Who Will Win, If Any, The California Recall Election? Interview With Madeleine Albright
SHIELDS: Welcome back. 11 judges of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned its own three judge panel and approved the California recall election for October 7. Followed by the only debate with all of the top candidates to replace Democratic Governor Gray Davis.</s>LT. GOV. CRUZ BUSTAMANTE (D), CALIF. GOV. CANDIDATE: I submitted a plan, a plan that I call tough love for California. In that plan, I raise tobacco taxes. I raise alcohol taxes. I raise the upper income tax bracket on the largest and the highest four percent of all Californians.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's certainly tough on taxpayers, that's for sure.</s>BUSTAMANTE: That's not fair.</s>ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER, CALIF. GOV. CANDIDATE: They realized they made a mistake and they spent money they don't even have. Then they go out and go tax, tax, tax. That's the answer to the problem?</s>SHIELDS: The News 10 Survey USA poll found viewers thought Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger won the debate with Republican Tom McClintock second and Democrat Cruz Bustamante third. Meanwhile, Governor Davis challenged Schwarzenegger to a debate, but was turned down.</s>GOV. GRAY DAVIS, CALIF.: This -- Schwarzenegger is wrong. He is mischaracterizing the facts and running down this great state.</s>SHIELDS: Al Hunt, who has the momentum as we meet right now in California?</s>HUNT: Mark, it's a Davis-Schwarzenegger race right now, even though they're not in the same ballot question. Both have high negatives. It makes it very uphill to get 50 percent. The advantage for Arnold is he doesn't have to get 50 percent. 40 percent will win it. Gray Davis blew it again. It took him two days to decide if he wanted to challenge Schwarzenegger to debate or not. First they said I might. And then he came back and two or three days later said I will. That was terrible. Arnold has had to consolidate Republican support. I think that's happening. I think the establishment pressured on Tom McClintock to get out is enormous. Whether he does or whether he doesn't, he's going to go down, I think, to single digits in the next week. Kate's publication this week wrote that to go for Arnold is a leap in the dark. Well, if that's the case, I want to tell you, our Robert Novak is the Michael Jordan of the right because he's in there soaring for Schwarzenegger.</s>NOVAK: That's right. I thought he did a good job. I -- California is not Mississippi. And you're not going to get the kind of people that I really like. And I think he's just fine as a conservative on economics. What's very interesting is that the -- Al is at the tracking in both the Davis camp and the Schwarzenegger camp now shows Davis losing the recall and Schwarzenegger winning the election. That's going to be a major thing. And I know that the left, they say well just Schwarzenegger's a liberal on social issues. They are scared to death of that because that could really change the political climate in California.</s>SHIELDS: Kate O'Beirne, those of us who watch that debate, there seem to be one consensus, and that was Tom McClintock was the most knowledgeable, along with Peter Camejo, the Green Party candidate, most thoughtful, most reasoned. And for all that great performance, the Republican establishment landed the next day like a ton of bricks and said get out of the race.</s>O'BEIRNE: Yes, just watching those polls. I can understand how the poll we showed had people thinking Schwarzenegger won it. He had the expectations in his favor because he did okay for a novice politician.</s>SHIELDS: Low bar.</s>O'BEIRNE: Tom McClintock is clearly the most competent and most polished performance on that stage. He's that rare principled, very competent politician, but he's trailing. There's every reason to believe he was the only Republican in the race that he would be number one now, instead of Schwarzenegger, but he's not. It seems to me Schwarzenegger should be talking to Tom McClintock. He's such a political talent. He ought to have a future in California. And maybe Schwarzenegger ought to try to convince McClintock that he could help McClintock have that kind of future.</s>SHIELDS: One of the reasons, Harold, that McClintock has resisted is that last year when he ran for controller, he only lost by 20,000 votes. And the establishment Republicans cut him off from dough. They poured money into the insurance commissioner's race, which was no hope at all. And they just stiffed him. So the chances of his getting out -- your read on California?</s>FORD: I was hoping at the debate they would have allowed more of the candidates, because they're...</s>O'BEIRNE: Oh, please.</s>FORD: ...the conversation got a little stale between the five of them. I think that Mr. Hunt has it right. It boils down to Davis and Schwarzenegger. I'm not convinced that the recall will pass. I know the numbers don't look great for Davis, but I think that more and more people hear the Republicans in disarray, and more and more people focus a little bit on what Davis is saying in his challenge to Schwarzenegger. He probably should have it far sooner. I know I would have from the outset. And one can only hope that voters will pay close -- I just think it's a bad think for democracy. Forget whether or not you think he should be recalled or not, you don't like him or not. I mean, Al Gore could have done the same thing or my governor, my state, his opponent could have done...</s>NOVAK: Let me say...</s>FORD: It's just a horrible, horrible practice...</s>NOVAK: ...I really like the idea of the recall.</s>SHIELDS: You do.</s>NOVAK: I like the idea of referendum, initiative, anything that gets between the politicians and eclipses them. I think it's a great idea. You know, Mark, let me just say one thing that I -- I'm really touched on your concern for a conservative Republican like McClintock and how bad he was treated by the Republican Party. I just -- I never found that before in you.</s>SHIELDS: He's the only one who took the no tax cut pledge. And you've just dropped him like a bad habit.</s>NOVAK: Is it possible...</s>SHIELDS: Honest to goodness.</s>NOVAK: ...that this is just a plot on your part to give Bush (unintelligible?)</s>SHIELDS: How much do you believe, Bob? I mean, is pragmatism, principal, where do they clash? What prevails? Next on CAPITAL GANG, a Democratic debate with the general leading.