Brown win in Mass. gives hope to Cali GOP

by CalWatchdog Staff | January 19, 2010 9:36 pm

California Republicans’ hearts are beating so fast they’re slipping Nitro pills[1] like candy under their tongues.

If a Republican can win in Massachusetts[2] (Massachusetts??????? Massachusetts!!!!!), an elephant can win anywhere, including in the Pyrite State.

The last time a Republican won the governorship here was in 1994, with Pete Wilson. (Arnold, who won in 2003 and 2006, really is a Democrat.[3])

The last time a Republican won a U.S. Senate seat was in 1998, also with Wilson. My old colleagues at The Orange County Register will tell you that, every time I heard Wilson’s name, I put my head through a wall — so much did I dislike Gov. Tax Increaser. But I have to admit that he knew how to win elections.

So, if you exclude Wilson, the last governorship or U.S. Senate seat won by a Republican was Gov. Deukmejian back in 1986, 24 years ago. Reagan was president, Michael Jackson was moonwalking, the economy was booming, the Soviets were stuck in Afghanistan, and I still thought Republicans in power would bring us smaller government.

Yet, California isn’t Massachusetts. The GOP winner there, Scott Brown, didn’t have to face Senator-for-Life Teddy Kennedy, who last year joined Mary Jo Kopechne[4] in eternity.

By contrast, Republicans here face two tested old warhorses, Sen. Barbara Boxer and, likely for governor, Jerry Brown. Boxer runs nasty campaigns[5]. So whoever faces her should not mind being doused in mud.

Jerry Brown is quirky, which cost him a Senate seat in 1982 (losing to … Wilson, of course). But his quirkiness includes backing tax cuts after Prop. 13 won in 1978. In his 1992 presidential bid, he proposed a flat tax. I suspect he’ll meet any Republican proposal for tax cuts with cuts of his own. That is, he won’t follow Sis Kathleen, who could have beaten Tax Increaser Wilson in 1996 — but foolishly backed tax increases of her own (after I twice told her, in meetings at The Register, that if she backed tax cuts she would win).

And who knows what will happen in the next nine months?

– John Seiler

Source URL: https://calwatchdog.com/2010/01/19/brown-win-in-mass-gives-hope-to-cali-gop/

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