I generally think that Californians know enough about Gray Davis to have decided long ago whether they should vote 'Yes' or 'No' on the recall ballot. If not, they certainly should. For that matter, I think that they knew all of this back in November when they re-elected him last time.
Still, the recall election is Tuesday, and evidently just before the weekend before the election is the best time to plant meaningless personal stories about your least-favorite candidate. I haven't even lived in California in ten years, but I was annoyed when he blamed all Texans for California's energy crisis, so what the heck. I'll do my part to spread perfectly factual gossip about the man, as if it matters.
Jill Stewart wrote an article for the New Times LA (no longer in print) back on November 27, 1997, that revealed much about the personal character of then-Lieutenant Governor Gray Davis. A word of warning: The following article contains foul language. If you're easily offended, well, California politics just isn't for you.
Closet Wacko Vs. Mega-Fibber
Jill StewartI have this file, labeled Gray Davis, that for the last few years I've been stuffing with all the bizarre little tales that are quietly shared among journalists and political insiders about the man who, though probably viewed as a blandly pleasant talking head by most Californians, is in fact one of the strangest ducks ever elected to statewide office.
Long protected by editors at the Los Angeles Times—who have nixed every story Times reporters have ever tried to develop about Davis's storied history of physical violence, unhinged hysteria and gross profanity—the baby-faced, dual personality Davis has been allowed to hold high public office with impunity.
Perhaps you are among the millions never told of Lieutenant Governor Davis's widely known—but long unreported—penchant for physically attacking members of his own staff. His violent tantrums have occurred throughout his career, from his days as Chief of Staff for Jerry Brown to his long stint as State Controller to his current job.
Davis's hurling of phones and ashtrays at quaking government employees and his numerous incidents of personally shoving and shaking horrified workers—usually while screaming the f-word "with more venom than Nixon" as one former staffer recently reminded me—bespeak a man who cannot be trust with power. Since his attacks on subservients are not exactly "domestic violence," they suggest to me the need for new lexicon that is sufficiently Dilbertesque. I would therefore like to suggest "office batterer" for consideration as you observe Davis in his race for governor.
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Article comments
1 - Murphy Horner
I heard this...I think it's terrible. So much for my decision to vote 'No' on the recall.
I didn't vote for him the first time anyway.
2 - Brian Flemming
The L.A. Times didn't report on these rumors largely because they didn't meet the standards they used for the Schwarzengroper story.
That story used some anonymous sources, but always spoken to directly by the Times and corroborated by named sources.
Jill Stewart's 1997 story has one named source for one incident. The other incident is neither directly reported nor corroborated. It's not only anonymous--it's a friend-of-a-friend thing.
If you read the L.A. Times story, you'll see that none of the six incidents of Schwarzengroping they report on are based on anything so shaky.
The Times editors said they had plenty of other leads about A.S. sexual-harassment incidents, but they couldn't corroborate them to their satisfaction in the seven weeks they had for the investigation (this election doesn't have anything near the lead time that a typical election would--it's not the Times' fault that the story is being published when it is).
Arnold's behavior follows a pattern that is confirmed time and again by witnesses not connected to each other or involved with partisan politics. The Gray Davis rumors reported by Jill Stewart simply don't meet that standard.
3 - Phillip Winn
ME: Goose, meet Gander.
GOOSE: No! My feathers are completely different, and the coloration is all wrong!
ME: What was that about raising the standard of evidence again?
GOOSE: But that's different! It's DIFFERENT!
ME: The 1997 sources said they were afraid to come forward, as did the 2003 sources. How is that different? More importantly, what the heck does either issue have to do with job performance, the issue at hand?
GOOSE: It just does, that's all.
ME: Sorry, buddy, your goose is probably cooked.
4 - RJ Elliott
So let's see:
Gray is a psycho
Arnold is a perv
Cruz supports a 5th-Column organization
And McClintock can't win
Why can't McClintock win? Please? Pretty please?
5 - Brian Flemming
6 sources
all directly spoke to the Times
all corroborated by other, named parties
vs.
2 sources
1 directly spoke with Jill Stewart
1 spoke through an intermediary
neither is corroborated by a named party
If you'd like the L.A. Times to lower its editorial standards to Stewart's level, you can send them a letter with your request. If they grant your request, though, they're going to need a lot more paper to print all of the (hundreds? thousands?) of A.S. stories that meet the lower standard.