California Brownout

Possibly likely to buy the governorship of California on November 2 is Republican Meg Whitman, the former EBay executive who made it possible to buy just about anything online - including old Volkswagen print ads (thanks, Meg!) - but can't leave well enough alone. She hopes to bring her smarmy, pro-business conservative politics to Sacramento, and history appears to be on her side. Republicans have won five of the last seven non-recall gubernatorial elections in the Golden State, and her Democratic opponent will be former governor and current state attorney general Jerry Brown. But because Brown has a lot of goodwill among the state's older voters and has a united party behind him in an increasingly multicultural Democratic state, he could be in a good position to return to the governor's office.

And once again, he'd be succeeding a professional actor. Sorry to see you go, Arnold, I thought you'd be an embarrassment to California, but you've proved me wrong.

Right now, Brown is behind by only one point in the latest Rasmussen poll out of California, despite Whitman's heavy advertising; many people still have little sense of who she is. To be fair, some people may have little sense of who Jerry Brown is anymore; did you know he married his longtime girlfriend in 2005? Did you know he even dated after he stopped seeing Linda Ronstadt in the seventies? Fortunately, Brown doesn't have to do much to re-introduce himself to the people of California; the Brown names is a pretty good brand in California, and he's done a lot over the years to build up its brand equity. He has a flair for explaining the issues, and he's always willing - eager, in fact - to listen to voters. He's likely to be outspent by Whitman in the short term - she's a billionaire with deep pockets - but, as an excellent article in the August 2, 2010 issue of Time demonstrates, he's still a formidable candidate.

Run, Jerry, run. :-)