Yesterday, in response to a post of mine in which our friend Dafydd ab Hugh laid out an optimistic election scenario for California, Ed Anderson — a law school classmate who has lived in California all of his life — wrote to tell me why he thinks California is basically a lost cause. Here is his take:
I expect both Brown and Boxer to win [handily]. This is based on my experience of living here all my life. The population is radically different from what it was in the 1970s. The public employee unions are ultra-powerful, the blacks are solidly Democratic, and the millions of Hispanics are led by leftists, even though the average folks are more moderate. Then you have the Silicon Valley elitists, the Hollywood crowd, and, finally, the gays, many of whom are one-issue voters and rabid liberals. As an aside, when I dropped off my absentee ballot this morning, I realized that, judging from the appearance of the some of the people in line, the heavy turnout in my precinct was likely prompted by Proposition 19, marijuana legalization.
I will be happy to be proved wrong, but I believe that if our country is going to be saved, it will have to be done so by the people in the heartland.
Bruce Kesler reached the same conclusion as Ed based on different reasoning:
After watching (too much) TV, and the overwhelming number of Boxer and Brown ads, [my non-political wife] is convinced that Fiorina and Whitman have just spouted cliches without substance and that they are exploiters of the working class. Fiorina and Whitman have allowed the ads to define them negatively, the Brown ads (painting himself as a born-again Tea Partier) and Boxer ads (painting Fiorina as a ruthless, self-serving protiteer). Neither Whitman nor Fiorina have connected emotionally with the open minded voters.
It may be a toss-up but the safe money in CA is for more of the same that has tarnished the former Golden state.
You can find Bruce’s analysis of the California results here.
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