One things that’s bugged me since the start of the effort to recall Governor Davis is that people keep bringing up the budget crisis.
Repeat after me: The Legislature chooses the budget, not the Governor.
Recalling the governor because the legislature can’t get its act together is like firing your plumber because your electrician screwed up.
Of course it’s all tied up in partisan politics. Some people just want a Republican governor, and are using the budget as an excuse. (Anyone remember the regular budget impasses during Pete Wilson’s administration in the early 1990s? This is not unique to Gray Davis!) Some people just want to throw someone out, and it’s less effort to kick out one governor than 100+ legislators.
But the budget crisis is all about party infighting. The Democrats have rallied behind tax increases, the Republicans have rallied behind spending cuts, and neither side will budge.
If these people would just stop fighting over who was a Democrat and who was a Republican, maybe they’d actually get some work done.
Additionally, the cost of the recall election is hardly going to help matters. And, on Salon, Joe Conason made the point that our budget woes would at least in part be related to the energy crisis, for which, though found to have been illegally manipulated into being, we still owe the balance (isn’t it nice to have friends in high places?).
It is, however, a great way to keep people from focusing on real issues.