The longtime strategist for Gray Davis is advising Newsom to set up a “war council” to “scope out every person who’s identified with the recall” and “opposition research them.” The reporter translated what he meant: “Dig up dirt that can be smeared all over the enemy.”
Since I’ve written a book titled Recall Newsom: The Case Against America’s Most Corrupt Governor, presumably this means me. Newsom has been attacking me with artless demagoguery all year. He’s claimed that by fighting his dictatorial rule I’m attempting “to prematurely declare an end to this ongoing crisis” or “throwing into chaos efforts to combat wildfires.”
But really, it’s all of us Newsom plans to smear. He’s repeatedly tried to blame the people of California for his own worst-in-the-nation COVID performance, saying things like “don’t be selfish” and “not everyone is practicing common sense.”
Incredibly, Newsom’s spokesman is now lashing out at the Recall as a misuse of time that could be spent “reopening schools and businesses.” The quickest way to reopen schools and businesses, of course, is to remove the Governor who’s arbitrarily closing them.
Newsom’s desperation has good cause. With two and half months to go, the Recall has already gathered more signatures than it took to qualify the Gray Davis Recall. Even the Davis strategist says there’s a 50/50 chance it will make the ballot. Newsom’s mentor, Willie Brown, writes that “Newsom is in trouble” and “will be in a fight for his political life.”
Meanwhile, it appears we’ll have to wait until 2021 for a decision in our case. The Los Angeles Daily News just published an Editorial titled, “A Needed Challenge to Newsom’s One-Man Rule,” noting that “the limits of a governor’s powers during an emergency, if there are any limits, are the subject of a high-stakes legal battle now pending before the Third District Court of Appeals.”
Newsom “has made statements that indicate his willingness to use the emergency to make permanent changes in California,” the Editorial observes. It concludes: “That suggests that the concentration of unlimited power in the hands of one individual is an emergency in itself.”
Happy New Year. Let’s make 2021 the year we change California.
Help show the strength of our movement for the end-of-year FPPC deadline