This special election is extremely important. The reforms being pushed by Governor Schwarzenegger are critical — whether reforming teacher tenure, restructuring our state finance and budget process, giving public employee union members say over how their dollars are spent, or ensuring that we have fair legislative districts in the state. The Schwarzenegger Team is to be commended for bringing this debate to the voters and running a strong closing effort as we approach election day.
That said, I am afraid to say that at this point, we are going to have to say that the special interests who have a grip on the heart of California, and are squeezing it dead, they have won at least one minor skermish – the cartoon battle.
A few weeks ago, the Join Arnold team put out a short animated movie – it is a spoof on the union bosses
literally shaking down a teacher to line their political coffers. You can see the animination here.
Shortly after this, the Angelides for Governor campaign unveiled their own animated cartoon — which paints our Governor as a pawn of the President, his people, and of Fox News. While the notion is laughable (Schwarzenneger is hardly a right-winger…then again, neither is the President) – the animinated feature is funny, and clearly more funny than the Team Arnold job. You can see the Angelides animated feature, Arnold’s Neighborhood, right here.
Those of us who enjoy these political cartoons hope that Team Arnold will respond with an even better, longer and funnier piece!
Jon
P.S. Of course, everyone is trying to beat the masters of this sort of humorous animated punditry, the folks over at JIBJAB – their two shorts spoofing Bush, "This land is my land" and "Second Term" are priceless – see those and more here. Hold your nose, though, as these JibJab folks are no Bush lovers!