Now voters have only themselves to blame -- Pittsburgh Post Gazette

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

[]

[]


Now voters have only themselves to blame

Sunday, October 12, 2003

Crotchety Californians, after months of virtually thought-free 
deliberation, have decided there is nothing wrong with their state that a 
homicidal futuristic cyborg with a Teutonic accent can't fix.

As for the rest of us, it's time to first consider the possible 
ramifications of The Governator.

Arnold Schwarzenegger became governor of America's largest state this week, 
lifting a groping paw to the controls of what some define as the fifth 
largest economy in the world. Two-thirds of the people who voted for him 
believe he will not have to raise taxes to rectify a $10 billion budget 
deficit. They are psychotic. One academic has called it "a rescue fantasy."

This is what happens when you get out the vote.

Coupla years ago in Minnesota, they got out the vote big time. Millions of 
veteran nonvoters flocked to the polls in the goobernatorial race. They 
elected a pro wrestler. Tuesday in California, they got out the vote. 
Millions who rarely, if ever, vote, by a 64-36 percent margin preferred 
Kindergarten Cop to Cruz Bustamante. Bustamante had labored under the 
ridiculous notion that as lieutenant governor, he was somehow more 
qualified than Arnold.

Forty-four percent of those exit-polled said they'd made up their minds 
more than a month ago. In other words, when actual issues were put on the 
table in the past few weeks, they'd already tuned out. This is what passes 
for citizenship in the 21st century.

The best case scenario for the Schwarzenegger administration is for Arnold 
to go down in history as the most important (if nowhere near the most 
competent) governor in history, important because Arnold was somehow the 
one pretend politician, in our hour of darkest ignorance, who awakened 
Americans to what's become of our civic life, our public discourse, and to 
where our sprawling national apathy has led us.

Perhaps some 25th-century history book (if they still have books) will have 
a chapter titled "The Schwarzenegger Phenomenon: America ends its long 
dazed journey into cluelessness." Yes, and perhaps a weasel will win the 
Nobel Prize for physics.

The worst case scenario, and a scenario eminently more plausible, is that 
elected officials nationwide will become substantially more skittish about 
making difficult policy decisions for fear of triggering a recall, that 
they will never really be able to stop campaigning and that the bitter 
political partisanship that exploded and ruptured the legislative process 
during the Clinton-Lewinsky affair will continue to steamroll any attempt 
at reasonable negotiation on and careful resolution of public issues.

The recall election that brought down Gov. Gray Davis and inserted Arnold 
was a small-time Republican fantasy until millionaire San Diego legislator 
Darrell Issa threw a few million dollars at it. Some 48 hours before polls 
even opened, California Democrat Zoe Lofgren warned of an instant 
retaliation recall. And, Lofgren told The New York Times, "I don't think 
there is any way to stop it."

Democrats may have no choice. Republicans have gotten so adept at 
challenging elections, it's hard to imagine that a close presidential 
election next November that doesn't go Bush's way won't be thrown into the 
courts again.

This is tragic, but while the politicians engage in the most divisive 
public rhetoric, the public and the media have no moral base for objection 
because they are both immensely culpable in the enabling climate. In 
America today, most serious public issues are debated by parties on the 
extreme opposite edges of those issues. The moderate and often perfectly 
sensible people in the middle, the vast majority that could enact viable 
compromise, are instead watching "Everybody Loves Raymond."

In California, in Pennsylvania, in Washington, D.C., and in so many other 
places, there simply is no centrist constituency.

To quote the great social observer and comic George Carlin, "You know the 
one group I never criticize? Politicians. Politicians are put there by the 
public. Garbage in, garbage out. You get the leadership you deserve."

The media are equally bad. The thunder you hear in the distance is from 
hordes of short-attention-span editors and producers and reporters and 
columnists fleeing California, lest they be required to illuminate the 
complex economic issues that brought the Schwarzenegger Phenomenon to the 
table in the first place, rather than just provide a shameless conduit for 
celebrity culture.

Arnold Schwarzenegger cannot become president but only because he wasn't 
born in the United States. If he could run, he could win, even if he knows 
nothin' about nothin'. We've already proven that.


----------
Gene Collier can be reached at 
<mailto:gcollier () post-gazette com>gcollier () post-gazette com or 412-263-1283.


-------------------------------------
You are subscribed as interesting-people () lists elistx com
To manage your subscription, go to
 http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip

Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/