Big Union Money Buys California Election

The election in California is not looking good for Governor Arnold Schwarzenneger. If these results hold up (website here) every one of the governor's propositions will go down to defeat. If it happens, it will be because the public employee unions who run this state successfully demonized the governor with a series of extremely negative television ads unanswered by the governor for months and paid for by money taken from their members regardless of their consent. (For an example of the coercive political fund raising practiced by unions, see this story here about employees who went to court and lost in an effort to have their dues returned to them because they objected to the union using their dues on politics.)

The election results prove that big money can buy an election for Democrats, that outrageous and false negative attack ads work, and that public employee unions are the most powerful special interest in California. It's a shame that the governor ran such an incompetent campaign in support of his reform agenda. The election results show that his reforms are necessary. But his weakened political position makes reform in California politics almost impossible.

-tdr