I’ll take stopping folks from buying elections with their ill gotten corporate gains however it can be done.

Nice.

I’m kinda worried about Meg Whitman actually gaining some traction in this race, so it’s good to see someone striking back. The woman has spent insane amounts of her own personal money on her campaign (yet another reason for campaign finance reform) and her small personal fortune is nowhere near tapped. For those that don’t live here in California, she’s peppered the airwaves for about 4 months now with nonstop advertising.

All of her ads have been fairly centrist and moderate, aimed toward rebuilding California and stabilizing the economy. They make her seem so … I dunno … sane. It’s scary.

So again, it’s great to see someone actually calling her record into question at the public level. Hopefully people pay attention to who Meg really is, not who she plays on TV.

Ms. Whitman as governor would make Ahnuld seem like a successful breath of fresh air. Californians deserve better in a public servant; I hope they know that and vote accordingly.

It is a sign of just how incredibly unpopular Wall Street is around the country that being connected to a big Wall Street firm is viewed as a huge liability in a Republican primary.

The Corporate Wing of the GOP does not want Corporations to be the enemy this election. Banks and now big oil are lightening rods in the GOP.
If the Tea Baggers start to pick up this train of thought then the Corporate GOP should stop their funding.
Win/Win for us.

The scary thing here is she has a really legitimate shot at winning this election. I’m beginning to think she may actually win. And it’s because of all the money she’s been able to throw at advertising. I haven’t seen a single ad from another candidate. Not one. And I watch a lot of TV.

Isn’t she walking a tight rope though since I know a lot of folks do get turned off when a candidate inundates the airwaves with so many ads. It reaches a point where folks will vote for ANYONE other than the person running all the ads.

Ms. Whitman’s ads also poke fun at state hiring – in the midst of a massive depression – and the number of lawyers the state employs. She claims the state employs more lawyers than the biggest law firm. It should. It is home to the world’s eighth biggest economy, some of the world’s top global firms, from big Ag to high-tech, some of the world’s prettiest and most deadly cities, environments and natural wonders. It is home to top universities and the wealthiest and poorest and most unemployed citizens in America.

I can’t imagine how a single legal issue could crop up in that mix that might require the state of California to represent its people in court or via its regulatory powers. But I can pull one from today’s headlines. The bumble bee death rate remains high (up to a third of bees did not survive the winter), which threatens one of the state’s and the world’s biggest food producers. Post-mortems on bees and hives have shown residue from as many as 121 different pesticides in some of them. While the causes of CCD remain unknown, responses to it are likely to require coordinating policies from many agencies, are likely to affect state revenues and expenses, and are likely to affect the state’s biggest players.

Ms. Whitman made a billion and now wants to make sure her state won’t tax any of it. She wants to go to DC next, to make the country safe for other billionaires and a few millionaires who want to follow in her footsteps. Good for her. That’s not a reason to give her your vote.

Book Salon up at the Mothership with Susan Kushner Resnick’s Goodbye Wifes and Daughters hosted by Michael Whitney

Poizner is a piece of shit, not that Megan is any good! She is just a shill for Wall Street. Our state would go bankrupt under further republican governorships… We just afford to do things the way they have been done. Our history that state does much financially under Democrats than Republicans… The Dems created a first class school system through college. And what did later republicans do??? Consistently under fund and cut those very school systems and threw out hundreds of thousands of mentally challenged citizens out of hospitals and on to the street where many remain now…
Megan and the Republicans can go kiss Arnold s ass and don’t bother me with your fucked up brand of thinking!

O/T but maybe not Mike Malloy—

CCD. One suspected cause is the anti-pest genes in the GMO crops. The pollen may be toxic to bees.

The bumble bee death rate remains high (up to a third of bees did not survive the winter), which threatens one of the state’s and the world’s biggest food producers.

Honeybees, not bumblebees.

Ira Glass did a good review of Steve Poisner that I heard last Sunday on NPR (True Urban Legends, 4/23/10: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/2010). He is not to be trusted. Only a little “poorer” than Whitman, he’s just as disingenous and out to buy himself public offices now that he made is killing in silicon valley.

Whitman is only and solely about protecting herself and her crony oligarchs from the scourge of taxes of any kind. Let them eat cake is her unsaid mantra. She hates, destests, loathes and despises all of us “little people,” who exist solely to only enrich Whitman, but like all good children should never be seen or heard. Poisner’s only marginally better and is basically a rich entitled white man shaking in his scared little shoe-sies about da dirty messicans comin’ ta git YA!! eeek ack.

Either would definitely make Ahnold look good; Ahnold is mostly socially liberal, even though he sold out the state totally to Enron and Bush, which contributed a lot to our current economic woes. Yet any crony Republic enriching the other one percenters off the backs of teh dreaded “little people” who should never ever get anything back for the tax dollahs they pay.

Jerry Brown – meh. He’s mostly a good man, but I have some issues with him. He did finally stand up and ask to have a three way debate with Poisner and Meg, but they refused to do it (probably a-skeered). But Brown’s done eff all in terms of campaigning.

It’s not at all unlikely that Meg will win (horrid as it would be). The State’s been wrung about as dry as it can get in terms of laying off zillions of workers, cutting even more funding to education, cutting all sorts of funding to the elderly and disabled (get off yer lazy butts and get a job, ya slackerz!!) and so on. But I have Republic friends champing at the bit to vote for Meg, bc of course! they think that they are having to pay far too many taxes and it’s so unfair. Of course, any tax cuts that Meg puts into effect will not decrease my friends’ taxes bc they simply don’t make enough to make the cut. Stupid is as stupid does.

And so on. Many people are suffering from Meg-fatigue. It might work against her; unsure. I have seen numerous ads for Poisner on tv and heard some on the radio. And I listen and watch both infrequently. Posiner is definitely pumping up the volume, but I doubt he’ll make the grade.

We Californians have no choice but to pick the best of the regrettable options set before us. That ain’t Meg. Fortunately G-S and BP (and by extension Chevron etc.) have made BigBiz a poisonous brand, at least for a while, and that’s a useful tool for us in this election year.

Remember, nobody actually likes Meg either.

“It’s not at all unlikely that Meg will win ”

Ack! In Poizner Flips Meg the Bird we read a reaction from the EMeg camp: “This type of pathetic distortion is exactly what Republicans expect from Team Brown and it’s convincing evidence that Steve Poizner has joined it,” replied Whitman spokesvolcano Sarah Pompei. “The truth is that Jerry Brown’s union allies and Steve Poizner will say and do anything to try and defeat Meg Whitman who is the only fiscal conservative running for Governor.”

Pathetic is right…Californians are pathetic to even consider buying this schlock.

Also, this:

“Both Sides Now: Great catch by our friend Anthony York of Capitol Weekly and the LA Times Blog who noticed that Goldman Sachs has hired Mark Fabiani to defend the investment bank’s reputation while his partner, Chris Lehane, is a principal in the anti-Whitman group Level the Playing Field which has attacked eMeg viciously for her ties to . . . Goldman Sachs.”

That ad — pitch-perfect.

One could substitute Barack Obama’s name in this anti-Whitman ad and it would still be accurate. They own Obama. They were his biggest contributor as a Senator and 2nd biggest in the presidential election in 2008 (almost $1 million; an investment in him repaid many times).

Obama spoke at the Goldman-Robert Rubin funded Hamilton Project in April, 2006, and commended “my friend Bob [former head of Goldman Sachs]” and spoke Goldman’s line about the need for cutting entitlements (social security) and more NAFTA-type agreements. That’s also the agenda of his bipartisan “deficit reduction” commission, by the way.

Obama’s administration is riddled with Goldies including the entire top brass of his economic team (Larry Summer, Geithner, Patterson).

Goldman owns Obama too, not just Whitman.

There’s one axiom that seems to be true in election after election

Never, ever, underestimate the ability of Californians to vote against their own interests

You got me there.

Mercy buckets, in my fractured French. Here is the article I recalled reading, but failed to remember the “honey” part.

Why are so many people on the Left down on Jerry Brown?

What are you expecting, super progressive people? I said before and keep saying it, its not like you don’t have any choice, you do.

Pete Shurman and Laura Wells, but NOOOOOO they are long shots in a field loaded with 7 digit campaigns.

So what bothers you the most about Brown? Prop 13? He didn’t do it alone and he’s not a accountant or tax expert, so if Howard Jarvis is in your ear and there’s a movement for a tax revolt, what are you suppose to do?

Of course he could have stood his ground if he believed it was a bad idea and some 30 years later its been proven to be more bad than good, but try tell that to many home owners in California including my mother, its a 3rd Rail in California and you know it.

What else has he done to make some so anti-Brown? Hey with the 2/3rds needs for any budget related law many folks believe your dammed if you and dammed if you don’t in California politics. That’s why there’s nobody standing in line to be Governor. Add to the fact that our schools have fallen behind, many companies have left leaving much of the State near double digit unemployment throughout most of the last 20 years.

Do you want three political novices at the head of the table? (Whitman, Wells, Shurmann) or a wanna-be “Tea Bagger”?

Low turn out = Whitman

Is this what you want?

Why should I even care? Besides my parents there is nothing keeping me here and I’m almost at the point where I would give up the excellent weather here to go someplace where the playing field is level and my taxes go to social needs not rich people’s pockets or military adventures where for sure the next war will be over either Oil again or for Water.

Less likely here than in other parts of the country.

Despite all the heavy spending by eMeg, she’s still trails and never has led; Even if its within the margin of error.

All of the negatives about her have yet to be exposed, which I believe once a clear winner is declared, Brown will bring out the heavy artillery, there’s plenty of “dirt” on eMeg that many of us know but the general public does not.

While I would love to see a 3rd party candidate have a real impact, the reality is, America has not hit rock bottom. California has not hit rock bottom. Only when its TOO late will Americans finally have the guts to risk putting their trust in somebody outside the political mainstream.

I.e., she will win. Californians have not changed, history repeated itself as farce, and will next repeat itself as tragedy.