Sunday Morning coming down -
Nov. 7th, 2004 08:31 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kyburgIt's chilly inside and out, and gray. Jim's sleeping last night's shift off and I'm alone waiting to get anything done because I don't want to wake him up.
Today, California is not a more Democratic state. In fact, over the past dozen years, Democratic Party registration has dropped from 49.1 percent of the electorate in 1992 to 43 percent in 2004. Of course, Republican registration has dropped as well, from 37 percent in 1992 to 34.7 percent in 2004. A sizable percentage of Californians are now ``independent'' registrants, growing from 10 percent in 1992 to about 17 percent in 2004. But it would appear from our voting behavior that the electorate is more liberal.
You might need a subscription to see the whole article - I didn't, clicking through Google News. Dumb as dead cats, I claim California politics can get - but this article points up some very salient points.
In Tuesday's election, John Kerry received a higher percentage of the votes cast (at 54.7 percent) than the past three times a Democrat carried the state. As popular as Bill Clinton was supposed to be in California, he only received 51.1 percent of the vote in 1996 and only 46 percent in 1992. Kerry even out-polled former Gov. Ronald Reagan's percentage of the vote (at 52.7 percent) in 1980 when Reagan beat Jimmy Carter and carried California.
More than Ronald REAGAN?!
The results from this last election continue to astound me.
No, it wasn't as simple as "yeah, yeah, California, mushy-head liberals, ya ya, my vote don't count if I'm conservative, always always democrat and nothing more, dirty hippies pinko commies ya ya YUUUUURRRRR."
Yes, yes, we all know that Schwarzenegger is a Republican, at least he's registered as one. But even Schwarzenegger wasn't able (or willing) to do very much for Jones or for the few GOP legislative candidates around the state who might have benefited from a healthy infusion of Schwarzenegger charisma. The governor even had his own celebration on election night, shunning the traditional Republican Party bash. Realistically, aside from Schwarzenegger, who hardly represents the values historically associated with the California GOP, there are no other high-profile, popular GOP personages left in a position of public authority in the state.
Schwarzenegger may have some coattails when it comes to the adoption or rejection of ballot initiatives, however, as evidenced by his success in March on Propositions 57 and 58 (designed to help the state through its budget crisis) and by the defeat Tuesday of the gambling measures. However, there's no evidence yet that the governor's popularity in California, now at an enviable 65 percent, is doing anything to revitalize the GOP in the state.
He's popular, but not very Republican - and he did more for Bush than anyone in California, party-wise.
Did you catch that his brother-in-law, Bobby Shriver, won a seat in the city council in Santa Monica?
I'm very much in the right place, for me to live.
California's latest contribution to new trends may well be an emerging new brand of liberalism, the early signs of which are at least somewhat evident in the results of Tuesday's election. This isn't our parents' liberalism of the 1960s or even a return to the New Deal liberalism of Roosevelt, which depended upon elected officials to act in the public's interest.
No, it's a new kind of public philosophy in which citizens are unafraid to directly use the instruments of government to create and fund social programs they deem worthy. It's ``do it ourselves'' liberalism. Key to this new philosophy is a heightened level of selectivity in the expenditure of public funds and a determination by citizens not to wait any longer for action by elected officials.
Uh, yawp.
Today, California is not a more Democratic state. In fact, over the past dozen years, Democratic Party registration has dropped from 49.1 percent of the electorate in 1992 to 43 percent in 2004. Of course, Republican registration has dropped as well, from 37 percent in 1992 to 34.7 percent in 2004. A sizable percentage of Californians are now ``independent'' registrants, growing from 10 percent in 1992 to about 17 percent in 2004. But it would appear from our voting behavior that the electorate is more liberal.
You might need a subscription to see the whole article - I didn't, clicking through Google News. Dumb as dead cats, I claim California politics can get - but this article points up some very salient points.
In Tuesday's election, John Kerry received a higher percentage of the votes cast (at 54.7 percent) than the past three times a Democrat carried the state. As popular as Bill Clinton was supposed to be in California, he only received 51.1 percent of the vote in 1996 and only 46 percent in 1992. Kerry even out-polled former Gov. Ronald Reagan's percentage of the vote (at 52.7 percent) in 1980 when Reagan beat Jimmy Carter and carried California.
More than Ronald REAGAN?!
The results from this last election continue to astound me.
No, it wasn't as simple as "yeah, yeah, California, mushy-head liberals, ya ya, my vote don't count if I'm conservative, always always democrat and nothing more, dirty hippies pinko commies ya ya YUUUUURRRRR."
Yes, yes, we all know that Schwarzenegger is a Republican, at least he's registered as one. But even Schwarzenegger wasn't able (or willing) to do very much for Jones or for the few GOP legislative candidates around the state who might have benefited from a healthy infusion of Schwarzenegger charisma. The governor even had his own celebration on election night, shunning the traditional Republican Party bash. Realistically, aside from Schwarzenegger, who hardly represents the values historically associated with the California GOP, there are no other high-profile, popular GOP personages left in a position of public authority in the state.
Schwarzenegger may have some coattails when it comes to the adoption or rejection of ballot initiatives, however, as evidenced by his success in March on Propositions 57 and 58 (designed to help the state through its budget crisis) and by the defeat Tuesday of the gambling measures. However, there's no evidence yet that the governor's popularity in California, now at an enviable 65 percent, is doing anything to revitalize the GOP in the state.
He's popular, but not very Republican - and he did more for Bush than anyone in California, party-wise.
Did you catch that his brother-in-law, Bobby Shriver, won a seat in the city council in Santa Monica?
I'm very much in the right place, for me to live.
California's latest contribution to new trends may well be an emerging new brand of liberalism, the early signs of which are at least somewhat evident in the results of Tuesday's election. This isn't our parents' liberalism of the 1960s or even a return to the New Deal liberalism of Roosevelt, which depended upon elected officials to act in the public's interest.
No, it's a new kind of public philosophy in which citizens are unafraid to directly use the instruments of government to create and fund social programs they deem worthy. It's ``do it ourselves'' liberalism. Key to this new philosophy is a heightened level of selectivity in the expenditure of public funds and a determination by citizens not to wait any longer for action by elected officials.
Uh, yawp.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2004-11-07 11:02 am (UTC)Except the Stem Cell Research one, in my view, was snuck in on Christopher Reeve and Ronald Reagan's coattails.
In a state in fiscal crisis - with cuts to education, state jobs, and spending programs - we just put ourselves 3 billion more into debt.
no subject
Date: 2004-11-07 06:35 pm (UTC)And with luck, with the added tax base, the debt can be paid off with some leftover.
Stem cell research in California just makes me feel warm inside - just a bit.
It's worth a hope.