In a week California will hold its primary election where one of two rich people will get the Republican gubernatorial position on the November ballot. In the weeks leading up to Tuesday after next the two potential candidates, Steve Poizner and Meg Whitman, have been running commercials in prime time (Whitman ran one during the finale of Lost, for example) where they're essentially vying for the title of who is most conservative. Or rather, they're attacking each other with accusations that the other is actually liberal, and thus undermining their collective credibility as genuine conservatives, leaving the only potential prize that of who is less objectionable to conservatives.
Conceivably either one could approximate conservatism better than the Democratic candidate would, but nonetheless they are presumably spending a bunch of money tearing each other down in an attempt to sway the hardcore base who is apt to vote in the primary. Not that they're so much touting their individual strengths but pointing out their opponent's weaknesses. It's wooing the conservative voters with the implication that the other one sucks even worse.
Undoubtedly once the June primary has decreed one as the party's candidate the survivor will change tact and begin touting those "liberal" aspects what had been used against them before the primary in an effort to convince non-Republican voters that he or she is not too right wing for an independent or middle-of-the-road Democrat to put support behind.
As the Republicans don't have an open primary I won't be participating in deciding which inordinately wealthy person will go up against… who is it? Jerry Brown? Again? However, I'm fine with not having a say in which one gets on the ballot. Their ads have pretty well convinced me that I wouldn't be enthused to have either in Sacramento.
That's effective advertising.
Maybe we should change the prize for the state lottery from millions of dollars to getting to be governor. Er, I mean, having to be governor.
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I need to fully admit: I understand what "conservatism" is supposed to be about as well as I got the ending of Lost. I'm sure there's supposed to be something to pull it all together, but it's probably best not to over-analyze it. Maybe conservatism is intended to be open to interpretation, having whatever meaning one wishes it to have.
Maybe you're not supposed to think about conservatism; you're supposed to feel it.
Ha, California wouldn't know what to do with a conservative. It's not even on their political spectrum. There's only left, and farther left. Which is why California is bankrupt. ;-) I had hoped Arnold would get something done, but he's just as milquetoasty as the rest of the nitwits in Sacramento, spending money they don't have. They're waiting for the Big One to end their fiscal crisis for them (along with ending everything else).
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