Whores, housekeepers and Nazis
Election Day has come and gone. The confetti has been swept up, the pundits are busy doing postmortems on how someone could possibly spend a gazillion dollars (that may not be the exact figure) and still lose by double digits.
As the analysts and talking heads dissect what went wrong in the most expensive statewide campaign in history, let's take a stroll down memory lane, shall we?
(Team Whitman is also in a nostalgic mood. Their YouTube retrospective doesn't make mention of whores or housekeepers, but we like the soundtrack.)
Here are some of the more quotable moments ... Read more
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Meg Whitman
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Nov. 7, 2010"The big unions in the last couple of years have spent $300 million on politics," Murphy said. "So, you either can't raise enough money to compete, and they swamp you ... or you spend your own money, but if you're a self-funder, the press wants to make that money the issue."
Source: PolitiCal (Los Angeles Times)Tags: Campaigns and politics, Labor, Assertion of fact
Meg Whitman
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Nov. 7, 2010Murphy also blamed spending by the state's influential public-employee unions, in part, for the loss, saying they "run California politics." Unions spent heavily on TV ads attacking Whitman during the summer months as Brown hoarded his limited treasury. "They paid for Jerry Brown's campaign," he said.
Source: PolitiCal (Los Angeles Times)Tags: Campaigns and politics, Labor, Assertion of fact, Candidate attack
Meg Whitman
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Nov. 7, 2010"We got beat. And, you know, I ran the campaign. I take responsibility for it," Murphy said Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press." "It's a very blue state, and it's getting bluer. As the red, you know, wave, kind of went one way, there was a bit of blue riptide coming the other way." Whitman was able to win GOP and independent votes, he said, but not Democrats, and "in California, if you don't win a lot of Democrats, you don't win." Murphy, who was paid $90,000 a month by Whitman for his strategic advice, had avoided questions about the race since Tuesday's defeat. The voters, he said Sunday, rejected "CEO candidates who were doing kind of a tough-medicine message."
Source: PolitiCal (Los Angeles Times)Tags: Campaigns and politics, Assertion of fact
Meg Whitman
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Nov. 7, 2010Mike Murphy, chief strategist to Meg Whitman, blamed public-employee unions and California's status as "a very blue state" for the GOP gubernatorial candidate's loss to Democrat Jerry Brown on Tuesday, even as she spent a national record $142 million of her own money trying to beat him.
Source: PolitiCal (Los Angeles Times)Tags: Campaigns and politics, Assertion of fact
Meg Whitman
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Nov. 4, 2010Friends: From the beginning of this campaign, I asked Californians who believe in a new vision for our state to join me. I have never stopped being amazed over these many months by the breadth and enthusiasm of your response. Your time and energy were critical to building this campaign. ... We overcame great obstacles to get this far, and I could not be any prouder of the race we ran. I gave it my all and so did you. We came up short, but certainly not for lack of hard work, determination and a clear vision for making our state better. Politics too often lacks humanity; I wanted this campaign to be something different, reaching all parts of California and engaging communities that often are overlooked or whose votes are taken for granted. By that score, we succeeded and how. We took the time and invested the resources to introduce our campaign to the state's incredibly diverse population. We met with hundreds of small business employers and their workers. By Tuesday, we had held more than 750 events. The journey is ending, but the mission is not. We did not achieve the victory we worked so hard for, but that is not a reason to give up on what's most important. We love California and we still believe our state can be a better place. You probably are familiar with my belief in the Power of Many. We proved it at eBay, and we proved it again in this campaign: Together, inspired people with common goals can accomplish what none of us can do alone. If you care about California's future, I have one more request of you: Let's keep working, each of us in our own way, to make our state great again. After all, we are Californians who always see a brighter horizon. Thank you again for being part of this remarkable effort.
Source: Meg Whitman campaignTags: Campaigns and politics, Quotable
Jerry Brown
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Nov. 4, 2010"Politicians come and politicians go, and the people are looking for things to be better," he said. "And if you can't deliver, they get somebody else to try. "I've been up and I've been down," said Brown. "I'm going to do my darndest to stay up."
Source: San Francisco ChronicleTags: Leadership style, Quotable
Jerry Brown
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Nov. 4, 2010He said Californians passed Proposition 25, which ends the two-thirds legislative majority for passing a state budget, while also approving Proposition 26, which calls for a two-thirds vote to pass fees. "The taxpayers gave - and they also took away," he said. "On the one hand, people said, 'by majority give us a budget' and on the other, they said, 'don't pick my pocket.' "What we have to do is win the confidence and trust of the people of California," he said. That, he added, will require competing groups - Republicans, Democrats, labor unions and business - to "push toward a common interest."
Source: San Francisco ChronicleTags: Budget, Leadership style, Taxes, Policy or issue position
Jerry Brown
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Nov. 4, 2010"The voters last night turned down a mere $18-a-year (car) tax by about 60 percent, so I would say that the electorate is in no mood to add to their burdens."
Source: San Francisco ChronicleTags: Taxes, Policy or issue position
Jerry Brown
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Nov. 4, 2010The former Oakland mayor also said he will continue living in the Oakland hills with his wife, Anne Gust Brown, although they will find a place to live in Sacramento that will be "modest." Still, he said, "I'm not selling (the Oakland) house until it maintains its original value, and that may take a lot of work on my part."
Source: San Francisco ChronicleTags: Personal life, Quotable
Jerry Brown
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Nov. 4, 2010"I want to rethink the structure, I want to flatten the administration," he said, adding that he wants to explore "organizing state government to make it leaner, more responsive and more coherent."
Source: San Francisco ChronicleTags: Government services, State legislature, Policy or issue position
