Calif. Debate: who won; who lost per BBB

Interesting. Anyone else seen it?

Unfortunately, yes.

Much ado about nothing...

I disagree with the impression of Davis' performance. His main talking point of the night was to repetitively say that he's learned his lesson and intends to be closer to the people and listen to what they have to say. He still doesn't get it that his proximity and listening skills are not what got him into the mess in the first place.



This article has excerpts from the debate if you're interested in the details.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A24303-2003Sep4.html

In the rest of the world a no-show is. automatically, a loser in any debate. So show the polls.

But hell, we're talking about California!

Internet meet-up for Ueberroth brings GOP politics to the Ha
VOICE OF THE VOTER
Internet meet-up for Ueberroth brings GOP politics to the Haight
Joe Garofoli, S.F. Chronicle Staff Writer Saturday, September 6, 2003

San Francisco -- Both the assembled Peter Ueberroth supporters and those just curious about the Republican's recall campaign shrugged at how they wound up meeting in the Haight-Ashbury.

Only California's recall could unite devotees of the co-chairman of the Pebble Beach Co. at the People's Cafe, a bong's throw from the Summer of Love's spiritual birthplace. When the guy behind the counter began fielding calls this week asking what time the Ueberroth meeting started, he thought "it was one of those Internet hoaxes."

He was half-right.

The masses were summoned by Ueberroth supporters using the hottest new thing in politics -- the "meet-up," in which like-minded supporters hook up over the Internet, then get together in groups large and small to plot an activist strategy. It's a way for those mad as hell at what's become of the Golden State to rail together as one.

OK, so only four showed up at the Ueberroth meet-up, even though three times that many RSVP'd a "yes."

Yet what else could surround a table in the Haight with a suit-wearing Republican, two moderate Democrats and a Libertarian ex-Olympic weightlifter named Butch? To talk politics, on a Thursday night, in a cafe plastered with half a dozen posters blaring the word "Disobey"?

It was a bit awkward at first. Especially after no one had an answer for the questions, "Where is everybody else?" and "Who is supposed to lead this?"

Yet once the Uebbies started chatting, there was no shortage of Peter bonding. And of anger about California's many problems. And of differing opinions about the recall. As for Ueberroth, one was ready to vote for him, one was leaning and two were undecided.

Despite their differences, within minutes they were dropping references from Ueberroth's 18-year-old, out-of-print book, "Made in America, His Own Story," gently critiquing Wednesday's stiff debate appearance ("I know Peter's better than that"), punditing on why his campaign has been nearly invisible thus far ("he's waiting for the Arnold supernova to flame out") and swapping tales of Ueb encounters over the years.

20-YEAR WAIT

"I've been waiting 20 years for him to run for governor," said James "Butch" Curry, the 50-year-old ex-Olympian who got to know Ueberroth when the candidate presided over the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles -- still at the top of Ueberroth's public resume.

Curry remembers Ueberroth coming to the weightlifting venue where he worked,

sans suit. "He was a real guy," the balding, burly Curry told his table mates.

"He wasn't like the suits who'd come down there."

Lara Hair, the group's lone Republican -- and the Haight's lone suit- wearer -- had Arnold Schwarzenegger at the top of her replacement list until he didn't show up at Wednesday's debate in Walnut Creek. Ueberroth intrigues her because he isn't a politician, which also is what makes her nervous. She wonders whether electing a nonpolitician would create a bigger mess.

"My hope is that he would come in and fix the economy," said Hair, a 31- year-old property manager in San Francisco's South Beach who came with her boyfriend, 33-year-old accountant Sean Tabler.

"Yeah, with some kind of miracle cure," Curry said.

"But there are so many other things that a governor has to do," Hair said. "I wonder if how he could avoid the politics."

"C'mon, don't you think there were politics with the Olympics? And with Rebuild L.A. (the organization Ueberroth helped after the Los Angeles riots)?" Curry said.

"He'd have such a mandate if he won," said Teka Thomas, a 28-year-old, third-year law student at the University of San Francisco and a moderate Democrat.

Still, Thomas has reservations. He wants to hear Ueberroth give assurances that he won't appoint conservative judges.

"Nah, he won't do anything really conservative," Curry said. "Like he said on TV (the debate) the other night, he's not interested in that stuff."

After listening to the exchange for 90 minutes, Tabler said Thomas had changed his mind on one thing -- the recall itself. Thomas likened it to a football team whose fans (the voters) had called all the plays, then fired the coach when the team went 0-16.


PLANNING NEXT MEET-UP
Smiles all around, the Uebs began planning their next meet-up, which would fall on Oct. 2, five days before the recall election.

"You watch," Thomas predicted. "If Peter hits 25 percent in the polls by then, this place will be packed with every country-club yuppie around. Haight Street will have never seen that many penny loafers."

"Nah," Curry said. "If that happens, then it would be held at Perry's" -- in the Marina district, where the Uebbies will find a lot more suits.

E-mail Joe Garofoli at [email protected].