Meg and Steve: BP and immigration

30 May 2010 |permalink | email article

PARDON me if it looks like a side show but the two Republican candidates for governor of California sound like trumpeting circus elephants, each bent on trampling the other into political extinction. 

But try as they may to distance themselves from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger many of the proposals advanced by Meg Whitman and Steve Poizner before the June 8 primary have already been attempted – or tried – by the very unpopular Republican governor, as the Los Angeles Times reported.

On balance the billionaire former eBay CEO would appear to have an election edge, burning through $33 million, or $512,000 a day – over the past two months. By comparison State Insurance Commissioner Poizner spent $17.3 million in the past two months, or $252,000 a day. (By stunning contrast Jerry Brown, who will become the Democratic nomination for a third term after the primary, has spent a parsimonious $3,900 a day.)

But two recent political developments may have some impact on the outcome of the Republican primary going into the general election this fall. One involves the candidates’ reaction to the BP oil spill and their apparent distancing themselves from Sarah Palin’s “drill, baby, drill” position while still offering conflicting viewpoints.

Whitman has said in the past that she has always been opposed to offshore oil drilling but, as the San Francisco Chronicle noted, conflicts with statements she made at the Republican National Convention in 2008 and prior to the disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. Poizner differs with Palin’s slogan but still insists that to get away from imported oil California should engage in offshore drilling as long as it’s safe.

The issue of illegal immigration has turned into a battle about which candidate is tougher. Whitman said recently in Orange County that “You haven’t seen an ad from me with the border fence,” she told Politico. “That has been Steve’s campaign. My campaign has been about jobs and spending and education.”

Whitman had to be reminded that her campaign ads do feature a shot of the fence – a burning image used by many Republican ads to indicate their willingness to crack down on illegal immigrants. But Poizner’s nearly total focus on the border issue has pushed the front running Whitman further to the right. In the campaign’s closing days it’s his only shot at an astonishing comeback after once trailing by 50 points.

Update: New Los Angeles Times/USC poll shows Whitman regaining huge early lead against Poizner but at the cost of falling behind Brown in a general election match up. Is being a billionaire in today’s economy a bad omen for a candidate? 

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