Going by the metrics, John Chiang may be the strongest candidate to succeed Gov. Jerry Brown in 2018 or U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer in 2016.

You’d never know it by the way the media have zeroed in on Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom and Attorney General Kamala Harris — even before the Nov. 4 election in which both were re-elected. Chiang, the outgoing state controller, was elected as state treasurer. All are Democrats.

As far back as 2011, reporters have been setting the stage for the inevitable “Kamala vs. Gavin” showdown.

“Gavin Newsom and Kamala Harris: the California Democratic Party’s future?” the L.A. Times asked in 2011. “The party’s top officeholders — Gov. Jerry Brown and U.S. Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer — are all in their 70s. Newsom and Harris top the list of up-and-comers.”

The Friday following this month’s election, the San Francisco Chronicle asked, “Newsom vs. Harris: Who got bigger bang for the buck?” In his recent speculation on the next round of Democratic name brands, Los Angeles Times columnist George Skelton mentioned Chiang as an afterthought. That was better than his colleague Cathleen Decker, who didn’t bother to include Chiang in her list of Democrats in waiting.

Consultants, too, are billing the Kamala vs. Gavin show.

“There’s no doubt in my mind that they’re on a collision course for running for governor in 2018,” Democratic consultant Garry South told the Times earlier this year.

Yet, when you look at every available metric, Chiang has outperformed both Newsom and Harris: 2014 margin of victory, lifetime votes, number of successful campaigns, cash on hand and party support.

2014 Margin of victory: Chiang closest to Brown’s vote total

There are still roughly half-a-million late absentee and provisional ballots left to count, but Chiang is on pace to deliver the best performance of any statewide candidate after Brown.

Despite being further down the ballot than Newsom, Chiang earned the most votes after Brown and had the widest margin of victory after Brown. He’ll be the second candidate in the state to hit 4 million votes in Nov. 2014.

Chiang performed 2.8 percentage points better than Harris, and 3.4 percentage points better than Newsom. His margin of victory – 17.2 percentage points – was closer to Brown’s 19.4 percentage points than it was to Harris’ or Newsom’s figures.

If you were to classify winning Democrats, you’d put Brown and Chiang in Tier 1 and Harris and Newsom in Tier 2.

Lifetime votes & number of successful campaigns

In the past 16 years, Chiang has appeared on the ballot 10 times, winning every race. That’s one better than Newsom and three more campaigns than Harris. He also has run for seats with more voters than Newsom or Harris. His lifetime vote total, 21.3 million, is nearly double that for Harris.

Every time that Chiang, Harris and Newsom have appeared on the same ballot, Chiang has been the top vote-getter. Of the bunch, Chiang is the only one who has exceeded 5 million votes in an election.

Money: Chiang raised most in 2014, most cash on hand

Statewide campaigns don’t come cheap, and Chiang steadily has improved his fundraising. In 2014, Chiang raised more money than either Harris or Newsom. And not by small margins either. According to the state campaign finance records as of October 18, Chiang’s $1.9 million raised in 2014 was $800,384 more than Harris and $382,510.54 more than Newsom.

Chiang has more available cash on hand, $3.19 million, compared to $2.8 million for Newsom and $2.39 million for Harris. One note on this figure: It’s possible Harris spent down her state campaign account because she can’t directly transfer those funds to an account for a potential federal campaign. But that should be dismissed.

State candidates can get creative with how to spend, transfer and shift resources between state and federal accounts. She could, for example, refund checks to donors, and then solicit those donors to support her new federal campaign account. 

And remember, Chiang outperformed Harris on Election Night 2014, meaning she spent extra money to boost her name ID, but still couldn’t match Chiang’s result. Chiang spent less, has more in the bank and performed better.

Sharing the Wealth: Chiang’s given more to Democrats

Who shares their wealth and is a team player? Again, on paper, it’s Chiang, who outperforms both Harris and Newsom. In 2014, Chiang donated $55,000 from his campaign committee to Democratic Party committees. That’s substantially more than the $11,500 donated by Harris or $3,790 by Newsom.

All three politicians pledged to raise or give the same amount to the Democratic Party this cycle.

That may be true, but Chiang’s financial support is easier to quantify, which will come in handy for persuading Democratic activists and delegates to support him in a tough primary fight.

Newspaper Endorsements: Chiang’s Clean Sweep

Scott Lay, the publisher of The Nooner and AroundtheCapitol.com, kept tabs on newspaper endorsements in the Nov. 2014 general election. Of the three Democrats, Chiang was the only one to achieve a clean sweep of newspaper endorsements throughout the state. The Orange County Register declined to endorse in 扑克王粤语在线 both the lieutenant governor’s and attorney general’s race. The UT San Diego backed Republican Ron Nehring over Newsom and declined to endorse in the attorney general’s race.

Both of those newspapers lean to the right, which makes Chiang’s endorsements all the more impressive and useful in a Top 2 primary. The only other candidate to achieve the feat was reformer Marshall Tuck’s bid for state superintendent of schools.

Other factors

Two final things. Chiang has a potential geographic edge as the lone Southern Californian. Both Harris and Newsom hail from San Francisco.

And when it comes to picking governors, sometimes voters have a funny habit of ignoring the early favorites. Just ask Gov. Al Checchi.

By John Seiler

With a name like Lance-Arm-Strong, Lance Armstrong should have kept fighting the anti-doping charges against him. The U.S. Anti-Doping Agency just supposedly “stripped” him of his seven titles, although it’s not clear if they have the authority to do so, and he might still have the titles. Said Robert Luskin, his lawyer:

“I think Lance ultimately decided he’d rather be eaten alive by zombies than locked in a room with lawyers for the next five years of his life with no promise at the end of it that there would be any peace.”

That’s an understandable sentiment. But somebody has to fight these bureaucratic flesh eaters. Moreover, less than three months ago, Armstrong blew $1.5 million pushing Proposition 29, which would have raised taxes on cigarettes for $735 million in unaccountable cancer research. The initiative especially would have hit poor people, who smoke more than the rest of Californians. It would have put in jail more people for violating laws against black markets. And it would have given employment to hundreds more lawyers.

If he was willing that much dough to stick the state with thousands of legal actions, why didn’t he have the guts to keep fighting his own legal action? Maybe he’ll tell us.

Anyway, here’s what Wikipedia wrote about the tyrannical U.S. Anti-Doping Agency:

“The United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) is a non-profit, non-governmental^[1] organization and the national anti-doping organization (NADO) for the United States….

“In 2001 the agency was recognized by the U.S. Congress as ‘the official anti-doping agency for Olympic, Pan American and Paralympic sport in the United States.’^[4] USADA is not a government entity, however the agency is partly funded by the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), with its remaining budget generated from contracts for anti-doping services with sport organizations, most notably the United States Olympic Committee.^[5]“

“non-governmental”? Actually, if it’s “recognized by Congress” and takes tax money, the USADA really is a part of the government, despite it’s alleged independence. And the legal system itself is run by the government.

Manic McCain

Moreover, the anti-doping mania has been given a boost by grandstanding congressmen, in particular Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who lost a presidential bid four years ago. Here’s what happened in July:

“Senator John McCain lent support Friday to the United States Anti-Doping Agency in its case against Lance Armstrong, saying the agency follows a fair process that has been authorized by Congress and that it has the right to investigate and bring charges against Armstrong.

“’This process is the proper forum to decide matters concerning individual cases of alleged doping violations,’ McCain said in a statement.”

Normally I don’t agree with Michael Hiltzik, the L.A. Times columnist. But yesterday he wrote a great column defending Armstrong:

“With the whole world atwitter over Tour de Francechamp Lance Armstrong‘s decision to drop his legal fight against anti-doping allegations, it’s the right moment to be appalled at the travesty in sports this case represents.

“It’s not that the case will be seen as a major victory for sports anti-doping authorities. It’s that the anti-doping system claiming its highest-profile quarry ever is the most thoroughly one-sided and dishonest legal regime anywhere in the world this side of Beijing.

“It’s a system deliberately designed to place almost insurmountable hurdles in the way of athletes defending themselves or appealing adverse findings. Evidence has emerged over the years that laboratories certified by the World Anti-Doping Agency, or WADA, have been incompetent at analyzing athletes’ samples or fabricated results when they didn’t get the numbers they were hoping to see.

“Athletes’ defense attorneys harbored some hope that by picking a fight with Lance Armstrong, the anti-doping system might have sowed the seeds for its own reform. Finally, it was thought, here was an athlete with the money and motivation to expose the legal sophistry, the pseudoscience, the sheer sloppiness that underlies sports anti-doping prosecutions all over the world.

“Instead, the outcome shows that the system is so relentlessly rigged that even Lance Armstrong doesn’t see a point in fighting it.”

Who will fight?

Actually, someone who has the stamina to fight would be someone who won seven Tour de France titles.

I also wish Hiltzik would be more consistent in opposing government encroachments on our lives, instead of so often wanting to give our oppressors more of our tax money. Hiltzik did oppose Armstrong’s Prop. 29 tax increase, but only because he wanted the taxes for other government waste.

It’s the government itself that’s not only run by dopes, but is doped up on steroids that have ballooned government powers to monstrous proportions. And like a junkie, the government supports its habit by stealing, which the government calls “taxation.”

We need to take the steroid syringes from the government by cutting off the tax dollars — all of them. Without our money, government would have to go cold turkey: