 |
Greasing Gray with Fat Checks
California's Richest Look to Protect Selves as Recall
Takes Off |
 |
|
|
| July 10, 2003 |
|
|
|
By Jill Stewart
As the Gray Davis recall moves into overdrive and the
noxious consultant Chris Lehane--who helped Clinton formulate
his creepy Monica Lewinsky strategy--prepares to launch
an assault on the truth unlike anything we've witnessed
in a California election, a phrase keeps circling inside
my head.
Follow the money.
Most political junkies know by now that Lehane and the
rest of Davis' advisors plan to paint the recall as right-wingers
stealing an election from liberals. Lehane is said by
some to be the most negative campaigner in the United
States, a guy who will shimmy so low to win that Davis---the
most vicious campaigner California has seen in modern
times---imported Lehane from Back East.
Many voters won't easily dismiss their own boiling fury
at Davis, nor at the $38 billion in debt that materialized
on Davis' watch after our fibbing governor and catatonic
leaders like Democratic Sen.
John Burton of San Francisco insisted things were
under control.
Even so, if you are tempted to buy into any of the Davis
camp's whoppers---such as the one making rounds that a
recall "hurts" California's economy (compared
to how rosy things are by keeping Davis), merely remember
to follow the money.
Why, for instance, is Mighty Morphin Power Rangers gazillionaire
Haim
Saban giving $100,000 to ensure that Davis remains
governor, and why did spoiled rich kid Stephen
Bing fork over $100,000, and why should Zenith
Insurance Co. of Woodland Hills have handed Davis
$100,000?
Why would John and Rebecca Moores, owners of the San
Diego Padres, give $100,000; why would two Service
Employees International Unions give a total of $200,000,
and why would Jerry
Perenchio, CEO of Univision, cough up $50,000 for
a governor who is clearly incompetent?
Why did the California
Professional Firefighters part with $118,000 (for
answer, see Page
1, SF Chronicle, 7/10/03, by Robert Salladay, at www.sfgate.com),
and why did Stewart and Lynda Resnick, who derive their
riches from Teleflora and incredibly garish dust-catchers
they sell via The Franklin Mint, give up $50,000?
Why did Roland
E. Arnall, chairman of Ameriquest of Orange County,
which lends high-interest dough to bad credit risks, convince
his firm to give $50,000; why did Richard
S. Ziman send $25,000 from Arden Realty LP, plus give
$25,000 personally, and why did aging Beverly Hills developer
Nate Shapell part with $25,000?
For starters, many in this bunch make up the Westside
money cabal in Los Angeles who created Gray Davis. They
are far too rich and disconnected from their fellow travelers
to experience normal human shame. For them, Davis is a
401K from which they are not yet ready to withdraw.
"Good God," says Shawn Steel, former chairman
of the California
Republican Party, "these people previously poured
millions into Gray Davis, and as they said in Tammany
Hall, `Once he's bought, he ought to stay bought.'"
A slightly kinder take comes from Democrat Kathleen Connell,
who stepped down as State
Controller in January after spending months blasting
her fellow Democrats for their unchecked overspending,
which Connell says clearly caused California's budget
debacle.
Connell was a fiscal toughie who, had Davis listened to
her, never would have permitted California to spiral into
the reckless "get out alive" budgets Davis and
the Democrats keep creating.
"You are going to see eight or so major players behind
Gray during this recall, giving directly, or through vendors,
or subsidiaries, and they are Haim
Saban, Stephen
Bing, [grocery magnate] Ron
Burkle, [SunAmerica billionaire] Eli
Broad and others," says Connell.
"The Democrats would lose their political control,"
Connell says. "Their greatest fear is if he's thrown
out it destroys Democratic solidarity and it would create
an opportunity for a Republican to be elected governor."
If these multimillionaires and billionaires avert what
would be the second recall of a governor in the U.S.,
they will gain unprecedented attention from Davis until
2006. That gushing gubernatorial gratefulness could come
in awfully handy for wealthy Democrats and Republicans
alike.
Take Jerry
Perenchio, chairman of Spanish-language Univision,
who a few years ago spent more than $1 million trying
to stop English immersion, Proposition
227. (Why lose all those Univision customers by having
immigrant kids in California learn English?)
Perenchio needs help from Davis appointees on the Coastal
Commission because he finally got caught by the Commission
operating his non-permitted, illegal, three-hole golf
course next to Malibu Lagoon--secretly built for his wife
behind eight-foot rock walls.
In filings long ago, Perenchio told the Coastal Commission
he was using the 10 acres for a "jogging trail."
But the
illegal golf course was an inside joke among L.A.'s
wealthiest, who kept mum as the hated Coastal Commission
dumbly failed to grasp where poisons running into Malibu
Lagoon were coming from.
According to Wetlands
Action Network spokeswoman Marcia Hanscom, Perenchio's
been spewing heavy pesticides onto his secret greens for
two decades while children romp in adjacent sand and tidal
pools--directly in the path of Perenchio's filthy runoff.
She notes, "The reason for $50,000 going from Perenchio
to Davis is pretty obvious."
It's hardly any wonder why initially, Coastal Commission
staffers wanted to give Perenchio a permit-after-the-fact.
But at a meeting on July 10, the Commission delayed any
vote indefinitely after Hanscom and the Sierra
Club said they would sue. Hanscom laughs, "The
commission got so embarrassed, I don't believe they will
rule on this until after the recall."
Perenchio is hardly the only name on the Grease Gray donor
list who may one day need a delicate personal intervention
from the governor.
Look at the growing mess facing Padres owner Moores, one
of Davis' earliest backers, who Davis rewarded by appointing
to the UC
Board of Regents.
Moores' software company, Peregrine
Systems, is under SEC
investigation and is in bankruptcy protection after
a massive scandal for cooking its books. Moores resigned
as Peregrine chairman recently. Company officials told
a San Diego newspaper they are now deciding whether to
sue Moores and other directors to recover upwards of $100
million.
Republicans in Congress are probing the events that led
Moores to sell more than 18 million shares of stock, for
more than $600 million, while the company's business health
was being faked. Peregrine officials insist Arthur Andersen,
their former accountants, cooked the books without their
knowledge.
If federal blowback affects Moores' many business dealings
in California, he could use a powerful friend in Sacramento.
A governor would be very nice.
Another favorite on my list of purely altruistic givers
to stop the recall is Zenith
Insurance Co., whose chairman Stanley
Zax told Associated Press the $50,000 his company
gave is unrelated to any state business.
Zenith, a major provider of workers compensation insurance
in California, spent $50,000 on lobbying in recent months.
I was at some of the heavily lobbied Sacramento hearings
on workers compensation this year. Workers comp is becoming
the next big Democratic disaster, with insurance rates
up 1000% in many cases even though California provides
among the worst care in the nation. Thousands of small
businesses, non-profits and independent companies are
in peril.
Republicans are fighting to deeply reform workers compensation
with bills like AB1579, which copies states where workers
comp is inexpensive and yet fully covers the injured.
Well, duh!
But ah, the Democrats. The Dems keep gutting the Republican
reforms, yet are only tinkering with fixing the crisis
themselves. Why? Because true, deep reform is opposed
by insurers, unions and healthcare groups who are bleeding
workers comp dry.
Despite huffy claims by Insurance
Commissioner John Garamendi that he will fix workers
comp, I say the Dems lack the guts to stand up to their
big campaign donors---the insurers, unions and healthcare
groups. I predict, as a result of Democratic spinelessness,
no major reforms in 2003.
Yet Stanley
Zax, chairman of Zenith Insurance, insisted to Associated
Press that his $100,000 gift to save Davis from recall
has nothing to do with state business. Please.
Who else is passionate about saving Gray Davis? Stephen
Bing, the brat New York heir and sometimes film producer
who keeps impregnating beautiful women and getting mired
in weird scandals for doing so, gave $100,000.
You may recall Bing's boorish behavior when he insisted
that global beauty Elizabeth Hurley have their child paternity-tested,
because Bing thought Hurley might be a floozy.
Turns out that Bing--who is also the father of the baby
in the Kirk Kirkorian-Lisa Bonder paternity battle---is
the real floozy.
Bing's the last person you'd place on a list of people
worried about Good Government.
Shawn Steel theorizes that Bing "is a huge fan of
Gray Davis because he's a brain-dead, party-down in San
Francisco, never worked a day in his life, bad news guy.
Bing gives me intriguing Socialist thoughts, like, 'He
doesn't deserve all that wealth.'"
Bing bought his way into social circles in Washington
and Sacramento that require huge donations. Now, with
the Democrats out in Washington, California's shell-shocked
political climbers--Bing, Saban, the Resnicks and others--are
focused like lasers on saving their power in Sacramento.
I also see on the Grease Gray list very rich trial lawyers
like the brilliant Joseph
W. Cotchett of Burlingame, who has good reason to
believe that California's backwards tort system, which
allows massive verdicts for modest wrongs, will never
be reformed under gutless Davis. And I see big developers
who know Davis will say California needs open space, but
then will allow awful development in the back door.
I'm quite sure these fabulously rich Davis loyalists really
do hope California turns around someday.
But priorities come first. And the first question clearly
is: what about me?
From JillStewart.net |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Sharon Davis'
Attack Blog |
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
