the next six months. We are not telling a Pollyannaish story.
Sure, there were missteps. There were not enough police in here. The plan maybe didn’t account for the kind of chaos. They expected the government to just sort of lop off the top and have people here standing ready to sort of start right back up again. But to their credit, the U.S. Marines said all the way up on the road with them, expect chaos. They expected this thing, like all totalitarian regimes, just basically crumbles into nothing.
And you sort of just are standing there with nothing to work with. But I will tell you, Joe, I have been extremely impressed with Ambassador Bremer. I spent an evening with him, went on the road with him down to Basra. Behind the scenes, he is not like he is on TV. He’s like a kid. He’s fun. He’s energetic. He’s witty. I challenged him on-not challenged-but I talked to him about this Belgian-style federal government. He immediately said, oh, no, that is not going to work. The Flemings take one spot and the Walloons the other. He really knows his stuff. And I talked to his whole staff, took them aside. And every stack of paper, he knows what’s in it. He’s on top of it. And they are bewildered at the CPA, bewildered, that they have all this progress, all these schools opening, all these clinics, and all they see on TV is something that’s made to look like Vietnam. In fact, I call it the Vietnamization of Iraq.
SCARBOROUGH: Now, the latest CNN/Gallup poll reports that 67 percent of Iraqis say Iraq will be better off in five years than it is now. And it is currently better off than it was before the U.S. invasion.
I asked Bob Arnot to explain why no one in America seems to hear about these numbers.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ARNOT: I think there are two reasons for it.
The CPA was saying the other night-one is that you have news organizations here that you can cover sort of one story. And it is interesting, Joe. To be honest, with us, today, our satellite truck is gone. We just have this videophone up. I’m doing the news of the day. And what am I doing? Bombing in Mosul and an RPG attack someplace else.
You’re sort of stuck. If you just do that one story today, that’s all can you do, and you kind of can’t ignore it. The strength that NBC has had on this story is having that extra team to be able to come in to sort of look around. My background as a physician is humanitarian. I’m on the board of Save the Children and a bunch of other great organizations, tremendously motivational organizations, and really trying to understand the reconstruction after a war, after civil war.
And it is very, very difficult. It is very, very complex. I met with
this U.S. Army colonel whose name is Russell Gould (ph). What an
inspirational guy. He is fighting the fight of his life. He’s fighting the guerrillas out there. He has not lost a man, thank God, in about siX weeks, because he’s getting those IEDs before they explode. He is making -” he has got a great, great network out there, tremendous intelligence network. But he also had his first district council meeting. He, the other night, sat out there with me in front of the district council. He says: You know what? I am teaching democracy. They have the freedom to speak. And they’re doing that right now. They have the freedom to assemble. He has seen them assemble. And you know what? They have the freedom to make decisions. And they’re marking hard decisions right now.
So, I’ll tell you. The commanders out here. I was with General Hemlick (ph) the other day, one of General Major Petraeus lead men there, 101st Airborne. Again, tears in your eyes sort of motivation when you see the danger they face, and that they took this town called Afghani (ph). And they have that town up, school, clinic, hospital, soccer field, police force, all up and going. And the kids were actually cheering in the street.
I was with Bremer the other day down with the Marsh Arabs. Again, you know, hi. I asked the kids, George Bush or Saddam Hussein, who do you love? They say, George Bush. So there’s a lot of enthusiasm. You have the Baathist here. There is no question, they have very deep pockets. They have tens of millions of dollars. They brought in this Ansar al-Islam sect. They brought the Wahabis in.
They are supposed to be a very, very tight, tight al Qaeda connection. They basically hire local thugs to do the dirty work. And it is. It is a big fight between good and evil. We are good. And I hope we win.
SCARBOROUGH: Yes.
Hey, I want to ask you about American soldiers, because, when I was in Congress, I represented a district that had five military bases. I still have a lot of friends that are serving the military, a lot of family members. They call me up. They e-mail me. They write me and they talk about being distressed, that their husbands, that their daughters, their sons are overseas doing a great job in Iraq.
And yet you don’t hear that good news, unless you see Bob Arnot reports and maybe one or two other reports sporadically. Tell me how our men and women in uniform are responding to the steady stream of bad news that’s coming out there. And do you get a sense that maybe the worm is starting to turn, so to speak, and maybe some other news organizations may be adding a proper perspective to tell the rest of this story in Iraq, the good news that’s happening out of Baghdad and the rest of Iraq?
ARNOT: Yes. I was on the weekend in a place called Sulaymaniyah. It is so safe they actually have U.S. armed forces up there, an R&R location, where the locals provide all of the security. Down south, again, outside of Basra, I talked to the honorable Hillary Senate (ph), who’s running that district down there. They have not had any car bombs. They have not had any shootings; 85 percent of the country is in reasonably good shape.
Now, you asked about U.S. armed services members out here. If you’re in a transportation pool and you’re going up and down the roads and you’re getting attacked day in, day out. It’s a little tough motivationally. but got to tell you, the individual commanders I have talked to from the 1st I.D., the 101st, out here, in fact the 1st Armored Division, just bring tears to your eyes. It pumps you up just to be around them.
And I’m not being jingoistic. I just mean, in terms of motivational bosses, they are absolutely phenomenal. And it goes all the way down the chains. I was out with these guys the other day-soldiers, I should say. They actually been attacked. Five of them had won Purple Hearts. They were all offered a trip home. And they all refused to take it, saying that they wanted to stay on the streets of Baghdad.
So, the commanders out there are just as spectacular as they were during the war. They have much more meddlesome, much more troublesome problems than they did during the war. But they’re doing a great job. And I’m not being a cheerleader. I just got to tell you, you go out there and you feel absolutely great.
Part of it is, I think, that it is sort of hard to get at those-quote-”good news stories,” because it is hard to get up into those different areas and set up and still cover the news down here in Baghdad. But the big bottom line, Joe, is just perspective. Any war has chaos afterwards. Any war is not as properly planned for as it might otherwise be. But you have to look at the march of progress.
SCARBOROUGH: One final question, because we had a congressman on a few nights ago that actually made-a Democratic congressman that went over to Iraq. He came back. And he actually said that he believed the media was hurting our chances of succeeding in Iraq.
I want to ask, do you get a sense that other media people, other reporters on the ground there, are starting to understand that they may not be giving the full picture to the American people? Do you get a sense that maybe “The New York Times,” who has run a few positive stories of late, CBS News, where you had Dan Rather a couple nights ago saying a lot of these negative stories do not create a proper perspective, do you get a sense they’re starting to understand that maybe they need to tell the rest of the story?
ARNOT: Sure.
I don’t want to be too critical of the press, because, when you’re out here, like we were yesterday, you have a bomb blow off out your window, it is a pretty dramatic and it’s a pretty interesting story. And day to day, that does sort of captivate your attention and it does sort of distract you from seeing the other story.
And, honestly, if you cover wars, you are not probably used to gas turbine generators and what kind of chlorine you use to clean up water and how many clinics are open. But I think, Joe, it is one of the most interesting stories ever, because imagine if it were the other way. Imagine if there were no terrorism and everything perfectly and they were turning the power on. It would be no story at all.
But given this tremendous sort of disparity, given the terrorism, the daily attack on U.S. soldiers out here and Marines, and the fact that they basically can go out there, against all this adversity, and do it make it one of the most interesting stories ever, just showing again how Americans, faced with this incredible adversity, are doing a remarkable job and inspiring the rest of us while they do it.
And I think that is the real story. I walk up to a commander and I say, I am not here to make up a story. I am not here with any agenda. I am telling your story the most honest way I possibly can. I just want to see what you’re doing. They’re very, very open. And when they let down their guard, what you see is great leadership and a great job.

Does California Insider need an editor? -- the NY Times weighs in.

And here is the Bee itself on the issue -- including a quote from Weintraub on this tempest in a teapot. There's been lots of discussion of this in the blogosphere. If someone does the roundup, please send me a link.

The San Diego Union-Tribune endorsed Schwarzenegger. Quotable:

Schwarzenegger offers the best hope, in our view, for fundamental reform of California's dysfunctional government.

Marci Hamilton -- free the law schools from the Leftist / Democrat party line:

During the mid-1990's, for example, Professor James Lindgren of Northwestern University Law School conducted a survey of law professors, and concluded that of the faculties of the top 100 law schools, 80% of law professors were Democrats (or leaned left) and only 13% were Republicans (or leaned right). There is no reason to believe these numbers have changed.

(via ProfessorBainbridge.com)

Elia Kazan is dead.

The truth about academia begins to leak out:

[DAVID] BROOKS IS GETTING BETTER Yesterday's column was not only strong, it was one Safire would never have written and the Times would never have run by a guest writer. Brook's highlight's what is common knowledge to every conservative journalist I know: post-grad academia is horrendously bigoted against conservatives. I have at least half dozen friends who either have PhDs but couldn't possibly find work in academia or who gave up seeking them for the same reason. One friend of mine whose credentials and scholarship are outstanding is toiling in a fifth-tier school precisely because he's a conservative. Other PhD'd friends of mine are in the administration, at think tanks or in journalism because they'd never have a chance to teach. And, as Brooks notes, it's not merely a straightforward political bias, the barrier also has to do with how loopy academia has become in general. Most conservative would-be academics aren't interested in partisan politics, but they are interested in the classics, the canon, mainstream history, etc -- and that stuff is knuckle-dragging nonsense to the folks who peddle post-colonial studies and the like.

-- Jonah Goldberg

And MORE from ProfessorBainbridge.com:

All too often, applicants [to law school faculties] with conservative lines on their resume -- an Olin fellowship, Federalist Society membership, or, heaven help you, a Scalia clerkship -- are passed over no matter how sterling the rest of their credentials may be. The problem is that at most law schools there is no critical mass of conservatives to act as "champions" for such candidates ...

Law school hiring tends to be driven by the self-perpetuating network of left-leaning senior faculty. Nobody pulls the conservative candidate's AALS form out of the slushpile, while the latest left-leaning prodigy gets the benefit of phone calls from their mentors to buddies of the mentors and having their AALS form flagged or even hand carried around the building. It may not be deliberate bias, but there still is a disparate impact.

My advice to aspiring conservative legal academics? Stick to private law topics (business law is especially safe) and follow Juan's advice: "there are reasons some untenured professors blog under pseudonyms."

(via InstaPundit.com) Who also has this from Juan Non-Volokh.

Today’s David Brooks column struck a chord. When I was an undergraduate at Yale, I had several long discussions with my senior essay advisor about whether to pursue my PhD. My advisor, who was himself quite liberal, cautioned against it, largely because of my emerging, right-of-center political views. As he described it, succeeding in the liberal arts academy is tough enough as it is without the added burden of holding unpopular views. To illustrate the risk, he noted that one of his colleagues on the graduate admissions committee explicitly blackballed each and every candidate who had ever received financial support (scholarships, fellowships, etc.) from the John M. Olin Foundation because, his colleague insisted, the Olin Foundation only funded people who thought like they did, and Yale did not want any graduate students who thought that way. If I truly wanted to be an academic, he counseled, I was better off going to law school. While he didn’t know much about the politics of the legal academy, a law degree would provide a better safety net than a history PhD. In the end, that’s what I did.

The Gallop/CNN poll -- Davis out, Schwarzenegger in.

The very un-PC Debra Saunders:

For Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, there apparently is no such thing as illegal immigration .. When asked if he saw a distinction between legal and illegal immigrants earlier this month, Bustamante told reporters, "I think that anybody who works and pays taxes ought to have a right to citizenship." U.S. citizenship is a right for non-Americans who break the law.

In Bustamante World, illegal immigrants should pay no penalty whatsoever. Au contraire, they should be rewarded with documents, tuition discounts and health care.

As for Californians who believe in enforcing immigration law -- well, their beliefs get no respect. To call for any limits on immigration, or any enforcement of immigration law, is to be anti-immigrant. Read: racist.

It doesn't matter when Gabriel Gomez, a third-generation Mexican American, tells the L.A. Times that his trade as a plumber is suffering. "When you get illegals doing the job for half the price, you can't compete," Gomez explained, adding that if there were fewer immigrants, "it would give opportunities for those of us who really deserve them."

It doesn't matter when American inner-city children fall behind in reading as they share classrooms with students who are learning a new language ..

Bustamante is a good California Democrat. He is a happy booster of the party's new religion. It's a demanding orthodoxy. No facts matter. No limitations apply. No one is allowed to say that the positive benefits of immigration are diminished when there is too much immigration -- especially illegal immigration.

Professor Gary Galles -- Hiram Johnson would cheer.

Governor pay-to-play.

BE prepared -- a Washington Post Schwarzenegger profile.

Dennis Miller -- Schwarzenegger Gets My Vote.

Schwarzenegger sits down for a talk with the San Franscisco Chronicle-Democrat.

The Long Beach Press Telegram endorses Schwarzenegger.

For their own good. Mickey Kaus charges the LA Times with shielding the public from the harsh realities of the world -- like facts about Gray Davis and the recall.

Rental housing owned by Bustamanate has failed three health and safety inspections in the last two years. And Bustamante has also likely taken unlawful write-offs on the government subsidized property he owns, tax accountants say.

The rental income Bustamante pockets comes mostly from federal taxpayers. Current tenants say they have no complaints with the candidate for governor.

Latinos, Asians & blacks prefer a color-blind society more than do whites. Quotable:

The poll .. found that 46 percent of Latinos, 42 percent of Asian-Americans and 41 percent of blacks support [Proposition 54] - while just 31 percent of whites favor it .. Prop. 54, written by University of California Regent Ward Connerly, would amend California's constitution to prohibit any government agency or school from classifying people by race or ethnicity - an effort he says is necessary to achieve a "colorblind society."

A significant proportion of the electoriate remains undecided. And it looks like many black voters have yet to pick a candidate in the race to replace. Quotable:

Only 17 percent of blacks support [Cruz Bustamante]. [While] Arnold Schwarzenegger's support .. [is] 7 percent among blacks.

In other words, less than one quarter have decided among the front runners. It's hard to imagine that this vote will break for McClintock or the crazy lady. Perhaps what we have here are potential recruits for the Feinstein "no on recall --- no on the race to replace" voting strategy. But I think most people will want their vote to count as much as it can in as many ways as it can.

MECHA sparks "fracas" at UC-Irvine in confrontation with anti-descrimination protesters.

I feel a draft. Calblog husband (!) gets the bandwagon rolling for the Dennis Miller for Senate draft movement.

Fresh Potatoes has the latest poll results from the Chamber of Commerce. Again, it's Schwarzenegger 2-1 in front of McClintock, and leading Bustmataxes by a few percentage points. All the post-debate polls are showing the same thing.

Hugh Hewitt on McClintock and the Tomikazes.

Weintrabaub's California Insider blog is today's essential reading for race to replace junkies.

Help Charlotte Goland get a new neighbor. Vote Yes on recall.

NY Times' Michael Lewis on the recall. This is a must read for recall junkies. Trust me.

Quotable:

''This isn't some right-wing conspiracy. It's valid criticism of leadership.'' -- Cruz Bustamante on the California recall movement.

The primary is over and the loser is Tom McClintock. McClintock's kamikaze plane -- and his campaign -- is stalled out. He hasn't moved in the polls in two weeks. And now, in the wake of the debate, Schwarzenegger has opened up a solid 2-1 lead over McClintock, according to internal polls being leaked today. On KFI David Dreier reported that the Schwarzenegger polsters have it 33 - Schwarzenegger, 27 - Bustamecha, and 15 - McClintock. The Cal Teachers Ass. has it 31-S, 26-B, and 15-M. On the recall, Davis hasn't moved past 40% in the polls in what seems like months. And nearly every voter in the state has made up his mind on the matter. There is going to be a new governor. Will it be Schwarzenegger or Bustamante? PrestoPundit reports, you decide.

Issa endorses Schwarzenegger. McClintock calls on Schwarzenegger to pull out of the race.

A quarter million register to vote in the last month. I wonder how many failed to register -- and were thus disenfranchised -- by the three Democrat 9th Circuit court and its partisan attempt to halt the election with its laughably contrary to law ruling sometime back.

Millions watch California debate -- in Los Angeles more people watched the California race to replace debate than they did the Gore vs. Bush Presidential debate in 2000.

Voting in Los Angeles began two days ago on "early voting" touchscreen machines around the city.

Tammy Bruce endorses Schwarzeneggar.

What does Fresh Potatoes think? The NY Times wants to know.

Miller's Time and Irish Lass report from the 3,000 strong Schwarzenegger debate party in Sacramento. Dennis Miller did the intro for Arnold and Maria. Sounds like a fun event.

40 of the 58 Republican county chairmen endorse Schwarzenegger.

Issa will endorse Schwarzenegger in a joint appearance sometime Friday.

Internal polls show Davis getting the boot.

Real Clear Politics analyses the polls and picks a winner in the race to replace. Quotable:

last night's debate - the only debate that will have any effect on the election - was a solid win for Schwarzenegger. It wasn't a home run by Arnold, but he came across as more than competent and his closing statement offered the voters of California something none of the other candidates did: the hope for leadership. All the media whining, post and pre-debate about how the voters need to here more specifics is just that: whining. Schwarzenegger seems to grasp that what the voters really want is change and leadership ..

Bottom line: with 12 days to go Davis looks headed for defeat on Question 1. And unless there is some late momentum for McClintock, Schwarzenegger will outpoll Bustamante and become the next Governor.

(via Fresh Potatoes, who reaches a similar conclusion).

John Fund's California Diary examines the debate and the horse race. Quotable:

While Mr. McClintock's inclination is to stay the course, he is aware that he faces a Republican primary in his state Senate district in five months. Redistricting has given him about 40% new voters, many of them moderate Republicans in Santa Barbara County. Former Chamber of Commerce official Beth Rogers, a moderate, is already making noises about a primary challenge. In 2002, Ms. Rogers spent an impressive $1.8 million in a House race against incumbent Democrat Lois Capps.

Schwarzenegger on the Sean Hannity show. Quotable:

HANNITY: Well, there is a bit of controversy .. involving -- you had a number of heated exchanges with Arianna in particular last night. Well, it seemed like she came ready to take you on. You had one line in the debate, you thought you'd have a perfect part for her in "Terminator 4." Now, because of that comment -- you may not know this, so we're making news here -- she is urging the women of California not to support you, and she says this represents what you think of women. And she believes you were referring to the scene in "Terminator 3 (search)" that showed a female robot's head in the toilet. That's what she's saying to our friends in the media that are here with us today. What do you want to say to that?

SCHWARZENEGGER: Well, I don't know why she picked that scene. I have no idea. But the fact of the matter is it was a compliment, because in "Terminator," we always had powerful women. In the first "Terminator" and in the second one, it was Linda Hamilton who played always the powerful woman that succeeded .. And in "Terminator 3," the female terminator was the most powerful character in the whole movie. So, therefore, in "Terminator 4," it will continue the trend. So, it actually was a compliment. If she takes it the wrong way, it's not my fault.

Simon endorses Schwarzenegger. Quotable:

"I am here to endorse Arnold Schwarzenegger for governor. I think Arnold Schwarzenegger is the right man to be governor of California."

Expect Darrell Issa and Peter Ueberroth to endorse in the next day or so. These three have been talking, and all have reached the same conclusion.

What Jonah really thinks ..

The trouble .. with Arianna is that there's this grave temptation to take her seriously because she takes herself so seriously. In reality she's a buffoon. The notion that she is driven by anything other than ambition, ego and appetite is simply unsustainable .. The fact that so many of her fans -- Franken, Maher etc -- think she's the real deal even as they claim the mantle of B.S. detectors simply reveals that those guys are frauds and buffoons too.

Peter Robinson drinks the kool-aid.

McClintock seems to be left with four scenarios:

1) He doesn't drop out, Arnold win anyway, but doesn't return Tom's calls.
2) He doesn't drop out, and Cruz wins.
3) He drops out, and Cruz wins anyway.
4) He drops out, Arnold wins and does return his calls.

Yes, yes, I know there's a fifth scenario where Tom wins, and rides a victory lap astride a flying pig around a snow-covered Capitol ..

Infinite Monkeys explains why some of these scenarios would be very bad for Tom McClintock.

Arnold blew it. We waited all this time for this? For some extremely rehearsed (yet still poorly executed) laugh lines, totally muddy specifics (except once or twice), and getting carved up by Arianna freakin' Huffington? ..

-- Matt Welch. And don't skip the comments section.

Howard Kurtz covers the media coverage of the debate.

Bustamante continues to violate the law, defying a judicial order to halt his illegal campaign activities. This is just what we want. Another politician in charge of the police powers of the state and our tax money with absolutely no respect for the laws of California.

During the debate PrestoPundit had his hands full trying to calm a fussing baby disturbed by a fussing Arianna. Meanwhile, Hugh Hewitt was living the life at the Balboa Bay Club & Resort enjoying the debate in style with a group of Orange County Republicans. Quotable:

There were many Tom McClintock supporters among the crowd, but it was strongly supportive of Arnold, a great sign of reality among the conservatives. Tom didn't lose any votes immediately, but he didn't gain any. His attacks on Pete Wilson were bad form, and suggest that he is still in this because of an old grudge. That didn't play well at all. He knows his stuff, but while Arnold and Cruz used the closing remarks to tell stories, Tom was still selling competence. It didn't work. His support, already drifting away, will continue moving towards AS. Tom needed the combination of a breakthrough, four home run performance coupled with a disaster for Arnold. He got neither.

LA Observed has a blogosphere debate score card.

"McClintock Fails to Prepare Debate 'Zingers'" -- ScrappleFace.

American RealPolitik debate analysis snippet:

Peter Camejo, for a socialist, wasn't half as kooky as he normally is.

Outside the Beltway on the debate. Quotable:

Bustamonte: I'd say he won the debate, even though I disagree with him on most of the issues. He was calm, actually answered the questions, and thoughtful.

Priorities & Frivolities has a round-by-round evaluation of Schwarzenegger's fight debate performance. Quotable:

[McClintock] looked like Robin to [his] party rival's Batman

CNN on the debate. Quotable:

At a post-debate news conference, Schwarzenegger noted that he and McClintock agreed on many issues and said, "I think we could make a good team in Sacramento."

The Washington Times gives a positive Schwarzenegger spin to its debate story.

NY Times debate story. Quotable:

One of his own aides said before the debate that expectations were so low, that all Mr. Schwarzenegger had to do was string a few verbs and nouns together, toss out a statistic here and there and the whole evening would be considered a success.

Why didn't McClintock go after Schwarzenegger? Quotable:

McClintock told reporters afterward that he didn’t spend time attacking Schwarzenegger because “this election is bigger than any of the candidates. I’m in this election to talk about the future of California.”

California race-to-replace debate transcript.

Howard Owens on, well, you know what. Quotable:

Arnold Schwarzenegger may have done better than expected on demonstrating a knowledge of policy issues, but next to Tom McClintock and Pete Camejo, he still appeared fumbling and unsure of himself at times ..

Hindrocket blogs the recall debate from Minnesota. Quotable:

Schwarzenegger: Excellent performance. His basic pro-business theme came through well. He was strong, aggressive at times, sincere and knowledgeable. He came across as at least a credible candidate as any of the others. One oddity: He frequently looked at another participant rather than at the camera. Weird, given his acting experience.

Roger Simon has a few thoughts on the debate. Worth quoting:

Bustamante: as dull as ever. Sometimes you forget he's even there.

Camejo: An earnest socialist in an era when everyone knows socialism has been tried and failed hundreds of times. Touching, really.

Arianna: one of the most bizarre human beings ever in American politics, the witch from the Wizard of Oz (and I don't mean Glenda!). Possibly a sociopath.

Slings and Arrows on Schwarzenegger and the debate:

Decent, but not excellent performance. He spent much too much time bantering with Arrianna. His comment about her having a part in Terminator IV was knumb-headed at best, very damaging at worst. He had a couple of bright spots, namely the "three strikes" comment and accusing the politicians of having a "tax and spend addiction". He stayed on point for most of the debate. He was weak on the "color-blind" question, but very strong on making "Kolie-vornia" a business friendly state.

Find more here, including real-time question-by-question blogging of the debate at it happened.

California Insider's take on the debate -- no clear winners. Quotable:

Schwarzenegger said this would be the "Super Bowl" of debates, but his performance was more apt for a pre-season game. He didn't exactly embarrass himself, but neither did he score any touchdowns. It's possible his performance will play better with the casual viewer than a junkie like me.

Mickey Kaus on the debate:

Arnold: Not too bullying or too vague ... but it was close! Did well enough to win.

Cruz: Mr. Blobby. Condescending, accomodating, pleasant, and once again Smarter Than Expected. But does he seem like a guy who likes to say "no"? Seems more like the guy who announces arrivals and departures at an Amtrak station. (Great voice!)

Arianna: If she'd been less shrill and grating when attacking Schwarzenegger, it would have helped ... Schwarzenegger! (Success for Arianna hurts Bustamante, by splitting the left vote). A useful presence who wore thin. And let me get it straight: The California economy is doing fine and it's all George Bush's fault!

McClintock: Solid presentation could make him a national figure. (Gee, why do you think he stayed in the race?) The only candidate who even tried to fully answer the immigration question. Briefly seemed to go into mantra-chanting trance.

Camejo: One-note johnny on tax distribution, but a walking case for proportional representation.

"[She] was galling. She was rude, dense, annoying, obnoxious, thoroughly unclever and unappealing in every way .. " -- Jonah Goldberg on the crazy lady.

"I think all the candidates did fine. I tend to agree with the conventional wisom that Schwarzenegger did as well as he needed to do .. " read more at fresh potatoes.

And here is Reuters debate story.

"Arnold doesn't share our values." -- Bustamante's double-meaning negative ad attacking Schwarzenegger. Aren't those high paid advertising folks clever?

Here is the AP's debate story. Quotable:

The tension between the two peaked when Schwarzenegger began to cut Huffington off and she replied: "This is the way you treat women, we know that. But not now."

Statham penalized Huffington and gave Schwarzenegger a chance to reply, providing another opening for one of his frequent movie references.

"I just realized that I have a perfect part for you in Terminator 4," he said to Huffington, as the audience laughed.

And it looks like this part of the post-debate story was pre-written before the debate:

Schwarzenegger set high expectations for his own performance by calling the forum "the Super Bowl of debates," and his rivals in the Oct. 7 recall election were expected to try and challenge him or trip him up.

"This is the opening scene of the third act of the campaign, and it's a referendum on Arnold," said Republican strategist Allan Hoffenblum.

"He needs to come across as competent, that he has command of public policy issues and that he appears qualified to be governor. If he does all that, he'll win."

Schwarzenegger's well paid staff continues to make junior high mistakes -- didn't anybody tell Arnold to look into the camera, and not away to the moderator? Didn't anyone catch this in debate practice? And why didn't Schwarzenegger's people insist that the candidates stand? Candidates sitting are always have significantly less stature than do candidates who stand. The sitting thing was a clear disadvantage for Schwarzenegger. And in my judgment the crazy lady simply should not have been allowed on the stage. She is not running for governor, she is out promoting her phony baloney career as a "political commentator". She simply didn't belong ,and the moderator utterly failed to keep her on the topic on California, rather than Iraq or George Bush or god knows what she was racing on about -- or was that the crazy man talking about Iraq? Who knows.

McClintock proved he would make a great governor -- of Arizona. I wish he'd make a great governor of California, but I'm convinced California is too big, too left, too media driven and too far lost for that. Bustamante was impressive in a quiet but confident way -- well measured and clearly experienced in the art of communicating with all sorts of different folks. Schwarzenegger stood out as the debate amateur here -- I don't know if this is such a bad thing, but I do know that this would not have happened if Schwarzenegger had allowed himself to put a couple of these under his belt across the course of the campaign. I've suggested before that the Reagan '66 way would have been Schwarzenegger's best course -- talk everyone's head off and end the perception problem which has it that Schwarzenegger is not smart enough or well informed enough to be governor. This debate format and Schwarzenegger's performance alone was not enough to do that. A damn shame that so many expectations were forced onto this one debate.

UPDATE: Don't forget to check out the comments section below.

Interocitor's mind is now made up -- he's voting McClintock. His 5th quarter advice for Arnold -- never argue with an idiot.

Economics 101 from Arnold Schwarzenegger in the WSJ:

Our state will prosper again when we commit ourselves in California to "Free to Choose" economics. This means removing, one by one, the innumerable impediments to growth--excessive taxes, regulations, and deficit-spending.

UPDATE: John Fund on the political power of the tribes -- and their new McClintock strategy to elect Crux Boostyourtaxes governor of California.

I know he had a weak case, but did anybody else conclude that Larry Tribe's arguments simply sucked? He falsesly talked of "dimpled" chads being an issue in California -- when they simply are not. He talked as if what people falsely believed -- not what was actually true -- should be the controlling consideration in the case. And his argument seemed (irony of ironies) to come down to a consideration of public confidence in elections -- when the three member court panel decision was crushing public confidence in the judiciary as well as in the election process .. and an en blanc decision upholding that decision would only do far deeper damage to public confidence in the courts and the system. Especially when you consider that the whole decision rested on a bogus study, and Orwellian falsehoods build into the language of ballot "errors" (chosen non-votes, etc.) and "error" rate statistics that where not even final outcome rates. And even these statistics were grossly distorted and misused by the ACLU people. I'm familiar with Tribe's constitutional textbook -- and I'm also very familiar with Tribe's second life as an Alan Dershowitz style partisan advocate who identifies the political result he's after first, and then does whatever it takes to rationalize that result as a matter of "law". I'm sorry, but I'm not impressed. And to my mind it's all of a piece. Leftist jurisprudence is by the nature of the case unprincipled -- it is expediency on moralistic stilts, and it is the enemy of principled liberalism, in my ever so humble opinion. And none of this denies that Tribe knows a lot of case law, and has a good memory, and knows how to put a persuasive argument together. So does Dershowitz, and that doesn't raise my respect for Dershowitz as an advocate one bit.

At a press conference afterwards Tribe said the Ninth circuit judges where "very, very on today". Unfortunately, Tribe was not even close.

On John and Ken today Darrell Issa as much as said that come Monday morning he will endorse Arnold Schwarzenegger for governor .. and he will use all of the resources of Recall California ensure that Schwarzenegger wins -- and Tom McClintock and Cruz Bustamante lose.

Schwarzenegger takes on the tribes! Firing a shot across the bow of Tom McClintock .. and directly into the deck of Cruzship Bustamante, Schwarzenegger tonight launched TV spots in LA attacking the corruption of California politics by wads and wads of Indian gaming cash -- $120,000,000 worth. And Schwarzenegger calls for California to do what other states do -- tax a bit of those Indian gaming profits to help out California. Watch the ad here. Schwarzenegger promises to clean up the corrupting influence of Indian gaming money in California politics -- and when he says it, you believe he's going to do it. So now we know why Arnold refused to take the no new taxes pledge ...

Political junkies have got to love this. Schwarzenegger is playing to win, and playing the game as hard as it gets. This is like watching Michael Jordan at the end of the 4th quarter -- or Ronald Reagan when the pressure was on. Politics ain't beanbag, and Schwarzenegger seems in his gut to know it. Got to love it.

UPDATE: California Insider has more.

"It is time to let the people decide" -- Arnold Schwarzenegger

Larry Solum has extensive excerpts from the Ninth Circuit California election decision and lots of good links. Check it out.

11-0. California Constitution Upheld. Election re-starts. Larry Tribe, ACLU & rogue court whacked by 11 member panel, which includes eight Democrat judges.

Steven Lenzner & William -- "What was Leo Strauss up to?".

The New Yorker's Hertzberg does a profile of Schwarzenegger and the California recall. Targorda has a spot-on critique of Hertzberg's political analysis.

Tagorda has links to video tape of the C-SPAN broadcast on the 9th circuit hearing on the California recall election case.

The Ninth Circuit will issue its recall ruling this morning (Tuesday). The best coverage continues to be How Appealing. Check out all the good links and interesting commentary.

The Clinton dominated Civil Rights Commission jumps with two feet into the recall fiasco -- but based on what? Well, it looks like no facts and false analogies to Florida's screwed up equipment and absense of standards. I.e. it's pure politics and pure spin from another doggedly partisan Clinton appointed panel. Worth noting -- once again an uninformed opinion is based on the false notion of "errors" -- when chosen non-votes and chosen multi-votes are the primary sources of the "errors" generated by the court cited study.

Former sports writer and aging baby boom lefty George Skelton fact checks the Ninth circuit. Now let's fact check the former sports writer -- because he gets a few facts wrong himself.

Fact #1 -- the court has a duty to follow the law, and it has absolutely no right to impose its own preferenced political outcomes on the rest of us.

Fact #2 -- The mislabeled "errors" cited by the court to rationalize its decision consists of people choosing not to select a candidate in some races, or, sometimes, choosing more than one candidate for office. A voting system can't be responsible for the voting choices of an individual any more than it can be responsible for a person choosing to show up or not on voting day. Or is Skelton proposing forced voting, something like the system used by totalitarian Lefties around the world?

Fact 3# -- The Constitution specifies that local counties run elections and choose their ballot system -- i.e. the Constitution specifies that different locations have the right to locally selected ballot equipment.

Fact #4 -- What matters for law is what the facts are, not what a mistaken court chooses (falsely) to believe.

So the following statement by Skelton is completely erroneous -- as a matter of fact, logic, and law:

The court had every right — indeed a duty — to postpone the election if it believed the obsolete punch-card machines would cause 44% of the California electorate to cast ballots that have a significantly lesser chance of being counted than the other 56%.

And one more civics lesson for George. It's a falsehood -- and a slander -- to call those who are defending the law against this court "anarchists". Anarchists are those who are out to tear apart the law. Something like this court shred the plainly written Constitution of the State of California. Leftist on the courts have been out to shred the law and impose their own preferences for generations (ever heard of Bill Douglass?). They aren't anarchists, but they are philosophical blood relatives, a fact they might have skipped at sportswriter school.

How Appealing has a Ninth Circuit recall election case preview here. Check his website for direct C-SPAN links and live coverage of the hearing at it is televised Monday, 1 pm Pacific.

Get the story at Hugh Hewitt, Xrlq and InstaPundit. Read Calbog's thoughts.

History / PoliSci professor and self-described partisan Democrat (are there any other kind) Jack Rakove says that California is utterly unMadisonian. Actually California is a Madisonian nightmare -- the very model of the massive failure of Madison's "solution" to faction outlined in Federalist no. 10. And I'm talking about the pre-Progressive features of the California system. The Progressive reforms of recall and initiative have been the the only things which have saved the state from utter ruin as the narrow interested eat the baby of the general interest alive in the Madisonian state legislature. I admire Madison perhaps more than most -- but he utterly failed to come up with Constitutional solutions to the Madisonian problem of "faction". The faction driven legislature is killing the taxpayer and business in the interest of the trial lawyers, the government unions, and the countless spending lobbies and dependency constituencies. This is Madisonian government run amuck -- and the Progressives at least gave us some effective tools for saving the people and the common good from the corruption of the Madisonian logrolling and hand-greasing process of government by a legislature unbound by law, principle or simple decency. The Madisonian system has created Illiberal Democracy and The End of Liberalism -- taking us on The Road to Serfdom.

Mickey Kaus -- favoring Schwarzenegger for Governor. An LA Times profile. Quotable:

Only a few years ago, Kaus went to the 30th reunion of his Beverly Hills High class. A classmate asked him what he was doing. "I have a Web site," Kaus said. "My daughter does too," the classmate said.

Kaus on Schwarzenegger:

What's Arnold got that Cruz doesn't? Kaus answers with Spanish slang for "guts." He is drawn to Schwarzenegger as a fiscal conservative who is liberal on many social issues. "I'd like a governor who can cut spending by telling lobbyists, including union lobbyists and lawyers, 'no.' Schwarzenegger has at least the potential to do that — and thanks to the Constitution we don't have to worry much about him using the state as a springboard to becoming president." He dismisses Bustamante as a panderer lacking the courage to condemn illegal immigration from Mexico. Yet when you ask Kaus what his two Schwarzenegger scoops say about his man, he says: "The commonality is that one of his character flaws is that he tends to see people as marks, people he can con with various scams ... and that could be tied together with his reputation as somebody who bullies people below the line on the movie set. It's troubling. For all Schwarzenegger's flaws, I still tend to think I would vote for him. [But] I am not so pro-him that I don't want all the dirt to come out."

And Kaus promises that he'll never stop blogging -- but may cut back from 3 hours a day -- when it stops be so much fun.

The SacBee has a Schwarzenegger profile. Memo to Laura Mecoy and the SacBee editors: there weren't any Nixon-Humphrey Presidential debates in 1968.

Like many aliens in America, Schwarzenegger didn't much bother about the details of state and federal law.

How Appealing gets bullhorn publicity from John & Ken.

Here is the archive of the Election Law email list for the month of September -- full of Bush v. Gore and Ninth Circuit v. California Voters posting from legal experts. Here is an example of the quality of the posts:

From: Bauer, Bob

Dan asks a good question: why so little analysis on the list of the substantive merits of the claim? I have detected one reason among opponents of the recall (and I am one of those who detest this recall): genuine uneasiness over the question of whether the merits had much to do with the panel's decision.

The dilemma for those opposed to the recall, who typically count themselves among the severe critics of Bush v. Gore, is that 1) the panel's interpretation of the case, as it applies in California, is very difficult to defend; and 2) in any event, those who dislike Bush v. Gore are hardly comfortable with resurrecting it for any purpose as legitimate precedent of broad application. And to the extent that the panel was--to put it politely--deciding the case on the political facts and not the substantive law, this too places Bush v. Gore critics in an awkward position, since it is precisely this result orientation that many attribute to the Supremes.

These are problems that will not go away: as constitutional and statutory laws controlling the political process become ever more elaborate, the specialists will debate theory while the courts will use the theoretical scaffolding to extend judicial dominion over the democratic process-- ruling on political "facts" in accordance with raw political preferences.

I am not suggesting that the panel thought this was what it was doing, but even those sympathetic to result suspect that this more than anything else was at work in the decision.

It for this reason that I was struck by Rick Hasen's defense of the use of BusH v. Gore--a defense both commendably candid and also troubling. He writes:

"[w]hen the Supreme Court creates a wholly new equal protection standard that does not stem from broad social consensus (as it has in cases like Reynolds, Shaw v. Reno, and Bush v. Gore), it should do so initially using a murky standard. That allows lower courts to experiment with the contours of the new equal protection right allowing the Supreme Court to gain valuable
information about how to ultimately shape the new right. That is how to read the current dispute over Bush v. Gore. This is an entirely good thing."

It is?? A Supreme Court claimed by many to be acting on political preferences creates a new equal protection standard that is conceded to be
opaque but somehow suited to experimentation by lower courts (many of which are being stacked with other judges with, er, political interests). Some would not sleep all that comfortably when confronted with this prospect. In any event, setting aside political suspicions, it will trouble anyone who fears the extent to which courts are being invited to design political processes and settle political disputes.

Posted by Greg Ransom | Permalink | TrackBack

Terry Eastland on the Ninth Circuit court. Quotable:

.. the judges represented what they were doing as a straightforward application of Bush v. Gore, an equal protection case. Indeed, for Pregerson, Thomas, and Paez, Shelley was Bush v. Gore all over again. Our case, they said, presents "almost precisely the same issue as the [Supreme] Court considered in Bush," that issue being "whether unequal methods of counting votes among counties constitutes a violation of the Equal Protection Clause."

But, as the Supreme Court said in Bush v. Gore, the issue before it wasn't "whether local entities, in the exercise of their expertise, may develop different systems for implementing elections" but "whether the use of standardless manual recounts violates" the equal protection clause. Indeed, the standards for accepting or rejecting contested ballots varied "not only from county to county, but within a single county from one recount team to another." A hand recount so lacking in standards could easily result in partisan discrimination, with standards bent this way or that so as to help favored and hurt disfavored candidates. That's what concerned the Supreme Court in Bush v. Gore ..

Posted by Greg Ransom | Permalink | TrackBack

Another reporter has his California punch card ballot facts all wrong -- this times its NY Times reporter John Broder. Someone should do a fisking -- and then please send me the link!

UPDATE: Eugene Volokh kicks things off.

Get your Join Arnold yard signs.

"You know who's on the panel, right? Do you think it's going to have much of a chance of surviving? I wouldn't bet on it." -- Judge Harry Pregerson.

UPDATE: This another instance of the 79 year old Judge behaving like a 2 year old -- or a teenager -- defying the rules, as How Appealing explains:

It is extraordinarily unusual for a judge to speak to the press about the merits of a matter currently pending before his court. Indeed, whichever party loses before the eleven-judge en banc panel could ask for rehearing en banc before all twenty-three non-recused judges on the Ninth Circuit, and Judge Pregerson is in that group. On the other hand, this is not the first time that Judge Pregerson has behaved in a manner quite different from the way that every other federal appellate judge would behave, as my Los Angeles Times op-ed published on June 1, 2003 explains.

Update: Don't simply take my word for it -- this document posted on the Ninth Circuit's own Web site states that "Due to codes of ethics restrictions, judges are unable to discuss the merits of the case."

It's time for this old goat to put himself out to pasture -- and he can spend his last cantankerous years defying the rules of The Home.

UPDATE II: Eugene Volokh weighs in.

Good LA Times article giving the lowdown on the members of the 11 member Ninth Circuit recall election panel.

Eugene Volokh believes that the 11 member 9th circuit panel will be forced to consider not only the Equal Protection argument ruled on by the 3 member panel, but also the Voting Rights Act argument the 3 member panel did not rule on. Read his argument here.

UPDATE: Comments section discusses this issue further.

Al Gore's attorney will argue the ACLU case in 9th Circuit Lefties v. The Voters of California -- the court decision which halted the California recall election while voting was in progress. Al Gore's attorney? That would be reliable Democrat and Leftie Laurence Tribe, of course.

SoCalLawBlog actually thinks through the logic of the 9th circuit decision in the case of 9th Circuit Morons v. Every Sensible Adult in California, and comes to a startling conclusion:

I read the 3-judge panel decision as saying the following: Bush v. Gore held that differing standards between a state's counties as to how similarly marked ballots would be counted is a violation of the Equal Protection Clause. Therefore, it must be violation of the Equal Protection Clause if counties use different voting mechanisms if it can be shown that the mechanisms differ in their error rate of vote tabulations. Otherwise, counties using mechanisms with higher error rates would risk their voters being disenfranchised in not having their votes count. Thus the only real remedy is to have uniform voting mechanisms throughout the entire state.

It seems to me that absentee votes provide the Achilles' heel for this line of reasoning.

First off, a delay in the California election would require that those who have already voted via absentee ballot have their votes thrown out. Therefore, even if you accept the court's reasoning, you are forcing actual voter disenfranchisement in order to prevent a mere potential disenfranchisement. This forces the court's decision to collapse under the weight of its own logic.

Secondly, it seems to me that the decision would likely force the end of absentee voting in all future elections.

Let me confess up front that I have never voted via absentee ballot, so I don't know for sure how the process works. But what is clear is that whoever votes on an absentee ballot would have to use the same voting system as those casting votes in the state on election day. Would California servicemen overseas have to have access to a touch-screen voting machine in order to vote? How likely is that going to happen? If they merely used a punch-card ballot or hand-written ballot, then that would violate the provisions of the court's decision if I am reading it correctly. The only way to correct the disparity would be to get rid of absentee voting altogether.

I have only one thing to add -- Bush v. Gore did not hold that differing standards of ballot evaluation between different state counties would be counted is a violation of the Equal Protection Clause. The decision as I understand it was about differing standard's of ballot evalutation within the same county. Of course, as everyone knows, California has a uniform standard across the state for evaluation punch ballots -- and today on KFI the LA County registrar said that the county has never had even a single ballot evaluation problem in all of the years she's worked as County registrar. And no dimpled chads ever. The LA County equipment simply isn't in the poor condition of the Florida equipment.

Conny McCormack also said today that the claims of the ACLU regarding punch balloting -- claims grounding the 9th circuit decision -- were "falactious" and "utterly erroneous". She said there were no Florida style problems with the punch ballot in California -- none.

She also said that the 9th circuit decision moving the recall election to the primary election of March 2004 would likely to cause massive chaos at the the voting place, and most likely would create a split ballot system deeply confusing to voters, who would also face the confusion of using a new balloting system for the very first time.

McCormacks' amicus brief to the court is here (pdf)

Cal Insider scoop -- Ted Costa demands the bulk of Appellees' argument time in 9th Circuit Lefties v. the People due to the fact the Sec. of State Kevin Shelley has abandoned every substantive legal and factual argument against the decision, and will argue only a very narrow procedural question. Unbelievable.

UPDATE: The story is reported in The Recorder. Costa's attorney, Charles Diamond of t O'Melveny & Myers, contends that Sec. of State Shelley has been "relegating to asides or ignoring altogether the important constitutional and public policy issues the appeal raises."

UPDATE II: In How Appealing's judgment, "Costa has presented persuasive reasons why his lawyers should have time to address the en banc court."

UPDATE III: "It's raw politics" said [Chapman law professor] John Eastman .. "I would say it's a less-than-vigorous defense." -- Eastman on Sec. of State Shelley and his failure to defend the use of punchcards, quoted in The Recorder article.

UPDATE IV: Xrlq have more thought on Shelley and the 9th circuit.

The federal government is borrowing an additional $1.7 billion every day to pay for its limitless appetitite for spending -- that is, vote buying. Next time you look your kids in the eye, think about it. That's their debt.

Krugman returns from a vacation in France A Guardian profile of America's most paranoid political commentator. Quotable:

"The first three pages of Kissinger's book sent chills down my spine," Krugman writes of A World Restored, the 1957 tome by the man who would later become the unacceptable face of cynical realpolitik. Kissinger, using Napoleon as a case study - but also, Krugman believes, implicitly addressing the rise of fascism in the 1930s - describes what happens when a stable political system is confronted with a "revolutionary power": a radical group that rejects the legitimacy of the system itself. This, Krugman believes, is precisely the situation in the US today ..

Michael Moore, eat your heart out. What is really needed at this point is a non-leftist Richard Hofstadter to expose the off-the-deep-end mental illness which become the mainstream of today's American Left. Can you say "out of touch with reality"?

How Appealing reports that C-SPAN will televise Monday's 9th circuit hearing on Ninth Circuit Crazies v. Democracy and Common Sense -- the California recall case.

How Appealing also has insider assessments of the Ninth Circuit panel draw from a pair of former Ninth circuit clerks. Not to be missed.

Right on the Left Beach google searches quick profiles of the 11 members of the Ninth circuit panel reconsidering Ninth Circuit Lefties v. Democracy, 03-56498, including the following (edited) information:

Panel breakdown -- Clinton: 7, Reagan: 2, Bush I: 1, Carter: 1.

Chief Judge Schroeder: Carter appointee.
Judge Kozinski: Reagan appointee.
Judge O'Scannlain: Reagan appointee.
Judge Kleinfeld: Bush I appointee.
Judge Tasihima: Clinton appointee.
Judge Silverman: Clinton appointee.
Judge Graber: Clinton appointee.
Judge McKeown: Clinton appointee.
Judge Gould: Clinton appointee.
Judge Tallman: Clinton appointee.
Judge Rawlinson: Clinton appointee.

Get more details here

Great news for those who believe in democracty and the rule of law from How Appealing:

How can I say that the eleven-judge en banc panel that will rehear the California recall election case is "conservative" when eight of the judges were nominated by Democratic Presidents? Two points. First, I'm using the term "conservative" relative to the composition of the typical en banc panel one sees from the Ninth Circuit. Second, three of the court's smartest and most conservative judges are on the panel, while none of the leading liberal voices from the court are on the panel. Also, Judge Tallman, while a Clinton nominee, was actually selected by a Republican Senator as part of a deal to get someone else's nomination approved. Judge Rawlinson, also a Clinton nominee, regularly votes with the Ninth Circuit's more conservative judges. And Judges Silverman, Graber, McKeown, and Gould are viewed as moderates by and large. [Update: A reporter who regularly covers the Ninth Circuit has emailed to say that Judges Silverman and Gould are "conservative-moderate" and that "the recall proponents just hit a home run."]

Perhaps Judge Kozinski sums it up best in this paragraph from an article that appeared in USA Today back in February 2003:

Four of President Clinton's 14 appointees to the 9th Circuit have turned out to be "really excellent, conservative jurists," says Kozinski, who was appointed by President Reagan, a Republican. After Congress expanded the court by 10 seats in 1978 and President Carter, a Democrat, filled them, "the court was dominated by liberals," Kozinski says. "But now it's really quite balanced. Any notion that there is a conservative wing or a liberal wing or a consensus or an embattled minority on one side, I think is total hokum."

Famed (true) liberal jurist and Hayek fan Alex Kozinski is on the 11 member panel set to reconsider the 9th circuit's decision to short-circuit an ongoing election in California. Other members include Mary Schroeder, Diarmuid O'Scannlain, Andrew Kleinfeld, A. Wallace Tashima, Barry Silverman, Susan Graber, Margaret McKeown, Ronald Gould, Richard Tallman and Johnnie Rawlinson. Reported by the Chronicle.

New 11 member 9th circuit panel will meet Monday to reconsider that court's rogue action halting a democratic election in California on grounds lying outside of the law -- a decision which local voting officials say is creating electorial chaos and promises to disenfranchize hundreds of thousands across the state.

When the law is determined by one judge's personal perception of "the conscience of the nation" rather than the plainly worded rule of law. Guess who the judge might be?

Inspired by the legacy of George Custer, Davy Crockett and the Kamikazes in the Pacific, Peter Robinson digs in for finally combat in his debate with Hugh Hewitt.

Davis: "we have people from every planet on the earth in this state".

Hayek on the web in China at SinoLiberal.com.

"Every single election will no longer be decided in the ballot box, but in the courtroom, if this decision stands." -- John Eastman, law professor at Chapman College in Orange County, speaking about the 9th circuits decision to halt the recall election in California as voting took place around the state.

In the last two years 11 Ninth Circuit decisions have been reverved by the Supreme Court in unanimous decisions and there have been three summary reversals without opposition. Quotable:

"if a court starts getting unanimous reversals or summary reversals in very many cases, that ought to raise a red flag" -- Michael Ramsey, professor of law at the U. San Diego School of Law

9th Circuit decision blogger Rick Hasen interviewed. Worth noting -- Hasen thinks punch balloting would be hunkydory if only everyone in the state was forced to use that same system -- even when this means that tens of thousands of voters would be "disenfranched" according to the Berkeley professors count of voting "errors" (including voters who intentionally chose not to cast a vote in particular races). So disenfranchising the actual votes of actual individuals is perfectly ok in Hasen's world, just don't disenfranchize abstract classes of voters when voters are considered not a living breathing individuals, but as mere representations of their racial identify as defined the state -- and the "scientific" university professors. Sidenote -- Hasen seems oblivious to the fact that the Supreme Court has said that the 200+ year American tradition of allowing each local county to its own voting machinary is the perfectly Constitutional law of the land. Bush v. Gore didn't touch that fact -- it affirmed it.

Nearly 5,000 people have signed up for Join Arnold MeetUp Day scheduled Saturday, Sep 27 at various locations around the state. Orange County is the top meetup location, with over 600 signed up for the event. Click on the link to see who is supporting Schwarzenegger and why.

Schwarzenegger's reform agenda.

Feinstein has endorsed Sen. John Kerry. Have you heard? John Kerry once served in Vietnam.

Jill Stewart's turkey watch:

AB 1245, by John Laird. Prevents draft ballot measures from first going to the Attorney General, who currently cleans up illegal language before public distribution. Instead, measures will go on a website so we see every screw-up. The intent is to create chaos around measures so they'll fail at the polls. Laird should be flogged in public for this sneak attack on our initiative process. Too bad we don't do that anymore.

AB 1309, by Jackie Goldberg. After a school district tears down houses to build a school, this allows a district to go tear down somebody else's house, somewhere else, to put up housing for those originally displaced. The intent is to make white suburbanites, whom Goldberg detests, suffer instead of brown urbanites. Watch for lawsuits by broad-sided homeowners.

AB 587, by Mark Ridley-Thomas. A box asking your skin color will now go on voter registration forms. It's voluntary---but expect a move next to make it required. Davis signed this creepy law Wednesday.

AB 1742. If your taxman has more than100 clients, he now must send your return in via Internet. Your privacy is at risk.

SB 796, by Joseph Dunn. Allows workers to seek fines of $200 each from firms who commit tiny labor violations. California's labor code is thicker than a Manhattan phone book. One code specifies a font size employee notices must be posted in. So 50 employees can now get $10,000 over improper fonts. More ice for our business climate. Dunn's special interest servicing of lawyers and unions is shameless.

SB 892, by Kevin Murray. Withholds funds from schools with dirty bathrooms. More anti-reform. Instead of giving principals the power to decide how to use money---such as on cleaning bathrooms---Sacramento has emasculated principals. Now, dopes like the oafish Murray ensure that struggling schools are further punished. Brilliant.

AB 231, by Darrell Steinberg. "Reforms" the food stamp program, which required that nobody own a fancy car if taxpayers were buying their food. Up to now, car value was capped at $4,650. But now? Now, you can own a Rolls, and your household can own as many luxury cars as it wishes. Also, no more face-to-face interviews to qualify. Just give a buzz. Who's this for---busy, jobless billionaires? If it's really so poor workers can keep reliable cars, why wasn't a new cap set of $15,000? Did I mention that California's food stamp program is rife with fraud, and in particular is being targeted by con artists who are not poor?

Oh, and she rips the California press. I left out the fun stuff. Go read it.

On KFI today Tom McClintock said that he can't do anything about Indian Tribes spending millions in independent expenditures to advance his campaign for governor -- in fact, he can't even talk to them about it. And, by the way McClintock says, they have every reason to support him -- not because these expenditures will insure the election of their good friend Cruz Boostyourtaxes, but because McClintock has on principle opposed any state regulation of Indian lands and activities. I'm guessing this is not the first thing on their minds, however. What we're seeing instead is the Davis strategy from the Republican primary of 2002. Are you disgusted with California politics yet?

Hugh Hewitt:

Some commentators are pointing to the initial reluctance of the Supremes to get involved in the Florida mess in 2000 and the Court's coimplete refusal to inject itself into the New Jersey U.S. Senate dust-up last year as evidence that the Court will not distrub the Ninth Circuit's result, no matter what it is.

I think this reasoning underestimates the wildly radical nature of Monday's decision. Bush v. Gore was a case of first impression on how ballots should be recounted in a Presidential election after the polls had closed. Monday's ruling takes that very narrow case --decided reluctantly and under extraordinary pressure, and then only following widely recognized irresponsibility by the Florida Supreme Court-- and, using Dr. Frankenstein technique, changes it into a license for federal judges to assume control over all state elections in the future. The current Supreme Court is best known for resurrecting protections for states against federal power, and the authors of Bush v. Gore know how carefully they wrote the opinions in that dispute in order to prevent just this sort of piracy. I don't believe the justices will stand by and see three out-of-control partisans loot and pillage constitutional tradition because they are afraid that Paul Krugman and Maureen Dowd might write something nasty in the New York Times or that Joe Conason will issue another unread book. Nobdoy watches Capitol Gang anymore anyway, so why care what Al Hunt and Margaret Carlson say?

In other words, the Supreme Court will act. Justice Jackson in his dissent in Korematsu warned of decisions that lay around "like loaded pistols" on the desk. Such is Monday's decision. If the Ninth Circuit does not do the necessary clean-up, I expect the Supreme Court will.

Some interesting ideas today from Arnold Schwarzenegger. I found these of particular interest:

Classifying as public records all internal e-mails and draft documents throughout state government, including the state Legislature. The governor's calendar would also be considered a public document.

Campaigning for an initiative that would apply open-government requirements to the state Legislature.

Right now nobody even knows what laws the legislature has passed in the last session -- an unbelievable scandal which hasn't gotten much press.

SEQUOIA VOTING SYSTEMS, INC., the company that bankrolled the Berkeley study used as the justification for the Ninth Circuit's recall decision gave $2,000 to help re-elect Gray Davis in 2002.

Shriver's campaign niche -- women owned businesses. A Shriver friend on the protesters at Shriver events:

"She's a Democrat. She's OK with yelling and screaming union people."

Fresh Potatoes rips law professor Rick Hasen.

KFI AM 640:

KFI Reporter Eric Leonard has dug into the arguments the ACLU used in its presentation that persuaded the court to postpone the recall election. Here is what he found .. The Research used by the ACLU in its case to stop the recall may have some problems. KFI news has learned the study that supposedly revealed problems with punchcard voting had been funded by a company selling electronic voting machines. State records also reveal while the ACLU claims minority voters make more mistakes with punchcards, California's highest recorded voting error rates were in predominantly-white counties ..

Quotable Schwarzenegger:

Growing up, I saw communism with my own eyes. When I was a boy, the Soviets occupied Austria. I saw their tanks in the streets. In 1956, the Soviet tanks crushed the uprising next door in Hungary. Hungarian people by the thousands fled across the border into Austria. I saw what communism did to those people. When I was nine, I helped my father in the refugee camps. I ladled soup out to the children. Then I saw the socialist country that Austria became when the Soviets left. Even when I was young, I knew America was the place for me

* * * *
Reporters keep asking how I am going to run things in Sacramento, so let me tell you a story that explains how I intend to govern. One day I went to visit a friend who was a sculptor. I went into his studio and saw all of the great work he has done. Sculptures of JFK, LBJ and Truman. All terrific works of art…and all Democrats. Well . . . I couldn't let that be. So I commissioned a bust of the Great Communicator – and it sits today in the Reagan Library. I have a copy of that sculpture of the President in my office, so every time I look up from my desk I see Ronald Reagan. And when I go to Sacramento, that bust is going with me. It's going to remind me of the impact one individual can have. The impact of the Reagan revolution was profound. The demise of the Soviet Union and the fall of the Berlin Wall changed the world. My fellow Californians, drawing upon Ronald Reagan's inspiration and example, we will change California. That is the kind of governor I intend to be.

Larry Tribe, just another a&$-talking political hack with tenure? Larry Sterling does a fisking:

Laurence Tribe’s assertion of “palpable hypocrisy” concerning the Ninth Circuit Panel’s awful conduct would be down right laughable if this was not such a serious matter. | A leftist cabal, of which Tribe is a charter member, has hijacked the California constitution. | Tribe’s analysis is wrong both on both the facts and the law: pretty sorry for a Harvard Law prof. | First, the facts: There are no systems errors in the punch card or the mark-sense systems. The Registrars of voters from both San Diego and Los Angeles Counties and others have said so in depositions that were never read by the judge and in recent press coverage. No registrar was called to testify and they are the ones that run the elections, not Berkeley Profs. | Both of these systems, far from being outdated, are mature, efficient, and effective technology. They have been used millions of times by millions of people. | The only people who state otherwise are the salesmen for Diebold and other touch-screen technologies. (A Boolean search of the Internet will disclose substantial controversies over the dependability of the touch-screen technology.) | All such assertions by Tribe or anyone else are simply blatant lies. | The evidence concerning the asserted error rates should have been excluded as “junk science” under The Federal Rules of Evidence. | The fact that the defendants did not object makes it appear that these were collusive suits between the ACLU and friendly office holders that had political conflicts of interest. | The so-called “error rate” attributed to these systems are a combination of so-called “overvoting” and “undervoting.” | So-called “overvoting” is not an error in the systems; it is an error by the voter. | It means the voter punched two holes in one race. In San Diego County, Registrar Sally McPherson has stated publicly and repeatedly that such mistakes by voters constitute just about one third of one percent of the unrecorded votes. | The much larger element of the putative “error rate” is “undervoting.” Undervoting is registrar lingo for the notion that some voters decide to simply not vote in some races. In political circles, this is known as the “voter drop-off rate.” There are simply many voters that pick and choose which races they feel comfortable voting in. | “Undervoting” is not a systems error and indeed not an error at all. The decision to vote or not to vote is the sole right of the voter. Any discussion about or assertion that undervoting is an error should be dropped from the debate. Automated systems will not make people vote. | He was also wrong on the law: The issue in Florida was that different counties had different standards for evaluating disputed ballots. California always had a statewide standard for evaluating disputed ballots. | There will always be some minor disparity in the vote recordation rate. It is impossible for it to be otherwise. The legal question is what level of disparity constitutes a violation of equal protection. The California systems are well within any reasonable tolerance level and appear to be a half of one percent when the “undervoting” data is eliminated. Pretty durn good record I would say. | The right thing for the Ninth Circuit “Banc” to do would be to suspend the order of the Panel and return the matter to the trial court for competent evidence. If such evidence is adduced, the case will be thrown out on its ear and the lawyers sanctioned for honeyfuggleing the court.

If I had more time, I'd be blogging about this.

UCLA law professor Eugene Volokh:

When the supposed constitutional wrong is that the existing plans will lead to machine error and voter confusion, then we should consider whether the remedy will in fact be materially better. So far, there seem to be good reasons to predict that the lost vote problems in the currently punch-card counties may actually increase with a shift to one of the supposedly technically better systems, given the likely glitches whenever a new system is used for the first time in a jurisdiction, and the possible problems flowing from the coupling of the unusually massive candidate list on the recall ballot (where all voters can vote for any candidate) with the primary ballot (where voters can only vote for their own party's candidates). If that's so -- if the constitutional cure is worse than the constitutional disease, based on the very same criteria (risk of lost votes) that are the supposed cause of the current constitutional violation -- then the Ninth Circuit's injunction looks pretty odd indeed.

Peter Robinson begs for help in his Tom vs. Arnold debate with Hugh Hewitt. His only other choice was to say "uncle".

A former 9th circuit clerk weighs in on Ninth Circuit Lefties vs. Constitutional Democracy, 03-56498 and her esteemed former bosses:

Reading the opinion, you can almost hear the panel saying: "Hey, let's not just halt this recall, let's have a little fun with the thing!" The opinion includes a fond historical nod to voting with fava beans and the wry observation that punch cards are "intractably afflicted with technologic dyscalculia." It's tough to count the number of times the judges gleefully point out that the secretary of state is barred from defending the punch-card machines because he is already subject to a consent decree holding that they suck.

And the—by my count—12 references to Bush v. Gore often carry the deliberate leadup: "Hey! It's just like the Supreme Court said in Bush v. Gore." Now, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe the judges on the 9th Circuit haven't been lying awake at night, wondering when they might finally have revenge on the high court for years of abuse and disrespect. There are ample other explanations for 9th Circuit nuttiness (and I know because I clerked there): The number of judges (26) and the fact that they sit in panels of three means that there is little predictability and less accountability for occasional wacky decisions. There is the possibility—which I'd dispute—that 9th Circuit liberals are more liberal than other liberals, including liberal Supreme Court justices. There is the phenomenon known by child psychologists as "labeling theory," wherein the little kid who always gets in trouble for standing in his cubby and pulling his pants down starts to do it because it's expected of him. And there is the fact that the 9th Circuit, while willing to bind itself by existing Supreme Court precedent, is not interested in playing the game played by other courts of appeals—namely, trying to predict how the high court might rule in cases of first impression. If there's no precedent, say the judges of the 9th Circuit, the buck stops here. Hence the Pledge of Allegiance cases, the marijuana cases, and the three-strikes cases.

But none of these explanations really offers the satisfaction inherent in my hypothesis: that the panel stuck it to the Supremes because it could.

Shelby Steele on Proposition 54.

Marc Cooper fisks MoveOn's 10 reasons to oppose the recall.

InstaPundit is doing some war strategy brainstorming and has come up with a few tactical maneuvers in our war with France..

400,000 disenfranchised California voters and counting. It's a certainty that some of these folks won't vote the next time the Feds allow Californians to hold an election for themselves -- some will be too sick, some will die, some will be so disenchanted with democracy they won't vote. The three Democrats on the 9th circuit seem to have taken the tack of destroying democracy in order to save it. It wouldn't be the first time a group of leftists have taken this road.

Nothing is more dull than a debate about debates. Candidates do what they think is in their best interest, and then make up whatever rationalizations and lies they need to attack their opponent and justify there own position. It happens every time, and anyone who doesn't wake up and smell the coffee on this is just added more lies and bs to our already overly polluted public discourse.

All I want to say is that it is perfectly understandable that Schwarzenegger does not want to share the stage with the like of the crazy lady and the leftist true believer. This would diminish Schwarzenegger, and it would give a bigger stage for anti-Schwarzenegger sound bites. That said, I'm with those who see Ronald Reagan's 1966 run for governor as a model for Schwarzenegger. Schwarzenegger should get on talk radio in every market in the state and then take calls from listeners until the phone stops ringing. Then he should sit down with Daniel Weintraub, and take questions until Weintraub has run out of things to ask. This is pretty much what Reagan did, and it shut everybody up. Here's another debate the debate story.

UPDATE: California Insider has some smart things to say on the same topic. Quotable:

.. his failure to debate has itself become such a big issue in the campaign that it is now a distraction that is undercutting his campaign. IIt has also put tremendous pressure on him to do well in next Wednesday’s affair, which will be the most-watched political event in California history. If he pulls it off, he could exceed the expectations of voters who have been told he has nothing of substance to offer, and that alone could rocket him to the head of the pack. But if he falters, he’s got no safety net to catch him, and it could be fatal.

My own view has been that this is part of Schwarzenegger's intended strategy. I don't think it's the best strategy, but we'll see.

Jay Leno ought to book Tom McClintock. Who knew?

The candidates also were asked some less weighty questions, such as their favorite book: Bustamante chose Tom Brokaw's "The Greatest Generation," Huffington picked Plato's "Republic," Camejo favored Michael Moore's "Stupid White Men" while McClintock's choice was Milton Friedman's "Freedom to Choose."

Huffington noted that Schwarzenegger had called Friedman, a conservative economist, a hero of his during the GOP convention last weekend.

McClintock quipped: "Yeah, but I actually read the book."

George Will -- let California rot. Quotable:

California is the sick man of the Republic.

A shameful decision -- David Lambro.

Joseph Farah is ticked off, and rightly so.

Laurence Tribe, master spinner law professor, on the 9th circuit decision. What's interesting about this typical bit of sophism from the esteemed Mr. Tribe is that he throws up strawman arguments through argument recasting, claims these arguments have actually been advanced, and then utterly fails to identify anyone who has advanced these arguments. A nice debating trick, that. And a typical one for Tribe.

Another complexity of conducting the recall election at the same time as the primary election is that for California's closed primary election voters must declare their political party affiliation prior to voting. This declaration is made in order to receive the correct ballot for the political party with which the voter is registered. We have seven different political parties, with seven different ballots, i.e. democrat, republican, libertarian, et. cetera. However, the recall election is a general election with numerous partisan candidates and every voter may vote across party lines for his/her choice for governor. Attempting to combine these two totally different types of elections has never been done before and would, in my opinion, result in significant voter confusion and enhanced potential for error.

From the amicus bried of Los Angeles County Registrar Conny B. McCormack, quoted by Priorities & Frivolities.

In Orange County I'll be voting on a multiple guess, fill in the boxes ballot of the sort everyone has come to love from their days in school. This sort of ballot allows for exactly the same sort of "errors" that Henry Brady, the ACLU and the 9th circuit court find so racially offensive -- intentional non-votes and intentional multi-votes. It's actually easier and more fun to multi-vote with multiple guess ballot than it is with a punch ballot. It's not to much of a stretch to think that all sorts of people will find it too tempting not to vote for not only Larry Flint, but also Gary Coleman, and maybe Edward Kennedy and that porn star. And if they do, we'll have another federal equal protection case our our hands -- and we'll have to throw out the election results. But of course, only if the persons who do this have the politically prefered skin color.

Mickey Kaus on Judge Richard Paez -- from the time of his confirmation March, 2000.

Professor Henry Brady defends his "voters are too dumb to put a stick in a hole" study, a study which counts intentional non-votes as "errors". Brady explains that individuals are not responsible for their actions in the voting booth -- e.g. intentionally choosing not to vote on a matter, or intentionally choosing two choices -- but rather the external environment is responsible for the voting that takes place in the booth. This, of course, is the grandaddy of all anti-liberal arguments -- and the great justification for the nanny-state.

Southwest Voter Registration Education Project v. Shelley, 03-56498 -- briefs, amicus letters and more.

Rewire This Circuit by Professor Einer Elhauge

The Ninth Circuit federal court's decision delaying the California recall elevates a straw-man argument against Bush v. Gore into constitutional principle, and then employs that bogus principle to deny the California electorate its constitutional right to oust its governor. The straw man is the claim that the Supreme Court decision in Bush v. Gore made it an equal protection violation for different counties to use different ballot-counting methods. Back when it was electorally convenient to them, Democrats lampooned this equal protection theory because it would lead to the absurd conclusion that it was unconstitutional to use punch cards in some counties and not others, which would invalidate just about every election conducted in the last century.

Now, the Ninth Circuit federal court claims that this absurdity is binding constitutional law, and thus requires enjoining the recall because some California counties use punch card technologies and others do not.

But Bush v. Gore never rested on such an equal protection theory. It couldn't have, because that decision sustained a machine recount despite the fact that some Florida counties used punch cards and others used optical scanners. As the Supreme Court stated, "The question before the Court is not whether local entities, in the exercise of their expertise, may develop different systems for implementing elections." Instead, Bush v. Gore expressly stated that the issue there was "whether the use of standardless manual recounts violates the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses." It stressed that, there, the standards about whether to count a dimpled or partially perforated ballot varied not only between counties but within counties over time and between different counters.

If allowed to exercise such standardless discretion in ballot-counting, counters could engage in political discrimination by manipulating the standard to disfavor the ballots and candidates whose political viewpoints the counters disliked. But such discrimination would be hard to detect or prove precisely because there would be no standard against which to judge the counting. As Bush v. Gore stated, "The problem inheres in the absence of specific standards to ensure its equal application."

If, in advance of an election, a county adopts a counting technology that undercounts votes in a uniform way, that choice is far less likely to affect the election outcome because its predicted effects apply to both candidates equally. Nor would any county have an incentive to adopt a technology that undercounts its own vote compared to the vote in other counties, for that would simply lessen its own political clout.

Precisely the same distinction is recognized for the conventional constitutional doctrine that bans counties from exercising standardless discretion about whether to grant parade permits because of the fear that it might be exercised against disfavored political viewpoints. No one had ever thought this makes it unconstitutional for one county to allow parades from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday, while other counties allow them from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Nor, apparently, did anyone think similar county variations in election machinery raised a constitutional problem for all the other elections conducted since 2000, until this recall created a strategic reason for so claiming ..

The Ninth Circuit's decision was as precipitous as it was unsound. It took an incredibly close election result for the relatively small number of incompletely perforated punch cards to arguably matter in Florida, and the media recount suggests it turned out not to matter even there. Nor has the problem been replicated before or since in other elections. But because of the concern that some similar problem might affect the recall election, the Ninth Circuit is with certainty depriving the entire California electorate of its right to vote on whether it wants a different governor for the next six months.

The Ninth Circuit appears not to have noticed the irony that, in so holding, it is keeping in office a governor who himself was elected under a system that used punch cards in some counties and not others, and thus must, under its theory, be holding office unconstitutionally. Does this mean Gray Davis cannot be removed from office by a recall election but can by judicial injunction? Or does the court really think that the best way to vindicate a purported right to vote using equal vote-counting technology is to require voters to keep in office a governor elected with unequal vote-counting technology?

The 9th circuit -- who are these political hacks wearing robes.

Treasure hunt! -- find the wackiest California legislation! -- a new contest at the SoCalLawBlog

Rick Hasen has a batch of election nulification litigation links. Including a link to his audio debate with John Eastman on NPR.

Go read Mickey Kaus, he's good stuff on the punch card / Bush v. Gore story -- and he elaborates on the vital angle originally explored by KFI's Eric Leonard.

Blame Weintraub -- the 12 questions for debate have been released by the California Broadcasters Association.

The prestigious Adam Smith Institute in London has launched a new group blog -- with posting by such folks as Hayek scholar Eamonn Butler.

Lots of 9th circuit election nulification coverage at How Appealing. Also check out California Insider for good links on voting machines -- and the latest on Schwarzenegger's appearance on the Howard Stern show.

"May a U.S. Court of Appeals judge refuse to follow binding U.S. Supreme Court precedent if the judge believes that the precedent is unconscionable? "Yes" is how 9th Circuit Judge Harry Pregerson recently answered that question .. " more.

The Irish Lass gets some good blogosphere press -- it looks like my first blog child is off and running. I enjoyed this quotable from the Lucianne.com site:

"A good friend of mine worked in day camp year ago attended by Arnold's three little daughters. One day one of the little girls couldn't unscrew her thermos lid. She asked a counselor for help, and the counselor had to ask another counselor, and so on, until finally one young man, grunting and straining trying to free the lid asked rhetorically, "Who made your lunch, anyway?" And she answered, "My daddy."

Good story, but one small catch -- Arnold has only two daughters!

Schwarzenegger's Republican Convention speech.

"arrogant, ill-considered, poorly-reasoned, over-reaching, unconstitutional" .. yet Fresh Potatoes is at peace.

Another misinformed East Coasty. This time it's law professor (and left-leaning political theorist) Bruce Ackerman who falsely writes:

It is undeniable that California's recall election, which will use punch-card voting systems, has the potential to become another voting fiasco replete with hanging chads and changing standards.

No, California has a single very detailed standard (see below) -- we aren't Florida, folks. My wife calls this sort of misinformed gassing "talking out of one's ass". Academics do it, journalists do it -- sometimes even in the NY Times.

But Ackerman gets this right:

Whatever its other merits or demerits, the court's intervention protected the right of each state to make its voice heard in selecting the president.

In contrast, the present decision attacks states' rights at their very core. The short election period is central to California's political integrity. Its constitution places a limit of six months on this extraordinary process. By extending the election beyond this period, the court condemns the state to an extended period of political paralysis.

Your vote -- Garbage? 11,000 completed ballots were received in the mail yesterday by the registar of voters in Sacramento.

Attorney Marc Levin:

there are flaws in the panel's opinion that, if the full Ninth Circuit affirms it, would allow the Supreme Court to reverse the decision while still adhering to its holding in Bush v. Gore .. [For example] the California Secretary of State has adopted a single standard for determining what constitutes a vote in all systems, avoiding different definitions of a vote being used in different counties ..

In 1988, the Ninth Circuit declared in Burdick v. Takushi that federal courts should refrain from invalidating state election laws when a reasonable alternative course of action exists. Now, the court has violated this principle by failing to even consider the many post-election remedies available, and the likelihood that the results will make this dispute academic. Consequently, the Supreme Court can reverse this decision solely because it imposes an excessive remedy, while still affirming the fundamental holding of Bush v. Gore that federal courts must ensure the integrity of all elections.

County registrars see no problems with California punch system -- but the do see very serious problems with combining the recall election with the March primary election. Another must read.

California Insider scoop -- Schwarzenegger on Stern Wednesday morning, Larry "Hardball" King Wednesday night.

Thomas Sowell:

Maybe it is just local pride on my part, but I think California is the purest example of [leftist] fundamentalism. New York and Massachusetts have their claims on that title, but California is not called the Left Coast for nothing ..

Read it all.

Debra Saunders:

The [9th circuit] panel ruled that the recall election should be postponed until March 2, 2004, when all counties should have replaced their punch-card systems. The judges also noted that former California Secretary of State Bill Jones, a Republican, "officially" deemed punch cards to be "unacceptable."

Wrong, bristled Jones on Monday. Jones noted that after Florida 2000, he pushed for California to modernize its balloting systems by 2006. The ACLU and other organizations sued the state to dump punch-card ballots more quickly. A federal judge in Los Angeles picked March 2004 as the deadline -- and the parties agreed.

"If I had thought these systems were so egregious, I would not have" suggested keeping punch cards until 2006, said Jones. He asked: If the ACLU believed that punch-card ballots disenfranchised voters, "why didn't they appeal that decision" for the 2002 elections?

The answer: As far as I'm concerned, the issue wasn't replacing the punch cards. It was that the ACLU wanted to muck up the recall election, and the Ninth Circuit wanted to help.

As UCLA law professor Daniel Lowenstein noted, "There are many elections scheduled for November 2003, including a recall election in the city of Lynwood" (which lies in one of the six counties, Los Angeles) "and I'm not aware of anyone who's objected to the use of punch-card ballots in those systems."

A former aide to Jerry Brown when he was secretary of state, Lowenstein described the Monday ruling as "one of the worst instances of judicial interference with elections that I've ever seen, and I've been active in this field for about 30 years."

Elections attorney Chip Nielsen warned that the replacement ballot systems could be worse than punch cards -- because voters and registrars aren't familiar with them. Lowenstein agreed that the new ballot systems could be as problematic as punch cards.

This is another Ninth Circuit horror story. Consider how in 1996, federal judge Thelton Henderson -- a former ACLU board member -- unilaterally overruled Proposition 209, which ended racial preferences in state hiring, contracting and admissions. Proposition 209, which was approved by voters, was based on 1964 federal civil rights law. A Ninth Circuit panel overturned the ruling on appeal. It should act likewise -- and quickly -- with this can of worms and spare California from the U.S. Supreme Court stepping in. As Nielsen noted, this decision spells "pure chaos."

While the ruling noted the need for "orderly" elections, it in itself is a recipe for disorder.

Should counties throw out the absentee ballots of those who have already voted -- or should they let every vote count? No one knows.

On the very first paragraph of the 66-page ruling, the Ninth Circuit judges misquoted Bill Jones, who never said the punch-card system was "unacceptable." (He said it was outdated.) They took a decades-old voting mechanism that helped elect the presidents who appointed them and decided that it was so unreliable as to justify their decision to postpone a scheduled election in which some citizens already had voted.

If punch ballots are so "unacceptable," they should recuse themselves, having won their place on the bench through such a discredited system. But if it's good enough for them, it's good enough for the recall.

Mickey Kaus -- worth quoting:

One--only one--of the problems of government-by-judiciary is that judges think they know all the relevant facts just from reading the briefs of the parties in the case. But they don't. ...

And this:

If you don't think appellate courts pay attention to editorials and other indicators of the public mood, you haven't clerked on an appellate court. ...

The remarkable human brain:

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a total mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Fcuknig amzanig huh?

(via The Vlookh Cnopsricay ).

The latest Google search visitor to PrestoPundit: Google Search: hack into the DMV to get a licence.

And the number one google search is: Mexifornia drivers licence -- which is a search for a joke "Mexifornia" drivers licence which I haven't featured or linked to.

Here is the web site of the company which financed the Berkeley study cited by the 9th circuit. In a stunning news report, KFI radio's Erik Leonard reported that intentional non-votes and double votes were counted as "errors" in the study. Also, the counties with the highest error rates were 85% white population counties, one using punch cards, the other not using punch cards. Also, the statistical method used compared racially categorized population figures from the census bureau with raw vote totals, having no racial markers -- a completely flawed methodology. KFI radio continues to run circles around the major Southern California news outlets as a source of investigative journalism on the recall and government crisis in Sacramento.

The 9th circuit court has an annual reversal rate rate of 75% -- more reversals than all of the other district courts combined. All of which is more evidence of a lawless court run amuck. A court dominated by political commitments and personal views rather than a commitment to the rule of law.

Here is the web site of Berkeley Professor Henry Brady, whose comparative statistics provide the underlying race-based rationale for the 9th circuit ruling. Brady is a graduate of MIT, which, research suggests, doesn't have a Republican on the faculty.

Tons of links on the 9th circuit's halting of the ongoing California recall election at at Rough & Tumble.

More on the lawless political appointees ruling from the 9th district:

During his confirmation hearing in 1979, Pregerson said that if the law conflicted with his conscience, he would vote with his conscience.

From an LA Times-Democract profile of the three 9th district political appointees. (via Calblog, whose got more on the election nulification). Note well. 2 of the 3 judges are graduates of the Democrat Party -- and Left -- dominated UC Berkeley School of Law. As I've suggested here before, what is killing us in California as much as anything is our elite institutions -- our major newspapers for example, and more importantly our elite educational institutions. These are Left & Democrat controlled guilds, out of touch with reality, and opposed ideologically to many of the bedrock foundations of classical liberalism, the underlying structure of our free society. To put it simply, they don't understand classical liberalism, their viceral reaction is deeply hostile to it, and they go about inculcating that gut take on true liberalism to their students. It's not at accident that at graduate school I was forced to use study rooms with giant pictures of the Stalinist Che Guevara on the wall, while not a sole knew a lick about Hayek. Various shades of thinking from the Left is the veritable mono-culture of the University, and this mono-culture is ultimately destructive of a liberal and prosperous society.

The lawless judges on the rogue 9th district panel:

the panel includes Judge Pregerson, who, following the Supreme Court's decision upholding California's three-strikes law, issued a series of dissents stating that he cannot apply the three-strikes law in good conscience. Judge Pregerson makes no attempt to distinguish the cases in which he dissents from the case decided in a contrary fashion by the United States Supreme Court. He does not even attempt to apply a legal rationale for his dissent. Rather, he asserts his own will in place of the legislature which wrote the law, and the United States Supreme Court, which declared that specific law to be constitutional.

Then there is Judge Thomas, who gained notoriety recently for authoring the decision which, by applying a procedural rule retroactively, has the potential to overturn more than 100 capital cases. Judge Thomas issued this decision despite the fact that every other circuit (including, ironically, the Ninth Circuit) had previously found that the principle of law that he on relies does not apply retroactively.

Finally there is Judge Paez, who referred to California's Proposition 209 — a popularly enacted civil-rights initiative which prohibited the use of race as a factor in admissions to state universities — as an "anti-civil rights initiative." Conveniently, the question presented to the court of the whether election may go forward in October affects not only the recall, but the Racial Privacy Initiative sponsored by Ward Connerly. As luck would have it, Mr. Connerly was also the sponsor of Paez's favorite: Prop. 209.

more.

A long selection of excerpts from the 9th district ruling in HTML.

The 9th district decision is a clear error of law --Legal Theory Blog. A must read.

Riordan:

Having a rule of law that people can rely on with confidence is necessary for democracies to succeed ..

Read it all.

An Interview With Milton Friedman -- by John Hawkins of RWN.

BOMBSHELL

And voting officials, already struggling to produce an election on a short deadline, were handed a new problem to consider: whether combining the lengthy recall ballot with the primary in March would produce a behemoth too large for the newer voting machines to handle.

"It's more than a wrinkle," said Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder Conny McCormack. "No one even asked the largest county in the state if we had the capacity to run it in March. The answer is no."

-- picked from today's LA Times by California Insider

The unbound arrogance -- arrogance -- of these three political appointees becomes more glaring with each passing hour.

We are a country were at the root of everything is the premise that the people rule -- the power and authority of the government comes from the people. It is important sometimes to assemble together such fundamental reminders. Here are some more:

-- Three Federal judges are intervening in an ongoing democratic election mandated by the California constitution and called by the proactive democratic involvement of 2 million citizens who signed the recall petition. Californians have been voting in the recall election for several days now. The court is not delaying an election which has yet to be held, they are suspending an election in the middle of the thing as the voting takes place.

-- There is no federal constitutional protection against an individual's own idiocy or incompetence. And as a citizen in the voting booth -- as we are before the law -- we are individuals with the rights of individuals. We are not the franchised representives of a race or a skin color or a class interest -- in the voting booth we exercise nothing other than our rights as individuals, as unique selves. It important to reflect on simple facts. Any voting method is subject to voting failure on the part of individual election participants. And children as young as 3 or even 2 have proven themselves capable of using the punch voting system, a system generations have used with no threat to democracy.

-- Timeliness is the essence of the logic of recall. This is clear not only from the particulars of the California constitution, it's also clear from the very idea of recall -- a process which provides a more timely procedure for correcting gross governmental incompetence, malfeasance and mismanagement. A recall delayed is a recall denied. It's the nulification of the power the people of California have by rights given to themselves -- taken away by 3 men who by rights do not have this power and authority. That is, if we are still to be a democracy where power and authority ultimately resides in the people -- i.e. where the people rule, and not as for to long in to many places, only a priviledged few rule. Are the courts our masters, or do the people rule in America? With this new decision it becomes one small measure less clear that we do.

Well, I'm beat. See you all tomorrow.

Angry Clam does a nice fisking of the 9th district's decision to nulify the California Constitution.

Does this still matter? Hugh Hewitt easily mats Peter Robinson in a "should McClintock bail" smackdown -- the first debate of a new National Review Online feature.

Priorities & Frivolities has a blog roundup and analysis of the political implications of the Fed decision to nulify the California constitution. This pick from Hindrocket was particularly worthy:

The Democrats' most recent ploy has been to disparage the recall as the latest in a series of "undemocratic" efforts by Republicans to overturn the popular will. (How an election can be undemocratic is unclear, but never mind.) It will be interesting to see how they react to something that is truly undemocratic; i.e., a court's order that an election called pursuant to state law not take place.

Fresh Potatoes defies the court .. tonight he's headed to the post office to mail in his absentee ballot.

Shark Blog ponders Canada:

Things we can learn from Canada Here's what I learned from Canada today --

a) The best way to get people to stop smoking marijuana is to put the government in charge of growing marijuana.

b) The best way to get people to not watch movies is to put the government in charge of producing movies.

Tune in to the next installment of "Things we can learn from Canada" where we ponder the question: "What is the best way to stop people from getting suitable medical care?"

Go to Sharkblog for the links.

SoCalLawBlog rips the 9th district court's Constitution nulification decision. A choice bit of the analysis:

If different counties in Florida were using different methods to interpret ballots that were already cast (i.e. one county would consider a "hanging chad" as a vote while another would discount it), is that the same as having different voting systems (i.e. punch-card vs. touch-screen voting) in terms of passing constitutional muster. The Supreme Court held the first instance in Florida to be unconstiutional under the Equal Protection Clause. But can the reasoning of how to interpret a cast ballot be applied to the voting systems themselves?

Contrary to the claims of the Ninth Circuit and the supporters of this decision, that issue was never addressed by Bush v. Gore. Indeed the Supreme Court explicitly stated in its decision that such a question has not been decided. Bush v. Gore states, "The question before the Court is not whether local entities, in the exercise of their expertise, may develop different systems for implementing elections. Instead, we are presented with a situation where a state court with the power to assure uniformity has ordered a statewide recount with minimal procedural safeguards."

Amazingly, the Ninth Circuit quotes this very same passage in its decision to declare the opinion to be simple application of Bush v. Gore. Apparently, the Ninth Circuit has seemingly interpreted the phrase "local entities" to mean "states", when clearly it was meant to refer to "counties". This issue has clearly not been decided by the Supreme Court yet ..

To require statewide uniformity in voting methods would put every statewide election at the mercy of a single county official who could very easily scrap elections either through individual negligence or deliberate sabotage.

And SoCalLawBlog's immediate reaction to the decision is one that deserves a wide audience, including this notable quotable:

Lawyers and the courts in this country have succeeded in creating an atmosphere where many segments of the populace feel that absolutely no decision in governance is in their hands - even indirectly. Needless to say, that is not healthy. Violent revolutions have started over much less. While that certainly doesn't seem to be in the air in this country, it always gets your humble blogger to question just what exactly the colonists were upset about when they took on the British.

Bound in a Nutshell has some solid California constitution nulification analysis, including this:

It is also clearly true that this impinges democracy. The court's opinion showed the court to have completely failed to understand the urgency of a recall election (an urgency which every other court to have heard a case on the subject grasped). The clear mandate in state law that recalls be dealt with promptly is brushed off as being of little import (despite mounting evidence that a six-month long recall campaign will paralyze state government, annoy the voters, and completely change the nature of the campaign and the effectiveness of the candidates). The will of the voters is being frustrated, and the pent up rage that caused the recall in the first place will merely intensify, and seek new targets. It's a politically tactless decision.

And yet ... the central argument of the decision is one which has merit ..

Bound in's explanation why is worth a read.

A caller to the John and Ken show pointed out that many polling places have kiddie ballots for parents voting with the little ones -- kids get to use the punch ballot to vote for Barney, Mickey Mouse, etc. The caller pointed out that his kids had no difficulty voting by themselves with ballot even at the age of two and three.

"Something is drastically wrong in this state when it's easier to get a California driver's license than it is to rent a video at Blockbuster. You need two forms of ID there."

-- political analyst Jay Leno.

Recall scholar Joshua Spivak --
"What Is the History of Recall Elections?" and "Why Did California Adopt the Recall?". Must reading for recall pundits and bloggers.

It wasn't a gangbang -- everyone kept there clothes on -- but call it a group love in between Oprah, Maria, Arnold, and Oprah female audience. Schwarzenegger leaps across the genger gap ..

UPDATE: The NY Times estimates that 850,000 California women saw the Oprah-Arnold-Maria broadcast Monday.

One of the biggest responses of the broadcast came when Oprah asked Shriver if -- as a Kennedy -- she'd been raised to look the other way at spousal womanizing. "You know that ticks me off. I am my own woman. I have not been bred to look the other way. I accept him with all his strengths and all his weaknesses, as he does me," Shriver answered to loud applause.

Here's the Reuter's story.

The bottom line of the whole thing is that Maria Shriver is an impressive advocate for her husband and this candidacy for Governor of California -- and a few hundred thousand of those women watching Oprah earlier today will no doubt be punching their chad for Schwarzenegger, if the courts will allow us to hold our election and follow our Constitution.

STUNNER -- RECALL ELECTION BLOCKED BY 3 DEMOCRATS.

Unelected Federal bench panel cancels democratic elections, says stuff it to voters of California. The Constitution of California is voided in unbelievable, shocking court ruling. Read the opinion here.

Worth quoting:

"The three judges from the 9th Circuit who heard [CA recall] the case were all appointed by Democratic presidents — Judge Pregerson by President Carter and judges Sidney Thomas and Richard A. Paez by President Clinton — and are considered among the most [far left] on the court."

And Debra Saunders:

"The 9th Circuit Court is known for its blatant disregard for legal niceties when it comes to decisions that grate against the court's rarefied politics."

From the courts Orwellian opinion:

"In addition to the public interest factors we have discussed, we would be remiss if we did not observe that this is a critical time in our nation's history when we are attempting to persuade the people of other nations of the value of free and open elections. Thus, we are especially mindful of the need to demonstrate our commitment to elections helf fairly, free of chaos, with each citizen assured that his or her vote will be counted, and with each vote entitled to equal weight. A short postponement of the election will accomplish those aims and reinforce our national commitment to democracy."

RECALL BLOCKED Google News Search here.

Calblog is half way through the opinion and has her instant opinion here. She has this reminder, "Not coincidentally, March is the Democratic primary, expected to increase Democratic turnout."

Xrlq has this:

The basis for this ruling is a little-known provision of the Fourteenth Amendment, which reads:

"No state shall ... use punch card ballots... in any specially-called election against a Democrat incumbent. Nothing in this section shall preclude such state from using punch card ballots to re-elect said Democrat in a regularly scheduled election."

And here is Fresh Potatoes on the Federal disenfranchisement of Californian voters.

Kausfiles provides evidence of the "condescending, museum-quality [leftist] mindset" of one of the federal judges, and lots, lots more.

Election Law Blog argues in favor of the cancellation of democracy in California.

Steve Hayward:

We should never be surprised at the Ninth Circuit's depredations. It has been a rogue court for more than 20 years. We shall have to await a close reading of the decision by our legal friends, but one question that comes to mind is whether the holding of this court is that punch card ballots are ipso facto unconsitutional, based on the Supreme Court's holding in Bush v. Gore in 2000.

There were some of our legal scholars (like Mike McConnell) who worried in December 2000 that the Supreme Court's use of the equal protection argument as it applied to the counting of punch card ballots in Bush v. Gore would come back to bite conservatives. Setting aside the constitutional wisdom of the California recall, this appears to be the specter that McConnell worried about. It will be interesting to see how the Supreme Court handles the appeal, i.e., whether it modifies Bush v. Gore and repudiates the Ninth Circuit once again, or whether it punts entirely, not wishing to be drawn into another political mess. If the Supreme Court overrules the Ninth Circuit, it will add fuel to the fire of the left that there is a giant GOP conspiracy to steal elections (even though this is nonsense).

Law professor Instapundit quotes Porphyrogenitus:

"Regular readers know I'm against the Recall on general principles. Still, three judges have decided that the voting machines which were good enough to elect and re-elect Grey Davis are too error prone to recall him. No partisan agenda there, I'm sure."

Then offers his own opinion:

"Unless there's some awfully compelling legal principle that's not making it into the press accounts, I predict a reversal on this one. It's just too explosive.

Robert Tardorda has extensive coverage here.

Schwarzenegger statement:

“One million, six hundred thousand Californians of all political persuasions have signed petitions to recall Governor Gray Davis. The Secretary of State has certified that this election should go forth on October 7th. The California Supreme Court has also ruled that the election should go forward on October 7th. I fully expect that the federal courts will come to the same conclusion.

“Today, I call upon the Secretary of State to immediately appeal this decision on behalf of the citizens who have exercised their constitutional right to recall Gray Davis, and who expect an election on October 7th.

“Historically, the courts have upheld the rights of voters, and I expect that the court will do so again in this case.

“I will continue to vigorously campaign for governor. The people have spoken, and their word should – and will – prevail.”

Eugene Volokh:

“ .. I have one narrow question: Assuming that punch card ballots are generally less reliable than the alternatives, why should we think that using punch card ballots in several counties in Oct. 2003 would be less reliable than using the alternatives for the fist time in those counties in Mar. 2004?

Several county governments, containing millions of voters, are scheduled to change their way of doing things, all at once, in the Mar. 2004 election. Sounds to me like a recipe for lots of snafus, in which quite a few votes may get lost, ignored, and otherwise uncounted or improperly counted (and, just as the problems with punch card ballots disproportionately hit voters in the counties that still use punch card ballots, so the problems with the changeover will disproportionately hit voters in the counties that will change over).

Now I don't think that this modest level of error would be unconstitutional. I think that as a policy matter, it might well make sense to risk some amount of such glitches in order to get things worked out for the future (if one thinks that over the long haul there'll be fewer problems with the new technologies than with the old, which I'll assume for now).

But the Ninth Circuit's assertion is that there is no "rational basis" for continuing with the old system -- and thus that there's a constitutional obligation to wait until the new system is in place -- because running the recall election under the current system will produce a substantial error rate and running the recall election under the new system would produce a lower error rate. I'm just not confident that this is so. Maybe I'm wrong, because the shifts to the new system are likely to be less troublesome than I'm afraid they might be. But given what we know about complex systems (especially government-run ones), I suspect that my gut feeling is correct here.

Daniel Wiener predicts a Democrat busting Supreme Court split decision.

Rick Hasen, election law blogger:

Preliminary thoughts on the ACLU punch card decision by the Ninth Circuit ..

1. Were the judges right to enjoin the recall? When the recall litigation started, I was very skeptical of most claims that were being brought to delay or change the rules for the recall. (For example, see here.) I said here back on August 1 that the punch card suit was the case to watch because the issue presented is so strong.

The argument is simply that the use of punch card votes---with their concededly much higher error rates--- in some counties but not others in a statewide election violates the equal protection clause. This is a straightforward application of Bush v. Gore. Indeed, back in 2001 I wrote this article about what Bush v. Gore's equal protection holding would mean if we took the case seriously, and I set out a series of hypotheticals. The punch card case was the easy case, my first hypothetical. If it violates equal protection to use non-uniform voting standards for recounting votes in a statewide election , if that "values one person's vote over another" in violation of the Equal Protection Clause as Bush says, then it must be an equal protection violation to use different machines with different error rates in the same election. This creates a systematic geographical disparity---if you live in Los Angeles or another county using punch cards, your chances of casting a ballot that will be counted is much lower than your chances from another county. The state knows it, and it could have prevented it from happening. If Bush v. Gore does not apply here, it applies nowhere and the opinion, as many of its detractors claim, has no precedential value.

2. What is noteworthy about the Ninth Circuit opinion? It applies Bush v. Gore in a straightforward manner. It hold that the state's claim fails even under rational basis review. This surprised me somewhat; my brief argues that strict scrutiny should apply and that under that standard, the use of punch cards fail. Another notable point is that the court did not even reach the Voting Rights Act issues, which potentially would have been a less controversial way to decide the case---without directly implicating Bush v. Gore. Finally, the opinion does not set a March date for a recall. It enjoins the October 7 election and lets the district court sort out whether the state can run an election without punch cards on a quicker schedule.

3. What is likely to happen next? The losing parties (the Secretary of State and recall intervenor Ted Costa) can petition the entire Ninth Circuit to hear the case en banc by a panel of 11 judges chosen at random or the parties can go to the Supreme Court, first to Justice O'Connor (the Circuit's Justice) for a stay. Justice O'Connor is currently out of the country. She likely would forward the request to the entire Supreme Court. Would either group be interested in the case? If either takes the case (and as Fred Woocher pointed out to me, any judge on the Ninth Circuit can call for an en banc vote even if the parties don't ask for it), it will be a good sign that a reversal is coming. But I think there is a reasonable chance that neither will want to take the case--especially the Supreme Court, which, having been criticized severely for intervening in the 2000 presidential election may not want to intervene again now when the stakes are, thankfully, much lower. We have no national election on the line, no potential transition crisis. Remember, the Court did not get involved after the New Jersey Supreme Court decided to allow Democrats to replace Sen. Torricelli on the ballot. that case too, raised a Bush v. Gore issue, albeit a different one (the right of the legislature, rather than the state courts, to determine the rules for federal elections). Note, there are also some interesting standing questions about who can appeal to the Supreme Court---expect these issues to arise as this continues.

Look for continuing blog coverage throughout the day from:

Election Law

The Southern California Law Blog

California Insider

Yes on Recall, Yes on Schwarzenegger. Xrlq is pumped up and voting today.

Pete Wilson discusses illegal immigration with National Review editor Rich Lowry:

The NYTimes reports today: "With Californians facing a shrinking number of high-paying blue-collar jobs, a huge state deficit and reduced access to the state colleges, the immigration issue has never gone away, even if mainstream politicians avoided talking about it." This is almost exactly what Pete Wilson told me a couple of weeks ago. He was commenting on a VDH cover story in NR: "I would disagree with only one thing and that was his first sentence. He said California "gave up" years ago on contesting illegal immigration. That's not true. First of all, the actual responsibility to control the border, legally and constitutionally, is with the feds. Second, they really didn't give up - 187 was, I think, remarkable. And it was scuttled by the courts. So I wouldn't agree with him that they have quit fighting it. They don't see the means at hand with this governor to do that, but hell, 187 would pass today, I think perhaps by a greater margin."

Shark Blog joins the vast right wing conspiracy the California Bear Flag League. Welcome aboard!

Grover Norquist -- "Don't Even Think About Raising Taxes"

Another interview with Schwarzenegger's old flame Barbara Outland Baker.

California Insider fact checks Bill Clinton campaigning for Gray Davis. Infinitely charitable, Weintraub gives every benefit of the doubt to Clinton, saying merely that Clinton's "history was a little on the weak side", that Clinton left some things out, and that one of his arguments "doesn't apply". But what we know about Clinton and his associates is that this stuff is not accidental, it's premeditated. And so by being "charitable" Weintraub actually falsifies the story -- i.e. gets the story wrong. The straight "just that facts" reporting in the case of Clinton campaigning for Davis is another instance of "there he goes again" -- there he goes with plain as day duplicity, a mucking up of the public discourse with "big lie" fabrications of the facts of California constitutional law, and a laughably false picture of the governor making hard decisions in the pre-recall world. Of course, this is a well burried lie because it insinuates that Gray Davis did make such hard decisions prior to the recall, when in fact the very reason he's being recalled it that he refused to make the hard decisions the state so desperately required.

Reporters spend so much time around politicians that they come to accept deception and duplicity as something folks in polite company don't call attention to -- putting light on such a thing is a social mistake sort of like a young child pointing out that grandma's makeup isn't put on right, or some parts of her underclothes are exposed. You've supposed to just ignore it and pretend its not there, or use some sort of euphemism like "spin" to pretend that it's something other than what it really is -- the big lie, the poluting of the public discourse. The greatness of H.L. Mencken -- and the great joy his political writing gives -- comes in part from liberty Mencken allows himself to be the growup intelligently revealing the truth all around him that any child can see, but that the cowering "get along to go along" adults pretend doesn't exist. And the truth Mencken most often exposes is that the moral high road of the politician was almost always a means for the politician to serve up the big lie in a way most appealing to the gullible and the wishful thinking -- which 9 times out of 10 included the deep-down hopelessly idealistic and agenda driven reporter, who was cynical only on the surface.

Well, my rant has taken me a bit away from where I began, and I'm at a point where it has little to do with California Insider, who I'm convinced is just a nice guy who doesn't want to go beyond were the facts very strickly allow him to go. All I'm suggesting is that these things prevent him from really telling the truth when he tells the story of Clinton, Davis and the Clinton campaign against the recall.

UPDATE: Andrew Sullivan provides a good example of Clinton doing what he constantly does -- intentionally using the Big Lie for political gain:

CLINTON LIES - SHOCK HORROR: Will Saletan has another example of something Maureen Dowd has also mentioned in the past - that the Bush administration tried to increase the levels of arsenic in the drinking water. Who repeated that hoary old canard? None other than former president Bill Clinton at the Iowa State Fair, saying that the Republicans "tried to put more arsenic in the water." He knows that it was his administration that delayed new, tighter arsenic standards for eight years, and that all the incoming Bush administration did was to review the last-minute directives from the Clinton White House, before enforcing a standard that was stricter than was the case for all of the Clinton administration. But, hey, who's listening any more to that incorrigible old rogue? The blogosphere, that's who.

California Women's Leadership Forum and the California Young Republicans polled 1200 people at the Republican convention in Los Angeles -- 82.5% supported Schwarzenegger.

Reported by The Irish Lass.

Scroll down for full Schwarzenegger and Republican convention coverage -- and some Hayek stuff too.

The San Diego Union Tribune has an official recall blogger. He has the practiced tone and perspective -- cynical condescension towards those dumb aliens among us, Republicans -- typical of a college political science professor, which he is.

Is giving licences to lawbreaking foreigners a bad idea? Well, there are at least ten major problems with it.

Taxed to death:

California's sales tax rate of 7.25 percent is highest in the nation.

California is sixth-highest in a ranking of the 50 states' corporate income-tax burdens.

California ranks at No. 11 in a ranking of the 50 states' property-tax burdens.

California is sixth-highest in a ranking of the 50 states' individual income-tax burdens.

California is No. 8 among the 50 states if you measure the dollar amount of state taxes paid per resident. As of Jan. 1, the California average was $2,214, according to the Tax Foundation.

There are four of us now in the PrestPundit family, so that would be $8,856. I'm a full time dad during the week, and I work both Saturdays and Sundays, and my annual take home income is within the range of that tax burden. Two kids, two cars, a new home -- you do the math -- direct and indirect California taxes basically appropriate my whole take home pay. So my weekends are dedicated to paying for the retirement at 50 (at 90% pay) of government employees -- and other such things the politicians thought they needed to do to in order to advance their careers.

Also quotable:

Bill Ahern, Tax Foundation spokesman, says that although California taxes aren't high in every category, they're high in the categories that matter most to companies making decisions about where to do business. That's what gives California an anti-business image, he says ..

In a California Business Roundtable survey of 400 companies statewide, 20 percent were planning to move or expand out of state.

Dan Walters on Schwarzenegger, the GOP, and McClintock:

Movie star Arnold Schwarzenegger's improbable quest for the governorship of California is utterly dependent on consolidating support among fellow Republicans. Schwarzenegger does not need every Republican vote to win his duel with Democratic Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante -- should Gov. Gray Davis be recalled -- but he does need at least two-thirds of them as a base to which he could add some independents and Democrats ..

"I can say no -- no to Davis, no to Bustamante, no to more taxes, no to more spending," Schwarzenegger pledged. "I will be saying no to these liberals in Sacramento." ..

[McClintock] has a little ax to grind with the state GOP leadership for not helping him with money last year when he was running very close to Democrat Steve Westly in their contest for the state controller's office.

Read it all.

It ships in November. Get your advance copies for Christmas and help support PrestoPundit and the Hayek Center. Bruce Caldwell -- an economic thought historian -- is the leading Hayek scholar in America.

The Democrat Party's God problem.

Jared Diamond on the effects of globalization and genetic engineering -- 10,000 years ago.

"Tearing down the mirror" -- a Mercury News Schwarzenegger profile.

The Left dominates in Sacramento, passing landmark socialized medicine legislation forcing firms to cough up multi-millions in a massive new tax on business.

"I am a conservative."

"I'm conservative because Milton Friedman is right and Karl Marx is wrong.

I'm a conservative because I believe communism is evil and free enterprise is good.

I'm a conservative because I believe in a balanced budget, not in budget deficits.

I'm a conservative because I believe money that people earn is their money, not the government's money.

When you look at this driver's license outrage.. I'm a conservative because I believe in the rule of law, not in political pandering .. I will take this Davis driver's license law and I will terminate it. I'll go to the Legislature for repeal, and if they refuse to act swiftly, I will take my case to the people and we will overturn it ourselves.

drawing upon Ronald Reagan's inspiration and example, we will change California .. "

-- Arnold Schwarzenegger -- rallying Republicans Saturday. Schwarzenegger told Club of Growth Stephen Moore that he will consider a flat tax and possibly capital gains tax cuts as Governor. Schwarzenegger releases his economic plan next week. The candidate also suggested that going forward with some sort of Gann-type amendment restricting spending increases to the rate of citizen income growth.
More at Reuters; and the LA Times, which included this:

Assemblyman Ray Haynes of Murietta, a conservative stalwart, announced his endorsement of Schwarzenegger and took issue with McClintock's jibe that the actor was an "amateur." McClintock had made the comment while criticizing his opponent's refusal to detail specific budget cuts before a post-election audit.

"Government's not rocket science, to be real blunt," Haynes said. "It doesn't take a whole lot of time to figure out what's going on." He called McClintock "the North Star" of conservatives, but said the state senator could not win. "Tom is a friend of mind, but Tom is not a consensus builder," Haynes said.

And this:

Schwarzenegger said his model in office would be Ronald Reagan, and he promised to take a bust of the actor-turned-governor along with him to Sacramento. "It's going to remind of the impact one individual can have."

UPDATE: Fresh Potatoes reports on his day at the convention.

Another Ronald Reagan reality check for national conservative yackity yacks who don't know much about history -- or Ronald Reagan, this time from Jack Pitney, professor of government at Claremont McKenna College:

A lot of conservatives will reject the Reagan-Schwarzenegger comparison and say that Reagan was a man of principle and Schwarzenegger is a compromiser. [But in fact] Reagan was a compromiser .. Reagan was a pragmatist. Reagan's first big act as governor was to raise taxes, in fact the biggest tax increase in American state history up to that time. Reagan signed the most liberal abortion law in America.

More -- Lou Cannon interviewed in the NY Times on Reagan's gigantic tax increase.

The drum beat -- it may not be entirely fair, but it's getting louder. Conservative Sacramento talk show host Ed Hogue:

Tom and I are good friends. He's guest-hosted my show. He's got tremendous character. A great man with a huge bright future. But Tom can't win, and he needs to get out.

Orange County residents -- the OC Register wants you:

Arnold Schwarzenegger and Maria Shriver will appear on “The Oprah Winfrey Show” at 3 p.m. Monday on KABC/7. The Register is looking for voters who will be watching. If you’d be willing to participate in a brief telephone interview before and after the show, please call (714) 796-3686 by Monday morning.

Promises made by lieutenant governor go unkept Bustamante's record shows little action on pledges to create jobs and cut waste. By KIMBERLY KINDY The Orange County Register

Cruz Bustamante made big promises about boosting the economy and cutting government waste when he was elected lieutenant governor in 1998 but failed to deliver on most of them, a review of his record shows.

Bustamante, who is running on the ballot to replace Gov. Gray Davis in case the governor is recalled, promised to create jobs - relying in part on an economic-development commission he heads. The commission has a director and received $792,000 in state funding the past two years, but it has never held a meeting, and campaign and office staff declined to provide the Register with any information that would account for what they have done.

Bustamante also promised that unnecessary and fraudulent spending would be rooted out by his Lt. Governor's Commission on Government Waste. But the commission was not formed ..

.. records show the lieutenant governor's annual budget has increased every year since Bustamante was elected to the position. The budget went from $1.7 million in 1999-2000 to $2.5 million in this year's budget - a 139 percent increase over that of his immediate predecessor, Davis ..

Read California Insider for the latest scuttlebut from the Republican convention -- among other things it looks like the Republican county chairman are lining up behind a Schwarzenegger only race to the finish line position.

Hugh Hewitt cherry picks this quote from reliable conservative State Assemblyman Ray Haynes.

Tom McClintock's "true friends are trying to give him a dose of reality. We can take this [race], but not with Tom. If we're going to catch the wave, we've got to hop on Schwarzenegger's surfboard."

Ward Connerly rips Schwarzenegger:

I am disgusted that the .. leading Republican candidate can so blatantly misrepresent Proposition 54, and needlessly alarm the people of California by falsely claiming health risks, and suffer no adverse political consequence for [these] lies and distortions ..

I am disgusted that a Republican candidate for governor who wants to wear the crown of Ronald Reagan and considers himself a disciple of Milton Friedman would support government intrusion into private lives by categorizing human beings on the basis of skin color and other physical traits. No true disciple of Friedman supports this kind of activity.

I am disgusted that a candidate for office who wants the government to stay out of the bedroom of consenting adults and out of the doctor’s office when a pregnant woman is making the choice about abortion or not, would want that same government to be in the delivery room asking the mother and father of their newborn child to designate a “race” on some stupid government form.

"right-wing crazies"

Did Schwarzenegger say it or didn't he?

Steve Hayward -- voice of the kamikaze conservatives:

If McClintock drops out, I strongly suspect that conservatives will still turn out to turn out Davis; they will skip Part B on the ballot, and not vote for any replacement. Taking Davis out will still be a deeply satisfying thing, even if Bustamante .. replaces Davis. The message will get through to Arnold and the GOP establishment that they can't take conservatives' votes for granted.

Now it's free tuition for illegal noncitizens.

Bill Bradley's Weekly column. Money quote:

It is obvious that Bustamante does not know what caused the state budget crisis, which precipitated the recall election in which he is now participating. He also does not understand the dynamics of the power crisis, merely the seminal event in the unraveling of Gray Davis’ political standing.

And this:

Although Schwarzenegger just received an unprecedented endorsement from the state Chamber of Commerce — the first time in 100 years that it has endorsed a gubernatorial candidate — the ex–Mr. Universe, strongly backs the state’s landmark anti-global-warming law, which had been targeted by the Chamber and other business groups as a major “job killer.” Schwarzenegger also backs major renewable-energy programs.

Calling all ghost writers:

Arnold's first girlfriend, Barbara Outland Baker, is seeking to publish a memoir on their 1970's relationship. In this proposed book, she plans to reveal dozens of great new Schwarzenegger photographs no one has ever seen.

Barbara, an English professor, met the then Mr. Universe in 1969 and became his first real girlfriend until they split up in 1974. "Surviving Arnold" is the working title but it will mention plenty of great personal qualities about The Oak.

And here is the Reuters story.

UPDATE: Reuters interviews Barbara Outland Baker on her life with Schwarzenegger.

And here is an alternative version of the interview. Quotable:

She also strongly backs Schwarzenegger for governor. "He's focused, he's capable, whatever needs to be done he will do it."

Bruce Herschensohn on Hugh Hewitt today at 3:20 PM.

Hugh Hewitt must have missed this:

Bruce Herschensohn, the conservative GOP nominee for Senate who lost to Democrat Barbara Boxer in 1992, is backing McClintock and said he knows it's a risk. "I'll vote for the person I agree with most," Herschensohn said. Otherwise, "my conscience would bother me tremendously. I can't do it."

The Washington Post on Blogging the Recall.

Students for Academic Freedom -- 70 chapters and growing.

Busted -- David Horowitz exposes a case of journalistic malpractice in press coverage of the Colorado academic diversity story.

Bustamante's negatives up to 50% in new LA Times poll.

-- 27% wish there were more candidates on the replacement ballot.

-- less than half of McClintock supporters say they will definitely vote McClintock.

-- 18% say Gray Davis will be a strong leader. Really.

-- 42% say Schwarzenegger will reduce the influence of special interests in Sacramento. This could be Schwarzenegger's ticket to the governors office -- Schwarzenegger leads McClintock by only 3% points on the issue of leadership.

.. ever notice how vaguely lefty Republicans are "moderate" while vaguely lefty Democrats are "centrist?"

I hadn't. Nice call by The Angry Clam.

Oprah, Arnold, Arnold, Oprah -- Monday.

100,000 new voters?

George H.W. Bush contributes $1,000 to the Schwarzenegger campaign, as Team Arnold prepares for the Republican party convention.

Here is the Schwarzenegger interview with Bill O'Reilly.

The golden rule of comedy. If it makes you laugh, it's funny.

But this isn't funny:

Watch it. Share it. We haven't forgotten. And we won't. (via Instapundit).

Cost of a Bustamante electorial win -- $8 billion dollars minimum. Cost of a Bill Quick electorial rant -- priceless (be sure to scroll down for the best rant of them all -- and note in passing that the Angry Clam has already marked his ballot for governor).

Stanford poll has Schwarzenegger leading Boostyourtaxes by 12%. (via the Condor).

Here's a snippet:

.. unlike almost all other workers in society, university professors are granted tenure -- a lifetime job from which it is almost impossible to be fired -- precisely in order to guarantee freedom of expression. But in practice, the tenure process has become the means by which the left rigorously weeds out conservatives. In many university departments, opposition from a single faculty member is all that is necessary to deny tenure. These days, such a blackball is most likely to be used against a conservative, especially in disciplines such as sociology, history, English and government.

Professor Robert Maranto of Villanova discussed this insidious practice in the Baltimore Sun on July 31. "While colleges strive for ethnic diversity," he wrote, "they actively oppose ideological diversity." The result is a lack of meaningful debate on campuses that makes corporate boardrooms a model of give-and-take. The reason is that in business, those who keep out new ideas lose market share to competitors. "But within the ivory tower, professors can hold dumb ideas for decades with no accountability," Maranto notes.

.. read it all.

Calblog's Bear Flag Review. Don't miss it.

Sept. 11, 2003 and the war goes on.

There are many fronts in any war but rarely is the domestic front as important as it is now. If you live in California consider on this day doing the small but important task of requesting a petition for the initiative to retain a minimally secure state identification card, by filling out the form found here.

What did you do in the war daddy?

William Anderson, tell us what you really think about Paul Krugman.

I just got off the phone with Arnold Schwarzenegger. I'm a Republican. I want to vote for him. I want to believe. Schwarzenegger doesn't quite convince me. That little extra something that tells me he's one of us -- a Republican who is willing to cut spending and gut bad regulations -- is missing. I think that man lurks behind the curtain, but I didn't quite hear him on the speakerphone ...

... Debra Saunders

Kathleen Connell is the sort of Democrat the likes of which we'll probably never see again -- call her the woman who by rights would be the most admired Democrat in the state. Anyway, I'd missed her most recent piece on the state budget crisis. Important stuff. (via VP)

Mark Glaser has an article on the top internet sites and blogs covering the California recall and race to replace. Glaser thinks the LA Times has the best recall page. And of course, Glaser knows about Weintraub. No mention of Kaus, no mention of Instapundit, no mention of Calblog, no mention of Bill Bradley, no mention of Hugh Hewitt, no mention of Fresh Potatoes, no mention of Tacitus, no mention of Robert Tagorda .. indeed, no mention of anyone in the California Bear Flag League, etc.

And then this on a flash cartoon available at the crazy ladies' web site:

No matter your politics, there's something gut-wrenchingly funny seeing Arnold say, "I'm pro-environment," then run over trees, schools and children in his Hummer.

No, actually the cartoon was about as funny as a crazy lady knocking over a microphone at a public event -- it just goes "thud" and makes the viewer a bit uncomfortable.

And Glaser cites with approval Drudge's uninvestigated report on "alleged racist comments from Schwarzenegger's past." Glaser is happy to spread the inflamitory charges, without giving equal time to the debunking these charges have gotten from the 1970's bodybuilders at Ironage.us. Don't they teach better than this in journalism 101?

Glaser seems to have his hand firmly on the pulse of old media and old institutions available on the new medium of the internet -- and not much else. He's completely missed, for example, the internet sources out of which the blockbuster MECHa issue developed, such as FrontPage Magazine, Tacitus, InstaPundit, Kausfiles, Sharkblog, Townhall, etc. etc. etc.

Glaser knows a bit about the blogosphere -- why isn't this kind of thing in his "review" of the more important recall websites and blogs?

The conservative Christian Times on the race to replace.

LA police officer "Jack Dunphy" on Davis, the licenses for illegals bill, and Mexicalifornia.

Edward Teller is dead.

The NY Times and that old chestnut the gender gap.

Bush -- governing from the economic theory left. Andrew Sullivan approves. Help me out -- I've forgotten just what is that makes Sullivan a conservative, besides the identity politics thing.

Keynesian economics-- the last great (and completely erroneous) excuse for the expansion of the state.

Shriver's campaign role.

Kausfiles parks one:

How slow and ponderous is the L.A. Times? The day after Bustamante's comments [i.e. "I think that anybody who works and pays taxes ought to have a right for citizenship"] the Times front page features what must have been a long-in-the-can thumbsucker headlined

"Candidates Skirt Immigration Issue."

Didn't sound to me as if Bustamante was skirting the immigration issue! .... The Warm Bath of Concern: A more accurate summary of Teresa Watanabe's Times piece would have been "Immigration Debate Has Moved Left as Latinos Fulfill Glorious Demographic Destiny," or perhaps "Why Nobody's an Anti-Immigrant Racist Anymore." But Times hed writers prefer the muffled pundit tone, in keeping with the paper's unstated motto, "Why Be Interesting?" ... Even if Watanabe's thesis is correct, it would have been nice if she'd acknowledged what had actually happened in the real world during the previous week. Weintraub somehow managed. Instead, Watanabe quotes an expert saying "It's not politically correct to talk about illegal immigration" -- a day or so after Schwarzenegger talked about illegal immigration....

Posted by Greg Ransom | Permalink

McClintock and the McClintock conservatives -- leaping off the cliff one more time?

Hayek taught us that there wasn't a dimes worth of difference between the radical left and the radical right -- both were statists and both were enemies of true liberalism. Here is Mussolini's original socialist/facist slogan:

"Everything inside the state, nothing outside the state."

And here is MECHa's variation on that slogan:

"For the race, everything. For those outside the race, nothing".

The Mussolini quote was found in Joshua Muravchik's book Heaven on Earth, by a reader of Instapundit. Muravchik hosted a Hayek-L seminar on his book last October.

Howard Stern -- newsman. An FCC ruling opens the way for newsbreaking discussions of gangbanging with governatorial candidates Arnold Schwarzenegger and Mary Carey. Wonder what Dan Rather -- and Pat O'Brien -- think now that Stern is an official government approved fairness doctrine peer.

Here is the California Chamber of Commerce poll. California Insider has some highlights here.

CNN --Ueberroth out.

DRUDGE REPORT has Ueberroth out of the race. That should put Schwarzenegger out in front. Was Ueberroth tuning in to John and Ken?

You don't see commentaries like this one every day on a candidate's official campaign web site.

Roy Rivenburg's RECALL MADNESS:

Question: Is it true the recall is part of a right-wing conspiracy to undermine democracy and steal the election?

Answer: Yes and, at last count, roughly 60% of California voters were in on the plot. However, many of them joined against their will. The only way to protect yourself is by avoiding direct eye contact with that big blue ring Schwarzenegger has been wearing. Repeat: Do NOT stare into the ring. It has hypnotic powers.

Question: I'm having some trouble keeping up with the onslaught of newspaper opinion columns about the recall. Any tips?

Answer: Most political columnists ran out of original things to say a week after the recall began. Some are now recycling attack columns from 1978 and 1980, replacing the words "Proposition 13" and "Ronald Reagan" with "recall" and "Arnold Schwarzenegger," respectively. So far, the public hasn't caught on, even though one careless writer recently lambasted Proposition 13 for "chickening out of a televised debate with the other propositions."

To save you the trouble of reading additional columns, here is a handy summary of their major themes:

Attack Schwarzenegger for not taking a position on the issues or, when he does take a position, attack that.

Tweak the Terminator for agreeing to just one candidate debate while conveniently not mentioning that Davis did the same thing when running against Bill Simon last November.

Criticize Schwarzenegger for having no political experience. Or, for a change of pace, criticize him for being just like every other politician.

If any reader of this newspaper spots an opinion column that breaks the pattern (i.e., the writer praises Schwarzenegger), be the first to e-mail us and you can choose a gift from our box of prizes.

Via LA Observed -- who said this about the LA Times columnists last week:

The L.A. Times' columnist lineup on the recall, meanwhile, looks more like a glaring mistake every day. They each got the gig because of their style or expertise and not their views, but the more they write the clearer it is they inhabit a fairly narrow range of the political spectrum. King, Lopez, Morrison, Skelton and Hiltzik are all recall disbelievers with only nuances of difference in the details. It already feels way old. Wouldn't one or two of those voices suffice, especially if complemented with a newly vigorous exchange of ideas on the op-ed page? Unfortunately that's not happening either, yet.

Bustamante -- master of the big lie:

During [Bustamante's] speech Sunday he said it was unfair to allow immigrants to serve and die in the armed forces while state policy denies them driver's licenses, as if he were talking about the same population. But U.S. military policy allows only legal immigrants to enlist. Any illegal immigrants who fought and died in the services have done so in violation of the rules.

From a Daniel Weintraub column on immigration law and the race to replace.

Here is the latest Field Poll on the California race to replace.

Citizens Against Driver's Licenses for Illegal Immigrants -- SaveOurLicense.com. Circulate petitions for the referendum to overturn SB60.

90 days, 400,000 signatures, and the things is dead -- until the citizens - citizens - of California get a chance decide this matter for themselves in March. Any guess how the vote might go?

Bruce Bartlett on George Bush, the anti-Reagan:

despite the need to rebuild America’s defenses, Reagan never let it be an excuse to give up on controlling domestic spending. It would have been a lot easier for him to buy the votes needed for national defense by loosening the domestic spending reins. But he never did and fought hard to bring domestic discretionary spending down from 4.7 percent of the gross domestic product in 1980 to 3.1 percent by 1988. That is equivalent to reducing spending by $165 billion per year in today’s economy.

By contrast, George W. Bush has raised domestic discretionary spending by 0.4 percent of GDP in just his first 2 years in office — equivalent to $630 billion over the next decade if sustained.

A key reason why Reagan made his effort is because he understood that the health of the U.S. economy was critical to national security and the defeat of Soviet communism. He knew that big government is a drag on the economy — not just because of the high taxes that go with it, but because it preempts resources that the private sector can use more efficiently. Thus, an increase in government’s share of GDP will eventually reduce growth even if taxes don’t rise.

What the indian monopoly priviledge on gaming is doing to California politics -- and its urban cities. Don't miss the Barbara Boxer nugget.

Jay Leno race to replace jokes.

Shark Blog fisks the tenured MECHa defenders.

How vicious and dishonest can "mainstream" Lefties be? Well, this ugly:

"Wait a minute. I thought Tom DeLay liked 'hate crimes.'

-- MSNBC sponsored Eric Alterman. Will he be fired for falsely and viciously saying that a Congressional leader likes it when innocent Americans are murdered or beaten? Don't hold your breath. Alterman is immune because he has a halo on as a man of the Left. And of course DeLay is by definition evil -- he's both a Republican and a Christian. What more needs to be said?

John Fund's California Diary -- Fund is doing some of the best analytic reporting on California and the race to replace.

Bustamante's new "big lie" -- from a California Insider report:

Sounding no more informed than a cranky letter writer to the local paper, Bustamante badly mischaracterized the roots of California’s budget crisis, falsely claiming that the electricity purchases the state made on behalf of the utilities in 2001 erased the budget surplus and forced the state to cut vital programs .. [The claim] is completely untrue, and any second-year staffer in the Legislature could tell you so .. The electricity purchases had no effect on the state’s budget situation.

Weintraub is charitable here, characterizing Bustamante as merely ignorant of the budget facts. I doubt it. More likely he is just doing what has become natural for a politician, he's lying to score political points. It's the great lesson Democrats seems to have learned from the Clinton experience over the last 10-12 years -- lying works and is completely legitimate -- it all goes to serve cause of those who are battling the vast right wing conspiracy, i.e. evil. It's the Clintonian ethos -- if the polls show you can't tell the truth, then what you'll have to do is you'll "just have to win" to quote Bill Clinton.

Sometimes it isn't easy believing the truth -- for example, every instinct in your body wants to believe something better of politicians. But in this case, I think we've come to the point where we have to put those idealistic instints aside, and admit that what our head is telling us is the truth.

Sidenote -- I've heard what Bustamante is saying many times, but never from members of the California public. Where I've heard it a dozen times is from East Coast journalists talking out of their *ss on cable television on a subject they seem to know nothing about -- California. Oh, and Paul Krugman was also spouting the same thing yesterday on Tim Russert. Lets see now, is Krugman an 1) economist?; 2) a journalist?; or 3) a Democrat party official. I'm not quite sure.

George Mason economist Tyler Cowan has his own blog. Definitely worth a blogroll. Cowen has been know to confuse the economics of Murray Rothbard for the economics of Friedrich Hayek -- but we'll forgive him for that, and point out that he's one of the more -- how shall we say -- "culturally literate" economists out there (if that isn't some sort of logically impossible statement).

Howard Dean repeats the big lie about the California recall. Everyone -- everyone -- knows that Karl Rove and the Bush Whitehouse were not friendly to the idea of a recall. And neither were the elite of the California Republican party. Dean is just talking out of his ass here. I.e. he's doing what politicians were born to do. He's lying.

This is the best article on MECha that I've seen -- from a former MECha members and organization sympathizer. Of course, there's a dose of anti-Republican & anti-white bogusity here, but it's worth reading if you are at all interested in the MECha blowup.

An open letter to Matt Drudge from Shawn Perine -- Publisher, IronAge.

UPDATE: Robby Robinson has pulled this open letter from the "forum" section of his website.

UPDATE: You can read the letter here, along with a report of the details of the Drudge - Robinson radio interview.

Drudge with breaking Schwarzenegger news. This will be a campaign issue.

Joshua Claybourn has more on Bush. It looks to me like the Republican elite in Washington has jumped the shark.

Has Bush jumped the shark? (via Instapundit)

"You shouldn't be governor unless you can pronounce the name of the state." -- Governor Gray Davis.

Mickey Kaus -- still playing catch up with PrestoPundit .. as is the Chronicle. The big question -- when will Kaus and the Chronicle run with this story? .. lets hope they aren't holding it for last few days before the election. The name in that story continues to be one of the top google searches finding PrestoPundit .. hmmm.

Remembering Upton Sinclair and the race of 1934. Quotable:

[Upton Sinclair] was a classic bohemian, subsisting mostly on brown rice, fruit and celery and so idealistic that journalist H.L. Mencken identified him as believing in more things than any other man alive.

Sounds a bit like Governor Davis, except for the bohemian and idealism parts.

Another reason we don't need Peter Ueberroth.

Google Search: Nativo Lopez, who has advocated seperatism in the past -- was among the honored dignitary Friday at Gray Davis's licences for illegals signing ceremony. California Insider has the latest on Nativo Lopez here.

The Fresno Bee got the Democrat talking points memo -- headlines illegals story "Immigrants can legally drive".

SacBee -- the Fair Political Practices Commission must act now to hault Bustamante's use of illegally obtained campaign funds.

Maria Shriver Schwarzenegger stands by her man. Quotable:

[Arnold is] one of the most gracious, supportive, open-minded men I have ever met .. He has encouraged me at every step of my life. I've known him since I was 21 years old, and I know that I would not be where I am today in my career, as a woman, without his support."

Schwarzenegger says it again -- I made it up. Quotable:

He invented colorful stories, he said, to promote bodybuilding and his movie, "Pumping Iron." "I think that the '70s was a totally different era. ... " he said. "You said outrageous things to make the headlines in the newspapers, to build up the sport. Even in that movie, I said a lot of things that were not true."

Jill Stewart fisks the "big lie" -- the talking points memo which tells Democrats to talk about "immigrants" every time they are asked a question about illegals. Quotable:

in-depth state audit showed only 19% of illegals bother to file taxes, and the best data on illegal immigrants, from the late 1990s National Science Foundation study, shows that each citizen-headed household in California pays out a net extra $1,178 to shore up 3 million mostly low-income illegal immigrants.

It is also worth pointing out that foreign born workers drain $10 billion dollars out of the California economy every year -- sending it back home to Mexico. As an industry, this cash is Mexico's 2nd leading source of income.

And don't miss Stewart on workers comp at the end of the article. This is must read stuff, including this mind-bending fact:

Costco operates in 36 states in the U.S., but 70 percent of its workers compensation costs come from California.

Xlrq is ready to sign the licences for legals only referendum.

Priorities & Frivolities fisks Tim Rutten & the Times on the MECHa blowup.

Ward Connerly on proposition 54.

Bill Bradley's latest on the race to replace. Highlights -- Schwarzenegger leads in most private polls. And Schwarzenegger says he won't attempt to revive proposition 187, as McClintock has said he will do.

Here is the leftist organization that was protesting Schwarzenegger yesterday. The press never gives the leftist backstory on these protest groups.

Schwarzenegger on the licences for illegals bill:

The California Legislature has now voted to give drivers licenses to undocumented immigrants. If Gray Davis signs this bill, I will lead the fight to repeal it as governor. I am an immigrant. I waited for ten years to get my American citizenship. And I know first-hand how immigrants who come to this country and obey the laws have struggled to achieve their dreams. I am pro-immigrant. But we should not invite fraud or undermine law enforcement. The federal government has expressed security concerns over this measure, and in a time of heightened national security, we should not undermine our nation's immigration laws.

Posted by Greg Ransom | Permalink

Here are Schwarzenegger's two new radio spots. One is an endorsement by the Howard Jarvis Assoc. The other spot encourages folks to register for the vote. Interesting.

Schwarzenegger speaks on fixing California's business killing laws before the California Chamber of Commerce, which endorsed Schwarzenegger's run for governor of the state. This is fairly interesting, because it is highly unusual for the Chamber to make an endorsements in gubernatorial elections, the Chamber said it made an exception in this case because the state is so in need of leadership on economic issues.

(Sidenote -- a NY Times article on this event mis-identifies Dana Point as Laguna Beach. Make up your own joke about hapless NY Times stringers & editors here).

Schwarzenegger lays out plans for reform during a Riverside press conference. And here's another article on the event.

Newsmax -- Driver License Bill Opens Door to Voter Fraud and Illegal Gun Sales. Quotable:

Tom McClintock said Thursday Colorado has already passed a law rejecting the validity of California driver's licenses should Gov. Davis sign the bill. He said the law means California licenses could no longer be used for identification or driving in Colorado after the California bill takes effect next year.

"It has loopholes big enough to fly a 747 through .. ". Gray Davis signs state licenses for illegals bill. Here is coverage from the Washington Post; and from the AP; and the SacBee. More at Rough & Tumble, which is all over the recall story like a case of chickenpox.

Debra Saunders wants proof that Schwarzenegger knows what it means to be an adult.

Requiring the DMV to issue a driver's license or ID card merely on the basis of the applicant providing a 'receipt' from the INS that an application or petition for lawful immigration status has been initiated is an invitation for fraud. Moreover, the states of Arizona, Florida, New Mexico, and Texas all require that a social security number be provided to their Department of Motor Vehicles. California should not embrace a weaker standard than those imposed by other southern border states. While I applaud the public safety concerns this bill seeks to address, it ignores the fact that California has made substantial efforts to make the driver's license a more secure form of identification. There is no question that a driver's license is often the key document used to acquire other documentation and to qualify for various services and services.

-- Gray Davis, one year ago, using the veto on a drivers licences for illegals bill with much stonger security checks than this years bill, which the Governor will sign tonight.

Georg Will endorsed "Tom McClintick" on the Sean Hannity show, and attacked Schwarzenegger for his endorsement of George Bush's school choice program. He also ripped Schwarzenegger for some dusty old remarks on cloning from long ago. Cloning -- so that is why Davis and his attack dogs have been going on and on about cloning. It was certainly a big mystery. But it couldn't be more obvious now -- it's more of the "Dick Riordan" strategy -- working to get the Republican vote to split. And George Will was happy to swallow up the bait. Where did Davis and Will get this stuff? Well, it looks like George Will and the governor have been reading Rev. Lou Sheldon's press releases.

Will the LA Democrat-Times publish this?

Bush's new agenda -- "ensuring economic security". The war paradigm takes over domestic thinking once again -- Robert Higgs has written a great history of how all this has happened before in his excellent Crisis and Leviathan: Critical Episodes in the Growth of American Government. The federal government has not seen this sort of domestic growth since the age of Roosevelt. Higgs edits The Independent Review. It's also worth a look.

This is actually no joke. There is not one human check anywhere in the system to stop this from happening. And consider this - there is not a single check in the system to stop this card with this picture on it from having your name name on it. And under the motor voter law, Osama would be handed a voter registration form -- and according to all of the officials in charge interviewed by KFI yesterday, no one would ever check the validity of the application, nor would any person check to validate the citizenship of the applicant. Osama bin Laden could very easily be voting in the 2004 Presidential election, and no one would know it, nor do anything to prevent it from happening. (image via Conservative Crust. Revised at the suggestion of the comments section.)

UPDATE: Schwarzenegger will fight to overturn the law.

Schwarzenegger's strategy.

Schwarzenegger needs to set this straight:

"TW: "Would you ever give up acting if you went into politics?"

AS: I would try to do movies at night and run the state during the day."

The last thing California needs is another Jesse Ventura, who didn't understand that being Governor wasn't just another money making publicity gig.

UPDATE: The quote is from a month or so before Schwarzenegger announced his campaign for governor.

Mickey Kaus catches up with PrestoPundit:

Schwarzenegger's Defense: 'I'm a Huge Liar!' He now says, of his 1977 Oui interview:

"I made statements that were crazy, statements that—a lot of them were not true and just exaggerated situations. ...I knew they would get headlines."

I believe him! The more you think about it, the more Arnold's boasting to Oui smells like pure PR BS-ing. Schwarzenegger, remember, was determined to rid bodybuilding of its homosexual image. So he comes up with a group gangbang incident--not only is he straight, but all the guys in the gym were straight! And the girls giving hummers backstage at the Mr. Olympia contest--that's just too good. Also well-targeted. ('Mom, I want to be a bodybuilder!') ... The "BS" theory doesn't get AS off the hook, but it's revealing in a different way. We know what he's been willing to do to get what he wants. ...His recent accounts of the interview have consistently pointed to the "BS" explanation, and they've been fairly consistent, despite the LAT's straining to find a big contradiction.

Leftist -- and MacArthur "genius" -- Mike Davis on California and the recall. If anyone gets the time to do a proper fisking of this, give me a heads up. I'd like to read it. (via LA Observed)

Here is the Schwarzenegger interview on the John and Ken show.

Fresh Potatoes attends the recall debate. This is by far the best thing I've read on the debate. Very much worth a read.

California Leads U.S. in Foreign Born:

Seven California cities, led by Santa Ana, are among the nation's top 10 ranked by percentage of foreign-born residents, the U.S. Census Bureau reported Wednesday.

Based on a 2002 survey, the bureau estimates that 48% of Santa Ana's population is foreign-born .. Ranking behind Santa Ana were Los Angeles, with 41% of the population foreign-born; Anaheim, 40%, and San Francisco, 37%. Also among the top 10 were San Jose, Long Beach and San Diego.

Peter Ueberroth -- "I agree with Tom."

Democrat George Skelton:

Davis' single biggest blooper, the one that later sustained a recall rally for Republicans? It was his spending $9 million on attack ads in last year's GOP gubernatorial primary to flatten the Republican candidate he feared most, former L.A. Mayor Richard Riordan.

Meddling in the other party's primary so overtly and heavy-handedly was unprecedented in California. But what made this so egregious was not that it was dastardly. It was just dumb.

In effect, Davis chose his own opponent for November — political novice Bill Simon Jr. This grated on Republicans. But worse, voters abhorred their choices.

The voter turnout was a record low, only half those registered. When people who did show up were asked in a Times exit poll why they voted for their candidate, the most frequent response — by 34% of those surveyed — was, "He's the best of a bad lot."

So these days when Davis argues that he won reelection "fair and square" only 10 months ago and therefore it's "unfair" to boot him, many reply: That was not a fair election. Davis rigged it. Our choices were lousy. We demand another election.

David Horowitz, blogger:

At 22 elite schools we found that during a ten year period not a single Republican or conservative had been invited to address the graduating class of any one. At the same time 173 leftists and Democrats were selected to be commencement speakers.

This is truly insidious:

The new [U. of Michigan] process includes a "diversity essay" in which applicants must choose from one of two topics on which to write. In the first topic, the applicant must describe how his or her acceptance into the university would contribute to "an academically superb and widely diverse educational community." If the applicant chooses the second option, he or she must describe a personal experience in which "cultural diversity -- or a lack thereof" changed the applicant's life.

Didn't Orwell describe a process much like this in 1984? The University isn't there to serve you. Instead, you are there to serve it.

What Bustamante's gas regulation proposal would really mean -- the Knowledge Problem.

Virginia Postrel on the race to replace:

The newspaper coverage suggests that the debate was pretty ritualistic and thus a pretty good event to skip. But that doesn't mean Arnold can get away with his current, "Elect me, I'm a movie star businessman and I love California" platform indefinitely. He says he'll be a leader if elected, but he won't be able to lead anything other than calisthenics if he gets elected without telling voters how he'd make policy--and budget--tradeoffs. Eventually he'll have to make someone mad, and it will be easier to get away with that as governor if he can point to something of a mandate.

There's more.

Rev. Pat Robertson endorses Schwarzenegger.

Arnold Schwarzenegger goes to policy school.

Gray Davis ignored warnings that the Workers Comp system was turning into a business killing disaster.

Dianne Feinstein launched a morals attack on Arnold Schwarzenegger tonight on the Chris Mathews show, expressing moral indignation at the possiblity that the sexual lifestyle of the former body builder might have included an episode of "group sex" thirty years ago. A bit surprising coming from the Democrat and former mayor of San Francisco.

Alan Reynolds remembers price controls on gasoline during the 1970s -- and concludes that Cruz Bustamante isn't fit to hold public office.

Pat Buchanan attacks the Schwarzenegger "sellouts" -- according to Buchanan conservative who support Schwarzenegger are the equivalent of prostitutes.

George Will -- expect some really ugly late hits in the race to replace. Quotable:

Ken Khachigian, a veteran Republican strategist, warns that Schwarzenegger should brace himself for what has become the Democrats' trademark tactic. In football it is penalized as a ``late hit,'' but in politics it is often rewarded with success.

George W. Bush received such a hit in the final weekend of the 2000 campaign -- the revelation of his drunk driving arrest 24 years earlier. That probably contributed to an unusual development: Late-deciding voters, who usually break against the incumbent party, broke for Vice President Gore in 2000.

California Republicans have experienced late hits three times in the last 11 years. In 1992, Bruce Herschensohn narrowly lost a Senate race against Barbara Boxer when it was revealed on the Friday before the election that he and his girlfriend and another couple had visited a strip club. In 1994, Michael Huffington narrowly lost a Senate race against Feinstein when, a few days before the election, it was revealed that he had hired an illegal immigrant as a nanny. In 1998, Darrell Issa -- he is now a congressmen; his $1.6 million funding of the recall petition drive produced this recall election -- lost a Senate primary when it was revealed that he had embellished his military record.

A late hit by the Davis campaign against Schwarzenegger cannot come so late that there is no time for another such hit, one against Davis' other problem, Bustamante. This could get even uglier.

Virginia Postrel -- what's wrong with Bustamante.

27% of those living in California were not born in America. Of course, these percentages do not include the American born children of the foreign born. My understanding is that something like 1/2 of all school kids in California are not the children of American born residents. Here is the U.S. Census Bureau press release.

Make no mistake, California is truly ground zero of America's foreign born population explosion -- of all foreign born people living in the U.S., a full 28% live in California.

More census data. 21% of Californians over the age of 24 don't have a high school degree. 41% of Californians speak a language other than English. Remarkably, with so many non-American born residents without an education living in California, only 13% of the population is officially categorized by the government as living in poverty. (And as study after study shows, most of those folks have TVs, VCRs, microwaves, air conditioning, etc. etc. -- luxuries for most of those living in the countries where so many of those in poverty are from).

And this -- 27% of those residing in California speak Spanish in the home.

Finally, one more -- but first consider the fact that the additional income from a working spouse's paycheck is usually just enough to cover the increase in tax on working families which have been imposed since the days of the single earner families of the 1950s. Ok, here's the stat. 57% of children under the age of six in California are parented by parents who both work. And this is below the nation average.

There is not a single Republican on the MIT faculty -- David Horowitz and the Center for the Study of Popular Culture report on our one ideology, our one party colleges and universities.

A bill which will make identity theft as easy as pie will soon be law in California. But that's not all. This bill will also let any -- any -- foreign terrorist get a valid California drivers licence, just as simple as pie. Why is the legislature doing this? It's a play for votes in the narrow interest game of California power politics. And -- that"s right -- you're a racist if you don't t think any of this is a good idea, and you're willing to challenge the elite who dominate the major newspapers and the Democratic party.

Bustamante -- the Democratic party isn't doing enough to chase business out of California.

Jesse Ventura defends his record as governor .. and has some advice for California voters.

Get out there and retaliate against the status quo-loving, power-hungry, pandering career politicians and do it with a vengeance. Tell them you are sick and tired of them spending your money to accomplish nothing and then blaming it on the other party.

... Believe me, Democrats and Republicans will break laws, take campaign contributions from anybody, slander, lie, cheat, conspire in defense of their power. And, more often than not, they will enjoy the compliance of the popular media in their quest to maintain their exclusivity.

Schwarzenegger on the "gangbang" -- I made it up. Quotable:

"I made statements that were crazy, statements that — a lot of them were not true and just exaggerated situations," he told NBC's Channel 4. "I knew they would get headlines. We were promoting bodybuilding, we were promoting [the 1976 documentary] 'Pumping Iron.' "

A long piece on Bustamante and MECHa. (via Instapundit)

Worth quoting:

I think Bustamante's refusal to [follow the campaign financing law] raises important questions about his commitment to the rule of law generally, and whether this would set a precedent for how he would act as governor.

-- Daniel Weintraub

Lefty historian Rick Perlstein on Orange County and the California recall.

The NY Times does a McClintock profile.

Thomas Sowell endorses Schwarzenegger for Governor. Worth quoting:

The big problem is that, even if Arnold Schwarzenegger becomes governor, the state legislature will still be in the hands of liberal-left Democrats, who think that they can impose all sorts of regulations, red tape and ever higher taxes on businesses and productive citizens without worrying about who will leave the state.

What could a Governor Schwarzenegger do about that? He could veto reckless spending bills and -- more important -- use the bully pulpit of his veto messages to educate the public to what is going on and to the fact that there is no free lunch.

Although he would be stuck with filling out the remaining years of Gray Davis' term, he would not be stuck with the current state legislature for all that time, since there will be legislative elections during the governor's term. Educating the voter might affect those elections.

See and listen to Tom McClintock on the cable networks and on talk radio. Why isn't the Schwarzenegger campaign making this stuff available?

A long interview with Tom McClintock. (via Angry Clam)

Schwarzenegger has a new television spot.

California's Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante is now a desperate candidate making audacious claims ... John Fund's California Diary. Quotable:

The parents I spoke with couldn't help but note the irony of Mr. Bustamante going against Hispanic parents who want their children to learn English. A profile in the Orange County Register pointed out that Mr. Bustamante's parents "would not speak Spanish in his household when he was young" so that he could learn English. Mr. Bustamante has accomplished a lot, including becoming the first statewide Latino officeholder in over 100 years. "But since 45% of Latino kids don't graduate from high school, one wonders where he would be today if his father hadn't insisted on an English-only approach," says Ms. Montelongo. "Why is he opposing parents who have their own idea on how best their children can succeed?"

Schwarzenegger for Governor co-chairman Abel Maldonado -- does his support for Schwarzenegger really make him "anti-Latino"? One race organization thinks so.

Priorities & Frivolities investigates a Bustamante appearance at a MECHa sponsored event two years ago. Quotable Bustamante (from the Modesto Bee) in 2001:

In his short 15-minute speech, [Bustamante] told the crowd that people of all races should celebrate Cesar Chavez Day. "It is not just for Latinos, it is for everyone who believes in dignity, justice for workers and humanity," he said. He pointed out that the new census results show that non-Hispanic whites no longer are a majority in California. "It is maybe a time in California when we should call each other Californians without other labels," he said.

Schwarzenegger will be on the Michael Medved Show at noon today. Listen to it here.

And the Main Event. Schwarzenegger will be on the John and Ken Show at 5 pm today on KFI 640 Los Angeles. Heads up to East Coasties. This broadcast is a don't miss event. Millions of drive time voters have learned the ins and outs of the Davis - California train-wreck on this show. If Schwarzenegger can play this room, he'll be the next governor of California. Listen to it live and commercial free here.

Why is Schwarzenegger going with the Sept. 17 debate, and not tomorrow's Walnut Creek debate? Three reasons. First. The Sept. 17 debate will be statewide and an all-media event, while the Walnut Creek event won't be. Reason number two. The first half of the Walnut Creek "debate" is a retain Gray Davis media event. And the third reason? Arnold doesn't want Arianna Huffington knocking over his microphone again.

Go Left young man -- and win yourself a "get out of jail free" card for any racist stain on your record. Shelby Steele can explain what this is all about.

Mickey Kaus -- Bustamante has yet to come clean. Why won't he denounce and renounce MECHa's racist propoganda -- and his participation in that organization? Is it simply a lack of guts?

California's corrupt union-government theft machine -- blame Jerry Brown.

Don't miss Hugh Hewitt on lefty hack Patt Morrison and Los Angeles's official Democrat Party newspaper.

Separated at birth?

UPDATE: Was it triplets? Don't miss the link in the comments section.

Bruce Bartlett on Cruz Bustamante and price controls. Quotable:

If Mr. Bustamante is really concerned about gasoline prices, he should look at California’s 50.8-cent per gallon gasoline tax—4th highest in the U.S.

See also the Mercury News "Bustamante needs Econ 101" and the SacBee "Bustamante's Folly".

Whalen on Bustamante -- the Peter Principle in action, or mediocrity-on-the-march.

Schwarzenegger goes with Kaus's tall tales defense. Quotable Arnold:

"This was the time when we were promoting body building and pumping iron and the more outrageous we were, the more we made the headlines that promoted the sport."

Worth quoting -- California Insider :

I don’t know of anyone who seriously believes that Bustamante supports, or ever supported, the creation of a separate Chicano nation on land to be taken back from the United States. But he does support ethnic-identity politics in the here and now, in a way that is insidious, in a fashion that works its way into everything he stands for and represents as a politician.

The whole thing is worth a read.

California Insider writes:

I still think he has created an unnecessary buzz around the campaign, a message that is repeated so often and so widely that it must be reaching the electorate: he is unwilling or unable to answer tough questions. By extension, the message is that he is unprepared to govern.

I can confirm that average folks in the general public have gotten the message that Schwarzenegger is short on specifics or plans -- and that this perception is shaping their views of the candidate. But those I've talked to seem to think that Schwarzenegger is doing this intentionally. It will be interesting to see how this develops. Schwarzenegger may be setting people up with low expectations for his make or break debate Sept. 17.

Mickey Kaus has interviewed Joe Gold, who says women in the early 1970's weren't even allowed in his gym. Kaus raises the very likely possibility that Schwarzenegger was simply telling sex tales for the benefit of the heavy breathing audience of a dirty magazine.

John & Ken & Arnold live and commercial free on KFI Los Angeles -- tomorrow.

Bustamante plays the race card.

Shark Blog google checks MECHa and compares the national socialism of the Germans with the national socialism of the MEChas.

Mickey Kaus:

The new Peter King "On the Recall" column is up! Value added: zero! ... My favorite piercing insight:

"Finally, there is the Arnold factor. The sense is that a lot of Californians don't yet know quite what to make of Schwarzenegger, the self-proclaimed populist with a personal fortune worth some $200 million."

How pathetic is it that the best thing LAT editor John Carroll could think of doing during the recall was to find a guy who had nothing to say and give him a twice a week column!

Rep. Ray Haynes and other California Republicans make the choice between McClintock and Schwarzenegger. Quotable Haynes:

"I'm at the point," he said, "of saying to McClintock, 'Show you can bring the resources to the table to win, or get out of the way.' "

Fed generated inflation erodes wages -- and heavy-handed Keynesian policies give us the worst recovery record since the failed recovery policies of Hoover - Roosevelt.