Phil or Steve: Who Can Beat Arnold?

01 May 2006 |permalink | email article

Phil Angelides, by winning the Democratic Party endorsement, remains alive for governor, and Steve Westlyís solid statewide poll lead hits a speed bump. Arnold Schwarzenegger gets a lucky break, aided by what ex-San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown described as a ėfamily fightî before the June 6 primary.

Winning the party endorsement is not an automatic ticket to the nomination. John Van de Kamp narrowly won it in 1990 but lost the primary to Dianne Feinstein.

Angelides, 52, a Sacramento-born liberal, faces stiff, but not impossible, odds to overtake Westly. The conventional wisdom is that a winning Democrat runs left to attract liberal voters in the primary then paddles back to the center in a general election. The state Treasurer is banking on heavy GOTV union and activist support.

But a must-read San Francisco Chronicle report Friday reveals that a generational primary shift may be unfolding between two parts of the California Democratic party - establishment and anti-establishment - with implications far beyond the state.

Bruce Cain, the respected UC Berkeley political science professor, said it appears that Westly and his campaign team ėhave recognized there really are people in the Democratic Party who are likely to turn out in the primaryî beyond traditional labor activists and advocates.

The ėThree Mísî matter in politics: money, momentum and message. Westly, the more centrist candidate, owns the first two so the decisive showdown in the next five weeks will turn on which side airs the most compelling ėvalueî ads to woo a large undecided Democratic electorate.

Angelides calls himself the most committed to Democratic values, describes himself as the ėanti-Arnoldî and implies Westly is ėArnold Liteî despite the fact he joined with the governor and top elected state Democrats to successfully pass two deficit-restructuring measures.

Westly, 49, the state Controller, who was born in Arcadia, and is described as a ėSilicon Valley Democrat,î opposes taxes as a ėlast resort.î His ubiquitous TV ads hammer home the point he is a different kind of Democrat.

A rare debate in L.A. this week may help to answer the central question before primary day ņ will Angelides, or Westly, appeal more to disillusioned moderate swing Democrats who voted for Schwarzenegger and now want him out?   

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