California Love

California Love

Do you have any interest in politics? Could you lay your hands on $3,500? Would you be able to attain 65 signatures from registered voters? If you answered yes to these three questions, then congratulations, you are qualified to enter the race to run the fifth largest economic empire in the world. All the more power to you my friend.

If you are not already aware, my home state of California is undergoing civic pandemonium disguised in political rhetoric as a “recall.” We are witnessing one of the biggest travesties in the modern era and poor Gray Davis is clearly the victim. Given the circumstances when he took office, Davis has done a pretty damn good job with the mess he inherited from former Governor Pete Wilson. Davis is surrounded by malevolent bureaucrats on a day-to-day basis, as is true for most politicians, and when one has to work with these bad guys, bad things tend to happen. Why is this? California is dealing with the fallout from an inefficient federal government that left its western daughter to flounder in the wake of a crisis the feds very likely created. When Wilson pushed for de-regulation of energy distribution (electricity/gas), outside suppliers, primarily Texas ringleaders like Enron, were allowed to run wholesale pricing up unchecked. Pacific Gas and Electric then filed for bankruptcy, Southern California Edison was similarly affected. Now layer on surplus spending from dot.com tax coffers and the inability of legislators to rein in spending after the collapse of the dot.com industries due to their greed or bury-the-head-in-the-sand mentality. Now you have a reversal of a record surplus to a record deficit of some 35+ billion dollars. Prime fodder for the Republicans.

Whenever there is a great deal of power, you will find a great deal of attention, greed and controversy. In the political arena, parties will strive for stability and control to maintain their power. So, is this recall really a street-smart reaction by Republicans, or is there a connection between California's recent foibles and a Republican conspiracy to regain stability and control? My congratulations go out to Mr. Bush for once. Perhaps he actually does know what he's doing. Perhaps he can push his personal agenda and look totally innocent. Knowing how much California would suffer financially, he couldn't have had any connection to the demise of Enron and WorldCom, could he? No ... certainly he didn't plan this crisis to rid California of its apparent cause, Gray Davis, did he?