By Scott Steward
The California recall comes at a difficult time, although it’s hard to imagine how a worse time could emerge. The pro-recall movement consists of a lot of people with a lot of painful experiences. People from all walks of life needing to express their pain. Gavin Newsom is not a symbol of someone who has experienced much pain, so tossing him out of office seems only fair.
It’s scary how much sense that seems to make, except recalling Gavin Newsom would only make things worse. This will be a close election and Californians are going to need to keep their cool and not destroy a basically good governmental agenda out of anger or rage.
Officials are coming out of the woodwork to leverage favors from the governor. Law enforcement, like Los Angeles Sheriff Alex Villanueva, are looking at the recall as a chance to get their way when it comes to dealing with petty crime, violent crime, and the deepening homelessness crisis — their way — with force and incarceration. Law wants more law.
Construction wants more construction; developers want more development. Each union and special interest is in this recall for something. Newsom is providing some of those groups with state dollars.
What is principle and what is political payola? We are not as sure because of the recall. What we do know is that the people who brought us this recall headache have jeopardized California’s social justice and climate action leadership.
What Gavin Newsom needs are lots of endorsements from working people, local leaders, business leaders, and union organizers who have benefited from the many good policies that are California’s big advantage.
It’s not a secret. California likes to have a safety net and improve the lives of all its citizens. The country is in a world of hurt, and California is receiving a large share of climate/economy refugees, on our streets and in our neighborhoods.
This is no time to put pain upon pain, as it could be so much worse. California is influencing national policy to take care of each other and help our law enforcement deal humanly and permanently with the homeless.
We got in this mess because of sweep-it-under-the-rug policies. These are the put-people-last policies of most of the candidates who want to replace Gavin Newsom.
The anti-California crowd could not make their arguments stand up in a regular election. Now these national bad actors have seen an opportunity to upset the California apple cart.
We who want California to be successful do not have the wind at our backs in the recall election. If this recall is successful, if too few voters turn out because they just want to not care about something (and I can relate), we are all screwed.
We are better than that. Let’s get through this. Vote and vote “NO” on the 1st question “should Gavin Newsom be recalled.” The second question, who to vote for, is not as important, as long as you vote and vote no on the first question. Your ballot counts if you only answer question 1.
You can’t write in Gavin Newsom for the second question. There are plenty of people voting NO on the first question and picking a “just in case” candidate for the second. A lot of those who are picking a just-in-case candidate are choosing Kevin Paffrath.
Personally, I’m not keen on voting for any of the candidates. Paffrath, who is better than most of the 45 other bad choices, is certain he can cure all that ails us in one year. Better listen to his YouTube to get an idea. It is BS, but at least he is not going to burn down the capital building.
Better to vote and vote “No” on question 1 and be done with it. We might need a better governor, but we don’t need a worse one.
