Think about this if you will, because the man with these beliefs has at least a slim chance of becoming governor of California today.
— Repeal all vaccine and mask mandates in the current pandemic.
— Not sure climate change has anything to do with state wildfires.
— Ban all abortions.
— Repeal all minimum wage laws.
Sound like a Texas Republican’s wet dream? Well, none of it is likely to happen even if longshot Larry Elder is able to take advantage of the Golden State’s bizarre recall law and become governor.
More than a hundred years ago, California set up a system that was supposed to give average people more of a voice in how the state conducted its business. Folks who wanted to make the effort could bypass the legislature and put initiatives on the ballot or recall incompetent government officials.
Sound good?
Not so fast. California is essentially a one-party state and has been since the mid 1990s, when limiting immigration became a huge deal to Republicans. Since Pete Wilson was re-elected governor in 1994. the GOP has won exactly one election for governor or U.S. senator, and that was Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2006.
George H.W. Bush in 1988 was the last Republican to carry California in a presidential election, and that was the last of eight GOP winners in nine elections going back to 1952.
Hard to believe in a state where Hillary Clinton beat Donald Trump by 3.4 million votes in 2016 and Joe Biden thrashed Trump by 5.1 million votes in 2020.
Yet current governor Gavin Newsom has had to scramble to keep his job because it only takes 12 percent of voters to demand a recall election. And the ridiculous way the law is set up is that voters pick two things at the same time.
First is whether to recall Newsom. A plurality no vote ends it right away.
But second, in the instance of a plurality yes vote, is picking someone to replace the recalled official.
No real Democrats are running in the election. The idea is that it would make it easier to vote yes on the recall if people are given a plausible alternative, so Democrats are urging their voters to oppose the recall and ignore the second issue on the ballot.
So theoretically, at least Elder could get 20-25 percent of the votes in a 40-plus candidate field and become governor if Newsom loses on the first question.
That’s ridiculous enough, but it’s incredibly awful to allow 12 percent of the voters to force the election itself.
That may have worked at one time, but in an era when 12 percent of the voters are essentially nihilistic lunatics, there’s no possible silver lining.
Get this over with and let Elder go back to his real goal of being the new Rush Limbaugh.