No way to argue with this craziness

A while back, some Pilot letter writers got upset with me because I

suggested that there has long been a perception in the rest of the

country that an inordinate number of political nut cases have

flourished in Orange County. I offered examples -- some of them local

-- in support of that thesis.

Now, I’m ready to pass that mantle on to the entire state. Like

any citizen anxious to cast a thoughtful, well-researched vote, I

spent an hour reading through the Los Angeles Times’ brief

biographies of the 158 candidates (I counted them) for the office of

governor of California. I consider this list a spectacular upgrading

of our political history, far exceeding any of my earlier examples,

and I congratulate the public servants who brought this about for

thinking big.

It also occurred to me that the political lessons we are now

learning in California might well serve as case histories for those

backward countries where we are trying to introduce democracy. The

Iraqis and Afghans, especially, should study some of the finer points

of participatory democracy illustrated in our recall election.

Probably the most important point is that elections can be bought.

This is not a new concept, of course. What is new about the

California recall is that money created an election where one didn’t

exist.

Our Iraqi and Afghan students need some background here. The

Republicans lost the governor’s office a year ago by finding and

running probably the only candidate in the state even less attractive

than the unpopular incumbent. So after he lost, his party then came

up with a creative new political concept now known as Issa’s Law: if

you lose an election, just keep buying new ones until you win.

There were two problems here. Normally, proof of malfeasance in

office is necessary to recall or impeach a public official. Since --

as a recent Los Angeles Times editorial pointed out -- “there is no

evidence that Davis is guilty of malfeasance,” Issa’s Law had to be

extended to include public officials who are arrogant, duplicitous

and personally unpleasant.

That this might well include half our office holders doesn’t have

to be a deterrent. It certainly wasn’t in this case.

The other problem was tougher. There wasn’t nearly enough interest

in the recall of Gov. Gray Davis to get the necessary petition

signatures. That’s where the money came in.

The sugar daddy behind the recall bought the services of a corps

of mercenaries who had no interest in the issues involved, but were

trained simply to get signatures -- and are quite good at it. After

enough signatures were obtained to force a recall, the angel who put

up the money in the hope of becoming governor himself, was then

dismissed by the party heavyweights.

He was allowed a public podium to make a tearful withdrawal while

the heavyweights scouted around the movie business for a

name-recognition candidate who could win. Fluency in English was not

required.

Several new sets of problems presented themselves after a date for

the recall election was set. It turned out a whole flock of citizens

had been fantasizing about being governor some day and suddenly found

an opportunity to be heard. All it took was $3,500 and a handful of

signatures. So, at the time I wrote this, 158 incipient governors had

applied for the job.

Then, some serious technical problems emerged. Creating ballots

long enough for all those names and counting them -- sometimes by

hand -- will be awkward and expensive. Estimates of the cost of the

election are running near $70 million in a state already scavenging

for money by cutting back on sorely needed social services,

especially in health and education. But that’s the way it goes

sometimes in a democracy. First thing’s first.

What we have to look forward to now is the campaign. The normal

procedure would be a series of candidate forums to discuss individual

differences on public issues. This will be possible locally only if

the candidates make a semicircle across the outfield in Anaheim

Stadium. To keep the program under two hours, each candidate would

then have 30 seconds to present his or her program for resolving

California’s economic and social problems so that we voters might

make a rational choice.

The forum moderator would, of course, be Jay Leno, who would have

to be cautioned against giving special candidate attention to porn

actresses, stand-up comics, reality TV producers or Austrian

weightlifters while he is warming up the audience.

Some of the debate possibilities are exciting. Schwarzenegger up

against Arianna Huffington, for example -- Austrian accent against

Greek. Or Bill Simon, debating with himself, in an effort to come up

with a complete declarative sentence. The problem here is that if

select candidates are given special media treatment, the other 150

are likely to demand equal time.

And finally, of course, there are the clowns. Every circus has its

clowns, and democratic elections are not exceptions. The problem

comes when the clowns take over the show. And our students in Iraq

and Afghanistan need to ask if that is what has happened in the

California model they are studying. So do we.

A TV satirist named Bill Prady is already sure. When he filed

candidate papers, he lashed out at the politicians involved in the

recall, telling a Los Angeles Times reporter: “As a person who makes

a living off of making mockery, I resent them intruding into my

world.”

Not me. I like a good circus. If these guys who have pushed our

democratic system over the rational edge and will be spending many

millions of badly needed public dollars to do it can bring this off,

I tip my hat to them. The state will probably be in worse chaos

afterward, and the system may have taken a body blow, but they will

have demonstrated a cardinal precept in this country today that we

need to look straight in the eye: that money can buy anything --

especially power.

There is still a chance that in this instance, money may have

bought an election, but not a victory. That will soon be in our

hands. And our resolution may well be the first and the final lesson

for our students of democracy.

* JOSEPH N. BELL is a resident of Santa Ana Heights. His column

appears Thursdays.