e-Claire

Occurrence at Walnut Creek

I had several responses to the debates last eve and it's just your luck that I am about to share them with you. I was struck by the lack of "star quality" possessed by Mr Ueberroth. Yet he seems the most focused of the candidates -- and the least political. I believe him when he says that this is a three year commitment on his part and that he has a damn good fix on what the problem is, and possesses the background understanding, the demonstrated leadership skills and the experience to begin the correction process. I particularly liked that he looked the poet and teacher directly in the eye while delivering the bad news that she cannot have her art funding until the state has a balanced budget. That demonstrated guts and a clear take on reality. Mr McClintok demonstrated a similar clarity of vision, commitment and much more "star quality." [aka "presence"] But he went completely sideways when asked if he would have signed a particular bill protecting the privacy of a woman's relationship with her doctor, and began an inappropriately graphic, frothing rant about partial birth abortions. Completely off-topic and striking in the way it stood out from the rational tone of the rest of his statements. He came across like a lifetime politician with partial sense. Mr Bustamante's moment came during his description of his youth as a child of immigrant [illegal?] parents working in the fields of agriculture. His words said, "I have picked cotton." Yet his expression and voice said, "and I'm still pissed about it. Really pissed." Ms Huffington became, well, quite huffy with him about his acceptance of Indian Gaming money [$2 mil] which he parried with an attempt at humor. Yet, as he related his history with that community, "I was with them when they had nothing. Nothing!" he became defensive in a way which seemed strangely out of proportion to Miss Huffy's accusations. McClintok also spoke directly to this campaign donation, calling it "barely legal" and outside the spirit of campaign contribution reform laws. Personally, taken in light of his continued support of MEChA, I began to wonder if his support of "The Tribes" is because they are also a "bronze people." If I were to say that "Miss" Huffington, as she seems to prefer to be called, is as unaware when spewing bullshit as she is when marrying a gay man, I would be approximating the level of go-for-the-nuts maliciousness she displayed toward Bustamante, [and only Bustamante Is there a history there?] The rest of her opinions seemed to be recycled socialism with some commie overtones. She even spoke of a "revolution, like the one against England that began in the East" beginning here and now in the West. [besides -- who could stand to listen to Eva Gabor for three years?!? Kee-ripes! get a voice coach -- you're ...er, rich enough to afford one.] Likewise, Mr Camejo's rants were class-ist in the extreme. Both he and Missy Huffington are determined to go after "the rich" to fix the budget deficit. They seem to be unfamiliar with the fact that upper income bracket taxpayers currently pay a larger percentage of the whole tax bill than the middle and lower income taxpayers. Miss Huffington, in particular, wishes to go after long-time residents who are "rich" and take away their Prop. 13 property tax status. Her idea is to tie the property tax to the income level of the individual and take accordingly. [shades of "from each according to his ability to each according to his need," eh?] Neither mentioned a flat tax. Both Camejo and Huffington were extremely class-ist in their approach. Mr Camejo's take on American history is "200 years of being governed by money," or some such crap. [what a commie maroon!] One of the most striking failures of comprehension was the repeated suggestion that "corporations should be taxed instead of the people©. Even after Mr Ueberroth explained fairly clearly that corporate taxes aren't paid by some mythical entity, some "other," but by the customers of that corporation as a part of the purchase price, the idea was suggested at least 4 or 5 more times. It's like the small child's fantasy of parental omnipotence. The two candidates seated in the middle have no concept of basic economics and are reacting on a purely emotional basis to their own fantasy of the all-powerful, "big, bad corporations" which are "secretly running the show." Yes, Virginia, there are people in corporations who steal, cheat and lie -- just like there are in government. Again, they are people, flesh and blood mortals just like the rest of us. The point is that individuals who break the law must be dealt with via the law, and corporations are only entities in the legal sense. In reality corporations are simply groups of individual people. They have no secret pockets for hiding wealth nor any magic powers out of which to create wealth without benefit of workers or products/services produced. Magical thinking gets us nowhere. One point that all candidates present failed utterly to address is the issue of drivers licenses for illegal aliens. There are two issues to this question: 1) will getting licensed make illegal aliens better, safer drivers? and 2) will giving drivers licenses, which also function as state and federal ID, to illegal aliens have an adverse effect on a) the legal immigration process and b) the current Homeland Security, terrorists-sneaking-in-over-the-Mexican-border problems? IMHO: 1) [hahahah] No. and, 2) Yes. [duh!] Davis' performance was marked by two moments, for me. His sarcasm-inspiring attempt to garner sympathy [!?!] for his current plight of "turning on the news and hearing everyone saying bad things about me." ["oh poor me" is actually the last resort of scoundrels.] The second little Davis gem is his persistence in citing the tired old, disproved meme about the Republicans depriving the people of Florida of their right to vote during the Bush/Gore election thereby "stealing" that election. When added to his allegation that the impeachment of Clinton was a ruse by Republicans to "do-over" that election instead a response to the illegal act of lying to Congress, and the idea that his own recall is due to Republicans' attempt to "have do-overs on" the last election instead of a response by California voters to his incompetence and the repugnance of Bill Simons , he looked like a fool. [He actually said "do-overs" and made a football analogy.] All in all; I think Ueberroth made the best showing despite his lack of "star quality." He was clear, focused, informed, and has a plan. For today, he is my pick. McClintok would not make me move to Washington, either. Missy Huffington would make me move to Nova Scotia.

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