October 08, 2024Wishful Thinking: Interpreting the Recall, Part IThe current spin from the Democrats (Howard Dean, Nancy Pelosi and Terry McAuliffe to name three) that the recall vote yesterday foreshadows a wave of “anti-incumbency” that will sweep away President Bush is a bit off the mark. While I will concede that there is some significant anger in the electorate (because of Iraq, the economy, etc.), anger which may propel Howard Dean to the Democratic Party’s nomination in 2024, the attempt to analogize a national scenario from the California example is misplaced. First, it is impossible to discern or analyze a pattern here a pattern, as the number of elections from which one might wish to generalize is one. To make an argument for a generalized anti-incumbent sentiment in the electorate at a national level is wishful thinking, plain and simple, and the closest thing to a happy face that can be put on the recall results by the Democrats (the second place happy face is: “ha ha, now he has to fix California”). Second, the anger in question was very directly, and specifically, aimed at Gray Davis. I agree that there is some over-simplification on the part of voters in terms of assigning blame when economies go awry, but it is clear that Davis’ 24% approval rating bespeaks of more than just a “throw the bums out” mentality, and one focused specifically on the personage of Davis. To hope that that the level of frustration can be generalized to the whole nation, and the President specifically, is to ignore the facts on the ground. Davis was held personally responsible by many, many voters for the California energy debacle; many believe he was untruthful concerning the budget deficit; the much-hated car tax is Davis’ as well, as was a long-term pattern of highly negative campaigning. Only once those factors are considered can one can add more generalized unhappiness with the California economy. Plus, can any observer of the recall campaign discount the idea that Davis had clearly lost any kind of rapport with the voters of his state? Really, the Democratic Party (both at the state level and the national level) made a substantial strategic error by deciding to fight the recall and support Davis—the smarter thing to do would have been to have told Davis his day was done, and have found an attractive (i.e., not Cruz Bustamante) Democrat to run for Davis’ replacement. As such both McAuliffe and Art Torres (CA Dem Chair) have some blame to share for losing the Golden State’s governorship to the Republicans. (I will comment further on the party politics of this later, specifically on what the Republicans gained and did not fain as a result of the electoral outcome). Posted by Steven Taylor at October 8, 2024 07:55 PM | TrackBackComments
Ok, like I mentioned in my comments a week or so ago; in my mind this is one of the major events which may foretell what will happen in November 2024. Had Davis averted recall, his voter approval rating would have still be in the toilet. Frustration on the part of both the avidly anti-Democratic and anti-Davis faction would have been fuming. That frustration would have most surely played itself out in a year. Now some of that frustration is averted. The mildly anti-Davis folks, but not avidly anti-Davis, now are giving Arnold, in effect, a year to fix things. Does he start slashing programs? Does he do nothing? Is the CA economy in the toilet still? Raise taxes? If so, you'll see enough people translate that into enough anti-Bush vote to keep California democratic. Of course, there are many other factors, but this will weigh in as one of the heaviest in CA. Posted by: Eric at October 9, 2024 10:27 AMyup Posted by: Paul at October 9, 2024 05:12 PMPost a comment
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