Los Angeles, CA – $142 Mil. Wasn’t Enough For Whitman To Win in California

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    Republican California Governor candidate Meg Whitman takes questions from the media at the Pasadena Republican headquarters in Pasadena, Calif. on Tuesday, Nov. 2, 2010. In California, the former CEO of eBay poured more than $150 million of her own money into the campaign, making it the most expensive non presidential race in the nation's history. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)Los Angeles, CA – Republican Meg Whitman poured $142 million of her personal fortune into her race for California governor, spending money at a record pace to flood the airwaves with ads about her plans to scale back government and turn around the beleaguered state.

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    Yet even in a year when voters were angry with career politicians, Californians rejected the first-time candidate and former chief executive of eBay Tuesday in favor of Democrat Jerry Brown, who has been in politics most of his life.

    Brown spent about $30 million on his campaign, although he was buoyed by another $26 million in spending by unions. Including contributions from others, Whitman’s total spending was expected to exceed $162 million.

    In the end, however, Whitman failed to connect with voters of nearly every demographic other than white men and the wealthiest state residents, according to public opinion polls and an analysis of exit poll results by The Associated Press.

    Her oft-promoted plan to target specific groups of swing voters also failed.

    Brown speculated that voters may have tired of her after nearly a year of advertising that included her Republican primary campaign.

    “Throwing a lot of ads on the TV in the middle of the summer might not make a lot of sense,” Brown said Tuesday as he cast his ballot in Oakland. “There’s only so many times you can tell somebody something.”

    The race set a campaign spending record in a year when Republicans appeared to have the edge and were expected to win a majority of governor’s seats across the country.

    Whitman’s campaign included a roster of highly paid Republican advisers from Sacramento and Washington, a staff photographer and research team, compared with Brown’s frugal campaign that relied on volunteers and extensive bartering with vendors.

    Many wondered why Whitman wanted the job at all. She had no previous involvement in government, no noticeable record of civic involvement and had rarely voted.

    The victory by the 72-year-old Brown, the current state attorney general, left him with the enormous task of lifting the state out of a recession and driving down a persistently high jobless rate.

    Brown was California’s 34th governor during his previous tenure from 1975 to 1983, and now becomes its 39th.

    “I take as my challenge forging a common purpose, but a common purpose based not just on compromise but a vision of what California can be. I see a California once again leading in renewable energy, in public education and an openness to every kind of person whatever their color is,” Brown said in his victory speech Tuesday night.

    Whitman conceded and said she called Brown to wish him well.

    “Tonight has not turned out quite as we had hoped. We’ve come up a little short, but certainly not for lack of hard work, determination and a clear vision for making our state better,” she told supporters at Universal City near Los Angeles.

    Brown’s victory brought the office back under Democratic control. Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s term will end in January after a little more than seven years in office.

    Schwarzenegger congratulated Brown in a statement and praised him for his lifetime of public service. He pledged to work with Brown for a smooth transition.

    The son of a former two-term governor, Brown has spent decades in and out of politics starting when he was seated on the Los Angeles Community College Board of Trustees in 1969.

    As the campaign entered its final days, Brown promoted his deep ties in California, with family roots stretching to the Gold Rush era, presenting an image of a native son deeply connected to the place he will oversee for a second time.

    He was eligible to run because his previous stint as governor came before voters enacted term limits.


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    7 Comments
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    basmelech
    basmelech
    13 years ago

    If I had so much personal wealth I wouldn’t bother running for office. I’d just sit back and enjoy life with my family and support all my sons in kollel and give a lot of tzeddaka.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    13 years ago

    Its nice to see these right wing zealots “burn” their money in seeking to be elected. She must be a happy camper along with Paladino in New York, McMahon in Connecticut and a few of the others who couldn’t buy their way into office

    13 years ago

    Enough of billionaire politicians.

    Chaveirim
    Chaveirim
    13 years ago

    Well as opposed to people like you, she wanted to help California, to be more precise she actually HELPED CA’s economy during the campaign, by giving so many people temporary jobs. It’s a shame that the Californians didn’t vote her in, they’ll pay the price for the next 4 years…

    KevinTheMevin
    KevinTheMevin
    13 years ago

    Thank g-d she was not elected, when she was running eBay it was a total disaster, she would of done the same to the state.

    charliehall
    charliehall
    13 years ago

    Brown was a successful governor by any standard. He left the state prosperous and the state government in good fiscal health. He was generally a social liberal and a fiscal conservative. For 23 of the 28 years since Brown left office, Republicans have run the state and they have run it into the ground. Since then, Brown has been a decent Mayor of Oakland and a decent Attorney General. Whitman’s tenure at eBay was mixed. (She does look good by comparison with her running mate Carly Fiorina who ran Hewlett-Packard into the ground.) Ironically, one of Whitman’s own ads said it all: She pointed out that opportunities were limitless in California when she moved to the state 30 years ago, that “you could do anything”. The Brown campaign took her words and put them into one of their own ads, pointing out that the Governor of California 30 years ago was…Jerry Brown!

    I hope that Brown’s second tenure as governor will be as successful as the first.

    HeshyEkes
    HeshyEkes
    13 years ago

    Unfortunately, the “takers” (of food stamps, Medicaid, ‘earned income credit’ etc.) outnumber the Payers (working people & businesspeople who pay taxes), hence the liberals will usually win elections & destroy this country.