(Blogging from Indian Wells, where Republicans will gather for the State GOP Conventions which begins today…)
At some point in the middle of the day yesterday, I actually looked at the date on my Blackberry just to confirm that it was in fact mid-September of the “off year” and not late May of next year, the election year. It was that crazy yesterday trying to keep up with some of the back and forth between GOP gubernatorial hopefuls Meg Whitman and Steve Poizner yesterday.
Actually (and I apologize for which invariably will be a bad analogy – I’m terrible with my analogies) as I looked from my backyard in South Orange County yesterday into the very dry Cleveland National Forest, with particular focus a small plume of smoke from a not-so-distant wildfire, I thought about the political goings-on of the day, and I realized that tensions are so high between these two campaigns that the GOP primary for Governor is like a dry forest in fire season – one little match can set the whole thing ablaze.
Yesterday that match was struck by Andrew McIntosh, a reporter from the Sacramento Bee, whose investigative piece on the really bad voting lack-of voting record of Meg Whitman. While the basic premise of his piece, that Meg Whitman missed a lot of opportunities to vote, wasn’t really news – I think the piece startled me on two counts. The first was that Whitman didn’t just miss some votes, according to the Bee there is no record of her voting for like decades – almost as if she lived her life for years oblivious of the fact that she was hanging out in a democratic republic. The second was that it felt like, at least from the way the Bee story referenced quotes and lack of comment from Whitman’s campaign, that they have not been consistent in talking about this issue. Yesterday I blogged on all of this mid-day, saying in part:
I recognize that spending a lot of time on this issue is not what the Whitman campaign wants to do. Hopefully they will produce something that just lays out a chronology of where she has lived since being of voting age, whether she was registered to vote at those addresses, and whether she voted during times she was registered.
In politics there is a rule — never let the way you handle a potential crisis make it worse. Right now we need to see a clean acknowledgment of Whitman’s voting history. It feels like someone is hiding something. This may not be the case, but you get that feeling reading the Bee story. The Whitman campaign needs to make sure that everything is transparent.
Anyways, the Bee piece sparked a back and forth between the campaigns. Around 9:30 in the morning, Jarrod Agen issued a pretty strong statement from the Poizner Campaign – going so far as to call on Whitman to drop out of the race…
"Reporters have uncovered the facts that Meg Whitman has been desperate to hide: She never voted – never voted once – before 2002. Yet she continues to try to deceive the public, even when confronted with the facts. Worse, Meg Whitman and her campaign team are refusing to answer simple questions and deliberately lying to cover up the facts.
It’s understandable that Meg Whitman is ashamed of this record. But it’s unacceptable that she continues to run from the record and deceive voters. Though there is no shred of evidence she ever registered as a Republican before 2007, she insists she did, yet she refuses to provide any evidence. Her arrogant answer: ‘Go find it.’
In the history of America, no one has been elected governor of a state with Meg Whitman’s 25 year history of no show voting. She is unelectable and has tried to cover her lack of honesty with millions of dollars.
What does this say about Meg Whitman? When Ronald Reagan was fighting to save America from Jimmy Carter’s weak leadership, she didn’t vote for Ronald Reagan. When Michael Dukakis wanted to do for America what he had done for Massachusetts, she didn’t vote for George H. W. Bush. She didn’t vote for Bob Dole when he was trying to restore honor to the White House in 1996. She didn’t vote for George W. Bush against Al Gore. She lived minutes from Mitt Romney’s house and didn’t vote for Mitt against Ted Kennedy in 1994. She lived in California and still didn’t vote for the historic recall of Gray Davis. She didn’t even bother to vote for Pete Wilson, her campaign chairman, for governor.
It is clear she should step aside and allow the Republican Party to select a nominee who can win and start to turn California around."
As noise continued to swirl in political circles, at 12:30 in the afternoon, the Whitman Campaign finally issued a statement:
California needs leaders who are accountable for their actions. I take responsibility for mine, while my opponent, Steve Poizner, runs from his. On everything from his position on taxes to his political contributions, Steve hides behind others or misrepresents himself.
I look forward to a vigorous campaign and to a discussion of the issues that matter to the people of California.”
And then, apparently not satisfied that this statement was sufficient, Whitman’s campaign at 3:30pm sent out a release where they had one of Whitman’s supporters, former GOP Gubernatorial nominee Bill Simon, blast Poizner’s own voting record.
It was a hard hitting release, but according to Agen from Poizner’s campaign, the allegation by Bill Simon was off base. Agen told me that Poizner was working in the White House and was registered to vote in Washington, D.Cc during the 2002 California primary. Therefore, he could not have voted in California in that primary.
Agen was quick to point out that based on the information in the Sacramento Bee story on Whitman’s lack of voting, that Whitman herself did not vote for Bill Simon. Specifically, Agen explained that Whitman could not have voted for Bill Simon in his primary because Whitman didn’t register until September 12, 2002.
Agen gave me a quote on the record: “Bill Simon is a great American and I am sure that like Steve Poizner, Bill voted for President Reagan and both President Bush’s. Steve Poizner was registered to vote in Washington DC at the time of the 2002 California primary, working in the White House, and could not have voted in the California primary. I wish Meg’s team would be more careful with the facts before involving Republican leaders like Bill in their false attacks”.
This is a good opportunity to say that I was actually very surprised to see Bill Simon weigh in so aggressively in this matter. In my years of knowing Bill, he has not been one to jump quickly into the fray, typically being more deliberative. In fact, that being Bill’s reputation, it made the release that much more impactful. That said, if what Agen claims is true, and Poizner wasn’t living in California at the time… Well, that’s a wee bit embarrassing for Bill.
I guess we’ll see if this was a one-round fight, or if it will leak into this weekends State GOP Convention here in Indian Wells. So far, all of this drama has been the talk of the place.
I will close by saying that it would appear that both Steve Poizner and Meg Whitman have been struck with that ancient Chinese curse – “May you live in interesting times…”
You can be sure that we here at the FlashReport will continue to look out over the dry brush, alerting you to fire and smoke wherever we see it.
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