Camejo & McClintock Shine, Other Candidates "Get Personal" In Animated Five-Way Debate

by Rogg McFadden

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- September 24, 2003 -- In a five-way televised debate between gubernatorial hopefuls that got heated and personal, candidates Tom McClintock and Peter Miguel Camejo may have come out with the biggest gains. Both avoided vicious verbal slings from Arianna Stassinopolous Huffington and each responded to questions directly with reasoned solutions to the State's economic and political problems.

Arianna described herself as "a writer" and quickly went on the attack against Arnold Schwarzenegger with her quiver of "code words" and catch phrases such as "Enron", "Global Crossing", and "the Bush Administration" along with a litany of meaningless stats. Early in the debate, the two European-American candidates began exchanging personal insults and interrupting one another before the moderator put an end to it after Arianna's "direct and personal attack" against Arnold S. over his opinion of women.

Republican Arnold S. had a great deal to lose in this, his only debate. He talked about how he "cares about seniors and children" the most, and said vaguely that "we need equality." The struggling political actor's collection of good rehearsed jokes were key in deflecting Arianna's vitriolic screeds. In the end, Arnold was able to regain composure after an initial shouting match with Arianna and came away spared of any seriously damaging "foot-in-mouth" commentary that might destroy his insurgent candidacy. Arnold Joiners will continue to believe in the man.

After Arianna's childish tirade and Arnold S.'s monotone overbearing roar of response, Green Party candidate Peter Camejo did his best to restore a level of levelheadedness to the affair. Through the entire 90-minute event, Camejo made no attacks against any particular candidate, agreed with his opponents on occasion, and kept himself to the topic at hand without meandering into unrelated blather about "Enron" and "Global Crossing" as Arianna did relentlessly.

Camejo called for increased minimum wage (or "living wage") and increased taxes on the financially successful (or "fair taxes") to increase government school budgets. He also pressed for California to become more "modern" with "single-payer" universal health care for all residents. "All advanced industrial countries have universal health care," said Camejo to support his argument with some "international" credibility.

Like all universal health care advocates, however, Camejo preyed on Americans' ignorance of foreign affairs by failing to mention the financially wrecked condition of socialized health care systems in Britain and Canada, and that health care choice for individuals there is restricted. There is also ample evidence that the quality and timeliness of care in a "nationalized health care" system can degrade to a state of universal mediocrity that may not be fit for such a free and "advanced" nation as ours.

At one point each candidate, in his own way, tackled the topic of subsidized health care for illegal immigrants. Cruz Bustamante gave a touching "Tribute to the Undocumented" that explained why he supports SB 60, the controversial "driver's licenses for illegal immigrants" law recently signed in by the "lame-duck" Governor.

Peter Camejo retorted that he did not approve of the term "illegal" and pushed to "end the apartheid system" among legal and illegal residents in California. Camejo, the Socialist Statesman of the debate, drew no distinction between the latest wave of "illegal" immigrants that has deluged the state since the last federal amnesty law in 1986, and the stream of "European-Americans" (not just Arnold S. and Arianna) who have come into the state since the US conquest of California in the 1840s.

Republican State Senator Tom McClintock was the only candidate to support existing immigration law. In explaining his opposition to rewarding "amnesty" on those who "cut in line" when getting into the country, McClintock alluded to the fact that illegal immigration cheats others who are mindful and respectful of American law and who seek to legally enter the country and become naturalized citizens. "Amnesty" would in effect reward those who knowingly violate the law, while doing nothing for other immigrants who wait patiently for a chance to come to America the right way.

McClintock also pointed out that not only have Arnold's fabled "businesses" left the state, but hundreds of thousands of long-time residents have forsaken California in the last decade. In fact, without the rising tide and big "business" of illegal/ undocumented immigration along the US-Mexican border, the state would have suffered a net population decline during the 1993-2002 period. McClintock questioned why residents are abandoning one of the largest, richest, most naturally diverse states in the Union to live in "the deserts of Nevada and Arizona."

Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante showcased his smooth-as-silk finesse and political cool as the establishment candidate. He lectured Arnold S. and the audience about how he authored the popular "textbook" law that schoolkids are so happy about these days, and admitted that "mistakes were made" in spending California's massive budget. "We spent too much," he said repentantly, but asserted that "everything we've done is based on research."

Cruz then set forth his "tough love" plan of increased cigarette taxes and alcohol taxes for California residents, before Arianna scoffed ostentatiously about the millions in contributions Bustamante has raked in from Indian tribes and prison guard unions, and how these special interests would be exempt from the State's threatened "tough love" measures.

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Note:

* Republicans are already planning a referendum in March 2004 to overturn the law which allows the state to accept the matricula consular as a recognized form of ID when obtaining a state driver's license. The matricula is an identification document that can be purchased at any local Mexican consulate.

According to La Opinion, a Spanish-language paper in Los Angeles, the law is widely unpopular among American citizens in California, and a "great majority" of Asians, Blacks, and Whites (over 60%) are opposed to SB 60. State Democratic Party Chairman Art Torres, however, claimed that public opposition to the law "is all a racist movement, like how they did with Proposition 187.”

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