Governor Declares War on GOP

Not only has California left the United States under the leadership of Governor Schwarzenegger, war has been declared on the Republican Party.

Thanks to a tip from a San Francisco Democrat friend of mine, I have come across a Time Magazine article claiming that Governor Schwarzenegger is in a war with the Republican party in California. Given the sentiment of many Republicans I know that listened to the inauguration speech this week, I expect this to be a common theme in articles written about the Governator in the next few weeks.

I have already posted about the Governor’s speech and his centrist, “post-partisan” agenda for his second term. Many Republicans (read: the old boys network including such figures as Mike Spence from the California Republican Assembly) are already condemning the Governor’s speech. Their argument is that this new post-partisan agenda seems to look an awful like the Democratic agenda and nothing like the Republican agenda. They believe that the Governor plans to make a number of Big Government, anti-business moves that will increase spending and require taxation. They also promise a fight against the Governor and his administration if these new policies come to the Legislature.

But this fight might be exactly what the Governor is looking for. According to my favorite Berkeley instructor (who I will henceforth call a professor out of respect, though he does not technically hold that title) Professor Dan Schnur, the governor could really benefit from some Republican opposition. Prof Schnur, who is a moderate Republican strategist, says that when Arnold runs for Senate in 4 or 6 years, “The more the conservatives do to push back at him, the more moderate he will look by comparison. As long as he doesn't raise taxes it's difficult to see a conservative candidate beating him in a primary, which means he's free to situate himself right at the political center."

Cause Sometimes You Feel Like a Nut...

Boi from Troy posted that Mike Spence, head of the uber-conservative California Republican Assembly wants to audit the California Republican Party. Spence seems to claim that with the millions and millions of dollars spent, we shouldn’t have lost.

Over at FlashReport, Spence gave his views:

Was Victory '06 a success? After over 20 million dollars spent that is an open question for me. I have my doubts. The Governor was on the way to victory long before the GOTV operation was needed. Maybe Poizner benefited. Although he really benifited from Bustamante.

First, I want to point out that I know something on this scale has not been tried before. I know many Victory '06 staffers. Many of them are great operatives. People can work hard and effectively in campaigns and still not achieve objectives. To be successful in the future requires us to take a hard look at some of these things.

I admit to only knowing a few things. Turnout in GOP areas was lower than four years ago. Imagine that. A "GOP" Governor is winning by 17% and turnout is worse than when we lose by 5%. What gives?

Then, Spence goes on to blame the National GOP collapse, the Governor for not extending his coattails further, and a lack of enough GOTV efforts by the party. In fact, he does his best to place the blame on everybody and everything that went wrong.

Except of course for what the real problem was.

He placed no blame on the far right of our party for alienating voters. California voters are not excited by right-wingers like Dennis Mountjoy, Mike Spence, Dick Mountjoy, and the like who grandstand and give our party at bad name. Chuck Poochigian, Tony Strickland, Tom McClintock, and Claude Parrish are all too conservative for our state.

If the California Republican Party wants to succeed, it must take a page from Schwarzenegger's playbook. It must learn that California wants to embrace economically conservative candidates so long as they are socially moderate.

Instead of auditing CRP and blaming them for the great loss, we should be dumping people like Spence as fast as we can.