Showing posts with label Pat Brown (SUB). Show all posts
Showing posts with label Pat Brown (SUB). Show all posts

Friday, January 27, 2012

CA Democrats to reality: We will never, never, NEVER give in!


Recently, I posted a brief piece on Pat Brown’s early responses toward his competitors in the 1966 CA governor’s race, making note of Brown’s complaint that his opponents were, “[running] around the state telling people what a bad governor I've been…Wait until I start telling them what a good governor I've been..."

In light of Brown’s own words, I found Brown-backer Marianne Means’ comments in The Tuscaloosa News, April 1, 1966 rather ironic:
As it always is during the Governor’s campaigns, all the interest this time is focused on the other fellows—on his primary opponent Los Angeles Mayor Samuel Yorty and the GOP contenders, Actor Ronald Reagan and former San Francisco Mayor George Christopher.  Nobody seems to be talking up Gov. Brown, except Gov. Brown.

But, like it says in the ad, he must be doing something right.  He has been an effective and honest governor and he has moved the state dramatically forward in education, welfare and conservation.  And the only ones who seem to notice these things are the people who vote.  

The narcissism of those in power is truly breathtaking.  Means acknowledges that no one was boosting Brown except Brown himself…yet never seems to entertain the possibility that this was because most Californians didn’t think there was much to praise. 

In grasping for specifics to validate her celebration of the eight-year reign of Pat Brown, Means pointed to the “dramatic forward movement” Brown had effectuated in the areas of welfare and education.  Conveniently, however, these forward movements were left remarkably vague (hope and change, anyone?).  One wonders, which was more forward-thinking of Brown:  his ineffectual handling of radicals on the Berkley campus, or his triumphant expansion of the welfare rolls?  Perhaps more to the point, why would anyone with a functioning cerebral cortex conclude that putting more people on the government dole for subsistence equates to “progress”?  

 



Monday, January 23, 2012

Pat Brown and the Decision to Seek a Third Term


In March 1966, DeVan Shumway reported on Pat Brown's “reluctant” decision to seek a third-term as the most powerful government official in the largest state of the U.S.  In his best imitation of a martyr, Brown announced that he “really wanted” to leave politics…but gosh darn it, he just couldn’t pass up a third term run if the alternative was letting those wascaly wepubwicans into the governor’s chair. 

According to Brown, the only thing his opponents could do was to:
"...run around the state telling people what a bad governor I've been," (as though that isn't what candidates challenging incumbents ALWAYS do?!) "Wait until I start telling them what a good governor I've been...I'm confident I'll win again."

Good King Pat the Humble was kind enough to elucidate the problems of his top Republican competitor: 

"I think Reagan is a reactionary.  He has a fear of government that could be dangerous in a growing state like California. He doesn't have the slightest idea what he's talking about...I, better than any handlers, realize you have to know what you're talking about.  Your ignorance will come out."

Yet for all his talk of how stupid Reagan was, the themes Brown suggested he wanted to tackle in his assumed third term sound remarkably Reaganesque:

“I would like to have major tax reform and equalize the tax burden of the people of California.  This is the major thing that must be done.  Some are paying far too many taxes; others too few.”

And, finally, in a bit of political assessment that Democrats treat us to every cycle (and, for reasons unbeknownst to me, some of our guys ALWAYS fall for), Brown opined on the “weak” Republican field, “[The Republican Party] has its poorest crop of candidates in the last 27 years.”

How embarassing, then, to get trounced by one million votes by the poorest GOP candidate in 27 years:)


Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Responding to Extremists: From Brown’s California in 1965 to Obama’s America in 2011




For all the talk of how “unprecedented” the Occupy Wall Street Movement is, a brief review of recent history demonstrates that the Left has been coddling actual extremists almost as long as they’ve been applying that label to people who favor smaller and less intrusive government.

In November 1965, John Chamberlain wrote a column on the internecine warfare facing California’s democratic governor Pat Brown.  The most glaring problem, according to Chamberlain, was Brown’s ineffectual handling of the abrasive California Democratic Council (CDC) and its firebrand president, Simon Casady.  Quoth Chamberlain:

Though the CDC was brought into being by National Committeeman Paul Ziffren, a Beverly Hills attorney, and other Democrats of “progressive” persuasion, it was babied along to success by Gov. Pat Brown through many a crisis of rather kooky leftist opinion-making. Brown passed lightly over CDC demands to abolish the House Committee on Un-American Activities, or to withdraw American soldiers from South Viet Nam, or to sanction trade with Red China, or to back teachers in the right to strike. His attitude could be summed up in the phrase, “This is dialogue.”
From the vantage point of 2011, of course, we can see that the CDC-types have been successful not only at fully coopting the Democratic Party, but have largely succeeded in leading America down the path to slow national suicide.  This should be a valuable lesson to any who would wish to claim the GOP mantle in 2012.  You cannot have “dialogue” with revoutionaries.  You must either defeat them, or be defeated by them.