The "No on 93" folks* put this out, which is worth sharing in its entirety…

This weekend’s endorsement of Proposition 93 by the California Democratic Party’s E-Board actually turned into a dramatic sign of the initiative’s weakness rather than a moment of triumph for its proponents.  Only the extraordinary personal intervention of Chairman Art Torres and other party heavy hitters enabled the Nunez and Perata forces to beat back strong efforts to have the party go neutral or oppose the initiative to loosen term limits.

In a remarkable demonstration of the growing problems for Yes on 93, the Assembly Speaker and Senate President struggled to gain the support of their own party. A stunning 47% of the Exec Board voted to have the California Democratic Party go neutral on the Perata/Nunez initiative.

Even Fabian Nunez’s communications guru had trouble spinning the narrowly avoided humiliation of his boss.  Writing on the California Majority Report blog, the spokesman explained, "The term limits initiative passed after some debate. A coalition of progressives who don’t like term limits at all combined with others who believe that the initiative would reduce the chances of Democrats picking up more legislative seats. Ultimately, the party endorsed the resolution after CDP Chairman Art Torres and other party faithful hammered home that the initiative would make the legislature more effective."

Left unsaid was the growing animosity – even within the Democratic party – towards the arrogance of Fabian Nunez and his attempted power grab with the intentionally misleading Prop. 93.  

Brian Leubitz, who does work for Yes on 93, admitted on the Calitics blog that "there was some passionate discussion on the issue, but in the end the vote failed."

Veteran liberal blogger Julia Rosen posted that, "It was a tense few minutes for the Pro-93 folks.  The motion to switch to neutral was close enough to trigger an official count of Exec credentials.  The final count was 81 votes for a switch to neutral and 91 to keep the committees recommendation that it be endorsed.  They needed a 60% vote and were below 50%, but it was not an automatic by any means."

"Chair Torres felt moved to be an official speaker to keep the yes recommendation when there was a move to recommend a No vote.  The move to switch to a No was easily defeated, but it was impressive to see Torres step down from the stage to stand behind the mike and address the members and observers."

When Don Perata and Fabian Nunez must pull out all the stops to have their own party narrowly vote to support Proposition 93, it’s clear that their initiative is in serious trouble.  Even more striking – it’s apparent that many in the Democratic Party do not believe they have to be concerned about the wrath of the Democratic leaders for much longer.

* – For some reason that we cannot fathom, the No on 93 Committee is now called the "Alliance for California Renewal" – which we think sounds more like a public service entity to encourage driving Californians to renew their licenses, or a project of the Sierra Club… 

This entry was posted on Monday, November 19th, 2007 at 12:00 am and is filed under Blog Posts.