Former Rep. Tom Campbell, the moderate Republican who is consistently the most original and thoughtful of any of the candidates for governor, spoke this morning at former Assembly Speaker Willie Brown's annual election day breakfast in San Francisco.
Rather than give a traditional speech, he cited a list of the top 25 "whoppers" that candidates for state office in California typically tell. Many of them relate directly to positions other candidates for governor have taken, but Campbell pointedly decided not to name names. The list warrants wider dissemination, so here goes:
"A 'whopper' is a statement that the person making it knows is not true, but it's useful in a campaign. Here are the 25 worst whoppers I've heard...
1. The budget will be balanced if only the wealthy pay their fair share.
2. Cut taxes and government revenue will automatically rise. (The logical corollary is that government will generate most revenue at a tax rate of zero.)
3. You can balance the state budget by eliminating 'waste, fraud, and abuse.'
4. You can balance the state budget by a 'top down' review to get rid of hundreds of state programs.
5. You can balance the budget if you 'run the state like a business.'
6. You can balance the budget by firing thousands of state workers.
7. We can solve California's water shortage if only farms would use drip irrigation.
8. We can solve California's water shortage if only Southern Californians would stop watering their lawns, and washing their 3rd and 4th cars.
9. We don't need to build new dams -- the system we completed 48 years ago is more than adequate today.
10. All our country's petroleum needs can be met by offshore drilling.
11. No source of energy is worse than nuclear.
12. Global warming is all made up.
13. Stopping global warming is more important to the 3rd world than clean water, child immunization, or anti-malaria treated mosquito nets.
14. You can't trust companies to stop producing greenhouse gases without monitoring every smokestack.
15. A new health care plan to cover everyone won't add a dime to the deficit.
16. One Republican Senator makes a bill bipartisan.
17. Thank God for Mississippi, because otherwise, California would be dead last in per pupil education funding. (Actually, we're 26th.)
18. California can cut funding to education without worsening results.
19. It's OK to have more than 30 students in a class, because children really don't learn better in smaller classes.
20. There's no such thing as a bad teacher -- that's why we haven't fired any.
21. You can fix education if you only allow corporal punishment back in the classroom.
22. The government can print 3 trillion dollars in new money without causing inflation.
23. The Wall Street melt-down was caused by paying greedy CEO's too much.
24. There's nothing wrong with Wall Street that more federal regulation can't fix.
25. You can raise 7 million dollars without really deciding to run for governor!"
I LOVE TOM CAMPBELL!!!
Tom Campbell is a genius, I'm bookmarking this list! If only the people of California were smart enough to vote for him!
Tom Campbell wasn't even on the Ventura County Republican Central Committees website until I bitched about it. Last I checked he was on but his web link wasn't active. Obviously, members of his own party are working against him. This is WRONG! He is the best voice for the GOP.
Katie, you have no idea how right you are about Campbell being the GOP's best option. I'm a Bay Area liberal (not necessarily a D) and Campbell is the only R in the race for Governor that I would give any consideration to, and I probably disagree with north of 70% of his positions. What impresses me most is his how he explains his approach to the issues and the depth of his familiarity with so many of the issues. Again, while I disagree with many of his conclusions as to what should be done, i'm more liable to vote for him because I can tell that he has given serious consideration and examination to the issues and is not just regurgitating the public's fantasy back to them (i.e. that we can 'lower taxes, decrease spending, and get higher quality outcomes' because there's so much waste and every previous office holder was a corrupt SOB -- that's just nonsense and any candidate who runs on that platform (Poizner?) is one I can't take seriously).
I especially liked this whopper:
6. You can balance the budget by firing thousands of state workers.
You could've fired every state employee back in February and still wouldn't have been able to balance the budget, yet Tony Strickland's employee Mike Stoker (running against Susan Jordan and Das Williams for AD 35) consistently perpetuates myth #6 in every one of his stump speeches.
Campbell needs to have a talk with this guy.
The Stricklands use #3 over and over.
On # 17, it depends on which list you use. Education Week has us near the bottom.
I'm an active Dem for Campbell, I think he's proposed thoughtful solutions to many of CA's problems. Democrats for Campbell!
Good writing. This gives good information on the topic.
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