O2C's 2021 California Gubernatorial Recall Election Voter Guide

It's election season in California, the voter guide is out, so you know what that means: another O2C voter guide. The good news: there's only one race, in two parts. They didn't try to put any ballot propositions on this year. The bad news: 46 candidates for one office. This is gonna suck, but here goes nothing.

Question 1: "Shall GAVIN NEWSOM be recalled (removed) from the office of Governor?"

Like a ballot proposition, there are statements for and against the recall effort. Unlike a ballot proposition, they have a particular form. There's the official notice and grounds statement, followed by a response, and then a separate argument section. The notice is full of legalese and is irrelevant, so we'll start with the grounds:

Right from the get-go, we have bog standard Republican whining and trotting out of political boogymen (eg, Prop 13 can't be removed without a ballot proposition, so nothing the governor can do makes a difference). Taking the claims one by one:

"Laws he endorsed favor foreign nationals, in our country illegally, over that of our own citizens." - I have no idea what this is talking about, and it's not referenced in the argument, so I'm going to take this as probably just a standard boogyman.

"People in this state suffer the highest taxes in the nation," - Dubious. Definitely not true for the average or median person. California is #10 on average. #11, median. The only thing CA ranks highest in is marginal income tax rate, which becomes higher than Hawaii after $359,408. The median individual income in CA is ~$31,000, which is in the 4% bracket, for a 2.3% actual income tax rate (assuming every dollar is taxable, which it's probably not)

"the highest homelessness rates" - lie. Statewide, CA is #4. Citywide, New York, at least, is worse than LA, the worst homelessness city in the state, per capita (and absolutely, but NY is bigger anyway).

"and the lowest quality of life" - California ranks 19th/50. Lie.

"He has imposed sanctuary state status" - This is hilarious because it's wrong twice: first, because the legislature passed it; it wasn't "imposed" by the governor, and second because the governor who signed it was Jerry Brown. Probably just an oversight by the recall proponents.

"fails to enforce immigration laws" - It's actually pretty clear he does enforce them, just not the ones recall proponents wish existed. Gonna call this another lie.

"He unilaterally over-ruled the will of the people regarding the death penalty." - This one's basically true. Newsom ordered a moratorium on executions, and withdrew a lethal injection protocol that was in the works to replace one declared unconstitutional, and has ordered the dismantling of the San Quentin execution chamber. And all that after a ballot measure designed to speed up enforcement of the death penalty was passed convincingly, at the same election he was elected. This is all technically legal, and will certainly delay the death penalty for some years after Newsom leaves office, but pretty clearly violates the spirit of the laws. Still, if we're going to have a governor that abuses his power, I'd certainly rather it be for something to prevent the taking of innocent lives. (The governor of CA does not have unilateral clemency power; the state Supreme Court is involved in that.) I can't say this persuades me much toward the recall position.

"He seeks to impose additional burdens on our state by the following; removing the protections of Proposition 13" - boogyman. He can't do shit about it.

"rationing our water use" - we're in a drought, one that's only going to get worse. It'd be negligent not to. He could do less of it if there hadn't been such opposition to Brown's water projects. Still, the water rights situation in CA is... ancient and ridiculous, to put it nicely.

"increasing taxes" - in point of fact, Newsom's against both of the tax increases the legislature is pushing, and specifically warned against raising taxes this year.

"restricting parental rights" - pretty sure this is the standard OMG ABORTIONS FOR TEENAGERS WITHOUT PARENTAL CONSENT?!?!?! stalking horse. True, but already in force, and hardly unique to Newsom. If anyone knows differently, let me know.

So of the accusations, we've got 2 true (1 ambiguously good, 1 bad I can't get myself to care about), 1 technically-true-if-you-don't-look-carefully-and-squint, 2 boogeymen, 2 stalking horses (or just plain made up), and 5 lies. Yeah, unless they've got some meat in the argument (see post 4 of this thread, probably), I remain thoroughly unconvinced that he should be recalled.

NB: Turns out the notice and grounds and the response were what was on the petition. They're just reprinted in the voter guide.

Newsom's response:

I do not see most of this doing Newsom any favors. Hopefully he saved a more substantial response for the argument. At this point I realized the NB above.

Actually this was fine... well, at least okay... mediocre might be about right... to be on the petition. The recall is a waste of money, the budget is balanced, the state does have good reserves (for once). But that weak-ass list is just... so cringeworthy and bad. It's out of touch and just screams "give me an A for effort!" And while Trump is bad, this is pretty much just "Orange Man Bad", when the Orange Man isn't even involved. And the arrogance -- "the definitive will of the voters"; no you jackass, there's a reason we have a recall process in the first place, it's that the will is not definitive, ever. And I definitely don't appreciate the scare caps about the nature of the petition as an information collection scheme.

I think if I'd seen this response on the petition on like the day after the French Laundry incident, I just might have signed it. Would have regretted it later, I'm sure, but it would have felt good. Yeah, I can totally understand how this petition drive succeeded.

Can you blame him? Trump is so defining that the backlash against him can be weaponized for you. You are a politician in one of the powerful blue states, you are going to use it. He would be stupid not to. Unfortunately the anti-trump button is one that activates a lot of low info voters in blue states.

So when does this recall happen.

Ballots are being mailed, the election is 9/14.

I've seen a lot less excitement about it in both directions than the one in 2003. Thankfully, no one with any star power like Arnold Schwarzenegger is running (given his relative sanity, he'd be considered a pinko communist if he ran today), but Newsom could very well lose if there isn't enough Dem turnout for him. I don't doubt California would survive mostly intact for the next year if Larry Elder wins but I'd rather not find out.

So the Taliban is at the Hoover Dam.

I mean, yes, I can blame him. Activating low-info blue voters is not the point here, and whoever told him it is should be fired. It only takes 12% of the previous gubernatorial turnout signing the petition to trigger the recall election. Which means he had to appeal to not only 100% of the 39.1% of registered voters who voted for him, but also 100% of the 36.2% of registered voters who didn't vote, AND 76.5% of the 24.1% of registered voters who voted for John Cox to avoid the recall election. With some margin for slippage, as obviously the petitioners aren't going to track down literally every Cox voter.

So there are good arguments like: this is a waste of money, he's done good things for the state, the recall is unwarranted, budget is balanced close to on time, there's a surplus, various noble occupations oppose the recall.

There are mediocre arguments like: 2018 was a landslide for Newsom (implication: this recall effort will fail, so don't bother), here's what I'm trying to do.

And then there's the bad arguments: anything Trump (as definitely more than 25% of Cox voters are Trump supporters), info-theft scares, when it's likely as not that most signatories were already on GOP lists, anything that smacks of arrogance.

The only reason to put something like this on the petition would be if he knew the petition was going to succeed and he wanted this in the Voter Info Guide because this has a better chance of convincing 50% of voters than 85% of registered voters. Even so, it seems wildly out of touch. Not a single mention of COVID, for instance (though it's possible that the timing of the petition was such that the jury was still out on how CA was faring). And the Newsom arrogance shines right through. No humility whatsoever, and not a little bit of condescension. No, this was a pretty significant misstep no matter how you slice it.

Honestly it's kind of a wonder we don't see recall elections basically immediately after every election using the top-two primary, given how many people get turned off of voting in the general by the primary results. You'd think non-voters whose candidates were eliminated in the primaries would want another bite at the apple, particularly when the threshold to win is so low.

The argument are a bit longer than the notice and grounds, but only a page:

Oh this bodes well. Second sentence and we're into half-truths. Only 1.719 million signatures could be validated. This is right on par for typical petition validity, but it's not 2 million either.

Newsom did not in fact promise to fix the homelessness problem. He actually promised to research how to solve it. And he did get an audit of homelessness spending done. Still not terribly effective, though I strongly doubt any Republican governor could do better. Near as I can tell, he didn't promise to make CA more affordable, though he did have plans to increase wages. Seems rather unlikely that any governor seriously could control the cost of living. He did get a statewide rent control ordinance passed, which is probably the closest thing to making CA affordable, distortionary as it is.

I don't know that "we use slave labor for firefighting and dammit he freed the slaves" is exactly the tone the petitioners want to strike, but there it is. Furthermore, it's far from definitive that early release has directly led to increased crime. Arrogance is a good accusation against Newsom though, and it's usually true. So it is here. https://www.npr.org/2021/06/25/1010...ic-about-wildfire-prevention-work-report-says

The French Laundry dinner is 100% an unforced error. Pure, unadulterated hypocrisy. Is it recall-worthy? No. Is it resignation-worthy? Alone, also no. Together with all his other unforced errors, yeah, probably. Still not recall-worthy. The mask procurement was also very poorly done. It was secretive, and made without consultation with other stakeholders. The complaint about sending the money for it is dumb. It's within the governor's emergency powers to do it, and half that amount was refunded after they failed to meet their delivery date. It was also done in the midst of 3M failing to deliver masks it had promised. I can't find any info on BYD's head donating to Newsom's campaign. I think this is just made up. Their CEO isn't American and so can't donate, at any rate.

I'm guessing this is what this recall is actually about. Newsom did something super dumb and signed off on a $450 million mask deal with a company run by CA Republican political operatives that had existed for something like 3 days. Within hours, the company was properly vetted (why the hell didn't they do that first??), the contract canceled, and the money clawed back. I suspect those Republicans are sore and that's why this recall is actually happening.

The EDD fraud started long before Newsom. He's just the one to shine a light on it, albeit a rather underwhelming one, especially at first. Crime was WAY down in 2019, and reverted to the mean for 2020. Homelessness is worst in CA (but not per capita; it's only 80% as bad as New York), and gas prices are highest, although it's questionable if the governor has any say all over that. The blackout stats hold up. Water is not actually being rationed (though there was a call for a voluntary 15% reduction); this bit is code for "Newsom is coming to get your farms," a typical CA Republican stalking horse. The forests are burning, but most of it is national forest land, not CA-managed.

So who is Orrin Heatlie? https://www.desertsun.com/story/new...p-leading-recall-gov-gavin-newsom/4836932001/ Well, nothing interesting there, except that he was motivated to start the recall by Newsom's insistence on 4th amendment rights for illegal immigrants.

But some of his points are valid. I just don't think they rise to the level of recall. I'd certainly support Newsom resigning though. If he resigns, the recall election doesn't happen, and the Lt. Governor, Eleni Kounalakis would take over. Newsom is, however, FAR too arrogant to ever consider it, just like Grey Davis.

So how about the other side:

So this is where it makes sense to connect Trump to the recall effort.

Hyperbole. There's still a Democratic supermajority in the legislature, and on the Supreme Court.

Technically true, although they'd be able to do nothing. Secretary of State is a separately elected position which handles elections.

Fun fact: this sentence was litigated in court. SCOCA decided that due to the margin of victory in 2018 (the largest since the 1950s), Newsom was A-OK to call it an abuse of the recall laws. Honestly, I think that's a pretty terrible precedent to set, and he should have been able to say that regardless.

Fun fact: the phrase "Republican recall" was similarly litigated. Proponents wanted to stop him from using the phrase. SCOCA saw right through that. It's pretty good branding.

Clearly and obviously true, and a fantastic argument for voting No.

Here we go, getting to COVID, which Newsom has handled worlds better than his Republican colleagues.

Pretty sure this is due less to leadership, and more to the state being filled with fewer complete dumbasses per capita than, say, Mississippi.

Good shit. Specific. Real GSD accomplishments.

This is weak. No specifics. No apologies for the shit they are correctly nailing to him.

The actual progress, yes. The "major new solutions"? They don't exist yet to be jeopardized.

Good endorsement.

It's REALLY lacking in humility. It's less overtly arrogant than the response to the petition, but there's not a peep of acknowledgment of his errors.

It's also made me realize the proponents' argument is better than I thought, in that it doesn't reference Trump. That would have been a surefire way to get it shot down in CA. Points there, but obviously not enough to make me vote for recall.

Voting No on question 1.

Gavin, resign. Especially if it looks like you're going to lose on Q1. Just resign. Don't subject us to 18 months of some Republican jackass for your own pride.

Going in the order the online VIG has them, the candidates!

But first: how do you get on the ballot in a CA gubernatorial recall election? Answer: really easily. It's a matter of some paperwork and a filing fee. You can skip the filing fee (which is around $4200) by getting 7000 petition signatures instead. Childs play. No primaries, just a free-for-all for anyone who can pony up 2% of the office's annual salary. There was also a release of tax returns requirement, but it was found not to apply at all to recall elections, ironically in a case brought by someone who was initially denied ballot access because he redacted too little from his tax returns. I think it was Elder, but I could be wrong.

And second: how does someone win? Simple: each person has one vote, and whoever gets the most votes wins, regardless of percentage that turns out to be. With 46 candidates in the race, that could be 2.2%. It's currently shaping up to be somewhere around 20%.

But moving on:

Dennis Richter - NPP - self-described socialist. When the Republicans say the socialists are coming, they only wish they had this guy to rail against. He's got it all: union leadership, "Defender Cuban Revolution", elected leader of the Socialist Workers Party. His website is literally "themilitant . com" (I'm not linking to that), "given talks on revolutionary fight for workers and farmers government in US". Yow. Still, by dint of being first, he's my first choice so far. I'm sure he'll be quickly replaced.

Brandon Ross - Democratic - self-described moderate Democrat. I think I said that in another thread he looked like the closest thing to an establishment Dem? No way the Dems would run this guy. He's got a story of losing everything to a drug addiction and getting clean. The Dems might be progressive, but they're not THAT progressive. He's almost a Republican on COVID: no mask mandates, no vaccine mandate, but at least he's in favor of the vaccine period and wants to do outreach. Wants to fight the opioid crisis by offering free rehab. At least recognizes that the housing crisis is fundamentally about having not enough houses. Nothing specific on homelessness. Wants to cut income taxes to 0 for everyone making below $150k. Wants to cut gas taxes. No stance on prop 13. Supports a minimum wage of $16 an hour. Very much stay the course on state-level climate change policy. Wildfire plan is to get property owners to build firebreaks on a property-by-property basis. Uh-huh. Pro choice, but in favor of an assault weapons ban. Well, he's better than the socialist, so now he's my first choice.

Doug Ose - Republican - Current Assemblyman. He's got a few big ideas: uncap charter school funding and actually tie it to attendance, and create a police state to enforce sobriety on homeless people. Anyone who refuses to get sober gets no benefits from state-funded programs, and he wants to make all programs state-funded. His water ideas are good: actually build the authorized water projects, and improve wastewater treatment and recycling rates. His wildfire solutions leave a lot to be desired, but they're better than nothing. Wants to expand MediCal (CA's Medicaid program). Very law-and-order focused. Not an antivaxer. I'll say he's my #1 Republican choice so far, but I'm not sure if I'd vote for him over Ross. Ross is really light on a lot of policy, which is the only reason Ose is remotely under consideration. He's a Trump supporter, but at least had the decency to denounce 1/6.

Caitlyn Jenner - Republican - She's dumped her Trumpism, at least as far as her website is concerned, but she can't escape it. Her platform is uninteresting and bare-bones despite using a lot of words. No.

Kevin Faulconer - Republican - Mayor of San Diego. His tax plan is... okay by me? Leaves the existing structure in place, but reduces income taxes to 0 for everyone making under $50k. I think he might actually be for the $1M+ surtax, which even Newsom is not. Might have an actual plan for homelessness, as San Diego was the only major city in CA to shrink its homeless population in the past few years. That's quite something, unless it turns out he's just bussing them to LA and SF. His plan to get kids back into the classroom seems outdated and doomed to failure, but at the rate things are going, Newsom's going to cave on that anyway. Weirdly, voted for Trump in 2020, but NOT 2016, but denounced 1/6, and Don Jr. is taking potshots at him on Twitter. Maaaaaaaaybe that's enough distance that, if he's in 2nd place or climbing fast in the polls, I could bring myself to vote for him as a matter of harm reduction. Definitely not my first choice.

Holly L. Baade - Democrat - her entire candidate statement is "Leadership for a brighter tomorrow." Ooooookay then. Her website confirms it: whackaloon. The least nutty thing she expects to accomplish in the first 90 days is to decrease the gas tax from 51.1¢/gal to 50¢/gal (why bother?). The most nutty is probably either paying for every home and parking lot in California to install solar panels, or making utilities tear down all their[sic] 5G towers (it's the telecoms, not the utilities, that have 5G towers), or possibly "Pause any permits or approval to research being done to create non-gendered humans made in test-tubes with Ai capacities." Anti-vaxer. Hard pass.

Okay, that's enough for now.

The parade continues:
David Bramante - Republican - Real estate agent. No on mask mandates, no on vaccine mandates (including for health care workers), no on business closures, no on social distancing. The pro-COVID candidate. Wants to add a gun rights amendment to the CA constitution, specifically in response to government COVID responses. Wants to cut sales and gas taxes to 0. Was absolutely incensed to see homeless people throwing themselves a party under the freeway, complete with a table and food. How dare they. And just a block from the $2.1 million house he just sold. How dare they. Bog-standard Republican line on immigration, but less interested in cracking down on illegal immigration than average. His last major issue... take a guess. If you guessed housing, wildfires, budget, the arts, education, or even 5G, you're wrong. It's... car modders' rights. Yeah, I got nothing. What an ass. Hell no.

Heather Collins - Green - Cosmetologist, former Democrat. Fiscally conservative; thinks taxes are too high, wants "a return to law and order". I think she registered for the wrong party. Believes education is THE way out of sustained poverty. Wants to get rid of AB5 (CA's anti-independent contractor law that Prop 22 overturned for Uber and Lyft) entirely. YES. Wants to cancel all Newsom's emergency pandemic orders. NO. No thanks.

James G Hanink - No Qualified Party Preference ( ) - claims to rep the Solidarity Party, which is some sort of religious group, maybe? Anti-abortion, anti-death penalty, pro-marriage (period), anti-assisted suicide, generically pro-environment. Against the war on drugs, against 3 strikes, pro-voting and electoral reform, pro-education. He actually appears to be the rare genuine, consistent pro-lifer. Still, something about the party gives me the willies, and on his Facebook he posts right-wing articles about the evils of mail-in voting with some regularity. A "fact checking welcomed!" disclaimer does not absolve you. No thanks.

Jeff Hewitt - Libertarian - an actual Libertarian in an actual elected office (3 terms as Mayor of Calimesa (in a council city, so he had to get the council to elect him), currently county supervisor in Riverside)? Who knew such a thing was even possible?! Turns out it's cause he's a good politician. His platform is vague as all heck. There are maybe 4 specifics. All of them good enough, but nothing wild. He won't even take a stand on the existing COVID measures on his website, just says we need to look harder at the consequences to small businesses. He sued for more vaccines to be delivered to Riverside County, so he's clearly no antivaxer. Not a Trumper either. Clearly the man knows how to make deals, which might actually translate to GSD. I can appreciate that. New first choice.

David Hillberg - Republican - aircraft mechanic and actor. Anti-tax, anti-spell-check, anti-grammar-check. Can't tell if he's a Trump supporter, but he's definitely reaching out to them. Wants to fire Nancy Pelosi (can't do that), and imprison other politicians. Noooope.

Angelyne - No party preference - Yes, that Angelyne. If you think that a pressing problem with California government is that there's not an official annual Governor's Masquerade Ball, she's your candidate. No.

Didn't Angelyne run in '03 too?

Yup. The only candidate on both recall ballots.

A Federal lawsuit has been filed asking that the recall be declared unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause. The argument is that, because of the way the vote is set up, Newsom might be ousted and replaced by a candidate who would not beat him if his name was on the ballot for the second round, so Newsom voters are not being equally represented. It's suggested the options are to either toss the recall or add Newsom to the second round.

https://www.politico.com/states/cal...california-recall-as-unconstitutional-1390127

SCOCA ruled on this in 2003 after Davis tried to get himself on Q2, which is why they didn't file this in state court. It would have been tossed on precedent. This *might* have had a shot if it had been filed and heard before the election started, but ballots are out already. I know half a dozen people who have mailed them back already. While I think there's a small chance they might have prevailed on one person-one vote grounds, I can't imagine the courts will halt the election now that it's underway.

Larry A. Elder - Republican - talk show host, "libertarian" who turned very Trumpy, and is now trying to hide it. Leading in the polls. Not necessarily an anti-masker or antivaxer, but a-ok with both. Pays lip-service to science based policy, but picks and chooses which evidence to base policy on, with no regard for result plausibility or any but top-line effects. Very good at calling out Newsom's arrogance and hypocrisy, which certainly helps his popularity. Clearly has smart people working for him, as his website praises Jerry Brown while criticizing Newsom (NGL, I'd vote for Brown if he were on the ballot and not termed out). Trying to make an enemy out of the media the way Trump does. Actual policies are vague. Based on the polls, might be the most dangerous candidate on the ballot. Hell no.

Joel Ventresca - Democratic - I knew I'd seen the name before; he ran for Mayor of San Francisco and came in 3rd. Berniecrat, with all the lack of specifics of Bernie too. Anti-nuclear. Supports state-level single-payer healthcare. Would ban lobbying of elected officials, so chalk up an anti-1st amendment stance. For strictly publicly funded elections. Doesn't attack Newsom for his hypocrisy, just all the things that were known about him at the time he was elected in the first place. Didn't vote for him for Mayor, won't vote for him for governor.

Posted in the Tweet thread but apropos here:



John Cox has failed to pay a campaign consultant $100k from his failed 2018 run and a judge has subpoena'd him over it.

Jeremiah "Jeremy" Marciniak - NPP - Candidate statement just says to search him on youtube, so I did. 4 videos. This first is full of meaningless platitudes. The second defends the recall against charges of being anti-democratic (which I agree with). The third says that he's in favor of police body cameras always being on while interacting with the public, and that departments should pay for them rather than officers. Pretty sure that's already how it works. Fourth video is about how the state should buy more 747 fire suppression tankers, and contains a spelling error. This is a nobody who thinks it'd be fun to pretend to run for governor. Can't even put up a campaign website. No.

Jacqueline McGowan - Democratic - "Cannabis consultant" and lobbyist. Ex-Wall Street. Admits to not always knowing what she's doing. Pro-mask, pro-vaccine. Pro-housing. Status quo (keep trying Newsom's programs) on homelessness. For qualified immunity reform and at least managed to do her research about what legislation is pending on that. Very pro-cannabis, as might be expected. Pro-water recycling and desalination and has put at least a tiny bit of thought into brine waste disposal. Fire policy is a bit weird, but no more so than anyone else's. She clearly realizes that lobbying works to GSD, and several of her position pages mention lobbying the federal government to get things she wants. I'm sold. New favorite.

Daniel Mercuri - Republican - Religious nut. Trump supporter. Poor speller, worse grammarian. Talks about how "socialism, Marxism, and communistic ideologies are sweeping the land". COVID misinformation spreader and conspiracy theorist. Dunno if he's a 'sovereign citizen' type, but some of the stuff he goes on about wrt the relationship between the state and the federal government makes me think so. "Not an anti-vaxer" who would ban all vaccines that every harm anyone from sale in California. Anti-abortion even by California Republican standards, eg would require 4 obstetricians to all agree that an abortion was medically necessary, no other abortions except for investigated and verified rape cases, in a limited (formatting his) time frame. No abortions for sex trafficking victims (is that also not rape??) or incest; counseling for the mother instead. His policy page is just so full of batshit crazy right-wing nuttery that I'm having trouble comprehending it. Hell. No. I say again, HELL NO.

Dan Kapelovitz - Green - Bernie supporter, former NPP. His two big issues are Basic Income and Animal Rights, and other than that he's bog-standard Green Party, as far as I can tell. Links to other peoples' and orgs' policy pages instead of having any of his own (except for the aforementioned 2, and his Basic Income page is entirely links). If you didn't vote for Howie Hawkins for president, you should probably not vote for Dan Kapelovitz. No.

Gotta say, McGowan's platform is attractive.

Mercuri would been better off burning that $4000 he paid to file with that platform.

He'd be a shoo-in down South though.

Kevin Kiley - Republican - Current Assemblyman from District 6, mostly Placer County. LA Times says he reminds them of Tom Cotton and Ron DeSantis. He's a bog-standard Fox News Republican, which I guess is better than an OAN Republican. Even his campaign website looks like he ripped the design from Fox News. Good attacks on Newsom, but nothing at all to make me want him running things. No.

Chauncey "Slim" Killens - Republican - Another religious nut. Explicitly wants to break down separation of church and state. No.

Patrick Kilpatrick - Democratic - Actor, writer, producer. Very clearly focused on the industry. I question his commitment to anything else. Calls himself a "common-sense Democrat" which typically means "conservative Democrat"; seems to be true, from what little I can actually glean. I think he wants to have the state directly employ homeless people, which is interesting, but it really doesn't look like he's thought it through. No.

Denver Stoner - Republican - again with the anti-separation of church and state. Fuck off. No.

Jenny Rae Le Roux - Republican - doesn't seem to be a Trumper. More corporatist than I'd like. Trying to thread the needle on vaccines and masks; failing. Pretends to have solutions for homelessness and housing, but mostly just goes on about how we don't have enough. Duh, but what are you going to DO about it? Pro-nuclear, pro-fracking, pro-energy storage, pro-magic more water in CA reservoirs. Wildfire populist (and careful not to blame them on climate change), but she's not entirely wrong in the solutions department. Tough on crime type, but very generically. Not the type to sport a thin blue line Punisher skull. I've seen worse, but I've seen better, including among Republicans (eg, Faulconer). No.

So I was talking with some friends about the recall, and I accidentally convinced at least one that Newsom deserves to be recalled. He's still voting "No", but only because a Republican is likely to win if Newsom is recalled. I don't entirely buy it, but it came from Newsom's failure to get all his paperwork in on time so that he could be listed as a Democrat on the ballot. Like, it's a sign of something deeply, deeply wrong in his management that his staff didn't get that filed on time. For similar reasons, he's not voting for McGowan - her picture isn't in the voter guide, and while her platform as a whole looks enticing, her candidate statement is more of a cannabis statement, with no few references to anything else. I'm inclined to give them both the benefit of the doubt in terms of either being fatal, as the filing process is opaque, idiosyncratic, and adversarial, but it's still a major knock, especially to Newsom, who really should know better.

Michael Loebs - No Qualified Party Preference - SFSU lecturer and California National Party chair. Yup, he wants CA to secede, and basically has since the election of Donald Trump. Wants to build the CNP into the US equivalent of the SNP. Other than that, key platform points are UBI, MediCal for all, devolution to counties on gun regulation, gas taxes, and other topics. Pro-housing. For electoral reform (though not my preferred flavors). Wants to implement a "California National Service program". Sounds like a step towards a draft. Anti surveillance state. There's more. It's an eclectic mix. A lot of it is very pragmatic, a lot of it is delusional. Thanks, but no thanks. Leave the crazy at home and I'll vote for the platform though. No.

David Lozano - Republican - Ex-sheriff from LA. His only deep policy dive (and it's not terribly deep) is on homelessness. Donated to Trump. No.

Denis Lucey - No Party Preference - One issue candidate, this issue... the impact of divorce on children. Wants the default in divorces to be 50-50 custody. Okay, but, uh, you're not running for family law judge. No.

Adam Papagan - No Party Preference - Candidate Statement: "Love U". That's it. His website is nearly as sparse, full of such strong and thoughtful policy positions as, and I quote, in their entirety, "Wildfires seem to get worse every year. It’s time Sacramento fixes the problem.", "Ending homelessness means building more homes, and we have the resources to do it.", and "People should know how government works, which is why I’m documenting my campaign on social media." I think not. No wait, he thinks not. I think "No".

Robert C. Newman II - Republican - Cranky old religious man. Anti-abortion, anti-euthanasia. Pro-border wall, and it looks like plain old anti-immigration. Not even lip service to legal immigration. Ideologue, knows absolutely nothing about anything he didn't see on TV. Heck no.

John R. Drake - Democratic - "Recent community college graduate with a degree in political science". Not even sure he can even drink. Platform is pretty bare bones, and COVID and homelessness are reduced to single bullet points. He has an FAQ where he gets a bit more in depth, but it's basically "CA should have a rainy day fund". No.

Ted Gaines - Republican - former legislator, currently on the Board of Equalization, which is the elected tax commission, and is basically vestigial at this point. Gave an interview to what I think is either a Chinese or Russian propaganda outlet without doing any research on it (I suspect Chinese, based on the font choice and the walls of text with no paragraph breaks, but if anyone knows what language the idiom "family man" can be accidentally translated to "family liar", that's the language of origin), which is a big point against. Doesn't seem to be a Trumper, but a pretty bog-standard CA Republican, if a bit dim, and very obvious. Like his candidate statement has a bible verse, but there's no other hint of religiosity on his site. Goes after all the usual boogeymen. Has some delusions of grandeur about personally overturning ballot propositions, but whaddayagonnado. No thanks.

Sam L. Gallucci - Republican - Business executive and pastor. Has a vision for the state, and little to no idea how to get it there (or at least is unwilling to share beyond generalities no more specific than "cut taxes and regulations"). No.

Anthony Trimino - Republican - Orange County entrepreneur, CEO. Pretty sure he's running to lower his taxes, personally. Believes that what's wrong with our healthcare system is not enough woo. Very much No.

Daniel Watts - Democratic - "Free Speech. Free College. Daniel Watts for governor." That's about all the substance on his website. His YouTube channel is similarly bare. His Twitter is entirely promotion of his campaign -- not his ideas, just the campaign. I think he's running as a shortcut to getting verified on Twitter. Hilariously, it didn't work. No.

Nickolas Wildstar - Republican - former Libertarian candidate for governor in 2018. I think I ranked him 3rd or 4th in 2018. Doesn't talk about himself in the 3rd person anymore. Someone's clearly training him to be a better politician. Says a lot about a lot while being vague enough not to piss off most people. Still pretty libertarian, but I don't think just being a better campaigner is going to make him better able to help the state. He's at least very anti-AB5, so that's better than many. Still no.

Thats it for candidates who have statements. I'll go find my actual ballot so I can take a look at the candidates who either couldn't afford to put a statement in, chose not to, or wouldn't abide by the fundraising and spending limits and thus didn't qualify to have one. Only 12 left.

None of these people are worth my vote. Or yours. So I’m leaving question two blank.