So. Central Green Lt. Gov Candid. Donna Warren Silenced by LA Times!! Write them!!

Hi All,
The L.A. Times published an article today on the Lieutenant Governor's race. The full article is at the end of this letter. The only mention of our outstanding candidate, Donna Warren, was when they listed the third party candidates, and then gave recent poll numbers. These were 52% for Bustamante, 31% for McPherson, and 16% undecided. This was from a Los
Angeles Times poll. If these numbers were true, that would mean that all third party candidates combined only had 1% support! This is preposterous!

The reason for these totally misleading numbers are that the questions was asked as follows:

"If the general election for lieutenant governor were being held today and the candidates were Bruce McPherson, the Republican, and Cruz Bustamante, the Democrat, for whom would you vote: McPherson or Bustamante?"

We need to blast the L.A. Times for their deliberate omission of third party candidates, particularly the Greens. Send your letters to :

<letters [at] latimes.com>
and
<readers.rep [at] latimes.com>.

Here are some points to make:

"If your poll numbers are to be believed, the Green Party candidate and other third parties votes add up to only 1%. This is quite preposterous. And it is only because the poll is conducted by completely *omitting* the names of all but the Democratic and Republican candidates."

"We now see that the L.A. Times consciously prints false information. You know that if the poll was taken asking each candidates name, that the results would be very different. The Green Party candidate alone might have accounted for 2-3% of the vote. Leaving out third party canididates is a deliberate act of falsification."

"It begins to looks as if the L.A. Times is acting as a shils for Democrats and Republicans. Perhaps the Times should have to register it's one-sided support for these parties as an in-kind campaign contibution."

"Green Party Lieutenant Governor candidate Donna Warren brings a courageous and fresh voice to the campaign. She pushes hard on issues the two major
parties won't touch, like the failed "War on Drugs" and reparations for slavery."


.................................................................................
October 16, 2002
THE STATE
Bustamante Makes Most of Post in Davis' Shadow Seeking second term as lieutenant governor, he is criticized by GOP rival Bruce McPherson as 'invisible.'

By Gregg Jones, Times Staff Writer

SACRAMENTO -- Over the past four years, Cruz Bustamante has gamely embraced the Golden Rule of Lieutenant Governors: Grab the limelight whenever you can, even if it means issuing press releases when you give blood or hand out Thanksgiving turkeys.

Being lieutenant governor will do that to a politician.

It's a thankless job, shorn of the governor's power and perks and scorned by pundits and other politicians. A steppingstone, perhaps? Graveyard might be more accurate. Only two sitting lieutenant governors in the past 120 years have been elected governor: Democrat Gray Davis in 1998 and Republican C.C. Young in 1926.

"You're not in the spotlight, except occasional moments," said Bruce Cain, director of the Institute of Governmental Studies at UC Berkeley. "You're not in control of any money or department. It's the state equivalent of the vice presidency, with many of the same issues. It can be a frustrating office."

Four years after becoming the first Latino since 1871 to win a statewide election in California, Bustamante is shrugging off those frustrations and seeking a second term as lieutenant governor on Nov. 5. His campaign is seen by many Democrats as a tune-up for a 2006 run for governor.

Bustamante, 49, a self-effacing former Assembly speaker, doesn't deny he's interested in seeking the Democratic gubernatorial nomination -- assuming he wins in November, he emphasizes.

"I want to continue working on the things we've started," said Bustamante. "I want to be able to help people."

Earlier this year, Bustamante was seen as vulnerable. The self-described "plodder" is dismissed by some Democrats as deficient in charisma and campaign fund-raising skills.

His chief challenger, Republican state Sen. Bruce McPherson of Santa Cruz -- a moderate who has managed to get elected to the Legislature in one of the state's most liberal areas -- was viewed by analysts as the GOP's best chance of winning a statewide race this year. But McPherson, 58, has been hampered by a lack of money to make his case with voters who don't know him or his reputation. Thus far, he hasn't been able to transform his local appeal to Democrats and independents into statewide support.

"People don't know McPherson from a hole in the wall," said Cain. "This is a classic case of not having the money to get the message out there."

A Los Angeles Times poll conducted the last week of September showed Bustamante holding a comfortable 52% to 31% lead over McPherson among likely voters, with 16% undecided. Other candidates on the ballot are Jim King, American Independent; Donna J. Warren, Green; Pat Wright, Libertarian; Kalee Przybylak, Natural Law; and Paul Jerry Hanosh, Reform.

In recent weeks, with the race heading into the home stretch, McPherson has gone on the offensive. He has attacked Bustamante as a lazy seat-warmer who has wasted taxpayer money. He has singled out for criticism Bustamante's attendance record at University of California and California State University board meetings.

"I describe him as the invisible [lieutenant] governor," said McPherson. "I think it's an indication of his lack of enthusiasm for the job."

Bustamante shakes his head at these charges, and fires back with a few of his own. His aides have compiled a 50-page analysis of McPherson's missed Senate votes. The back-and-forth over missed votes and meetings may matter little to most voters, who pay scant attention to "down-ballot" races such as that for lieutenant governor, experts say.

Still, for the politically attuned, the debate is shining a rare spotlight on the duties of a lieutenant governor and on the difficulties of maintaining a meaningful profile in a job that can be a political black hole, experts and politicians say.

Bustamante took office four years ago amid a wave of Latino euphoria over his historic victory. His aim was to reach beyond his prescribed duties as lieutenant governor, which are largely confined to sitting on a network of state boards and commissions. Bustamante said he has accomplished that goal by "thinking out of the box" and launching his own statewide initiatives on breast-cancer awareness, racial tolerance and other issues.

Humble Beginnings

By Bustamante's own account, he's the political equivalent of a pack mule, plodding steadily forward toward the finish line. It's a defining trait he learned growing up as the son of a barber in the small Central Valley town of San Joaquin, where he worked in the fields and studied to be a butcher before a summer internship in his local congressman's office in Washington, D.C., set him on a path to politics and public service, he said.

Bustamante makes light of his lack of flashiness. His humble, self-deprecating style has endeared him to fellow politicians and voters.

Bustamante has stamped his style onto his standard campaign speech. In one version, he tells students and other constituents: "Remember, if you ever think something -- even college -- is beyond your reach, just think of me. Your perfect role model. I am short, overweight and losing my hair. If I can become lieutenant governor of the state of California, there is nothing that you can't do."

Bustamante said he has tried to make access to education a central issue of his first term. He has championed development of a 10th UC campus at Merced, in his native Central Valley. And he has traveled the state to promote Cal Grants for college-bound students.

Like other politicians, he's also been quick to tap into anger over the day's burning issues. Last year, for example, he attempted to position himself at the forefront of public outrage over the energy crisis by filing a lawsuit against energy companies on behalf of state taxpayers.

In the mold of previous lieutenant governors, Bustamante has jumped at the chance to savor his fleeting powers as "acting governor" when Davis has left the state, ordering flags lowered to half-staff to honor deceased politicians and police officers, and declaring emergency areas in fire-ravaged counties. Perhaps with an eye on a future statewide race, he has shrewdly cultivated key Democratic constituencies as lieutenant governor, strengthening ties with Latinos, unions and environmental groups.

He has been an election-season favorite of Native American tribes awash in casino profits and, in turn, has been a leading tribal advocate in Sacramento. Two years ago, when he created a lieutenant governor's Woman of the Year award, he named Mary Ann Martin Andreas -- then-chairwoman of the Morongo Band of Mission Indians -- as the first recipient.

When Bustamante took office four years ago, it marked the first time since 1974 that a lieutenant governor and governor from the same party had been elected. Davis and Bustamante pledged to work as partners. But their relationship deteriorated three months into their terms in a dispute over Davis' decision to seek federal mediation in a legal challenge to Proposition 187, the 1994 ballot measure curtailing social services for illegal immigrants, which was approved by 60% of California voters.

Bustamante said his criticism of Davis was born of "principle and conscience."

These days, Bustamante sums up his relationship in terse fashion. "He's an independent person -- and so am I," he said in an interview in his Sacramento office.

McPherson can't match Bustamante when it comes to the incumbent's compelling personal story. The Republican candidate grew up in relative privilege in Santa Cruz, where his family owned the local newspaper. Writing newspaper editorials for 10 years whetted his appetite for politics and honed his views, and the next logical step was a run for the Assembly, he said.

But McPherson's story took a tragically poignant turn last November, when his 27-year-old son, Hunter, was shot to death during a robbery on a San Francisco street. McPherson quietly refers to the murder as "a setback in our family situation."

Why Rival's Running

The Republican candidate said he is running for lieutenant governor for two fundamental reasons: It's a job that plays to his strengths and interests, and it's an opportunity to give Californians a chance to elect a moderate Republican.

McPherson embraces the label, which he said is defined by his support for abortion rights, gun control, environmental protection and public education. He counts several education initiatives as his proudest legislative achievements, including bills limiting class sizes, expanding the Cal Grant program, and strengthening technical education opportunities for high school graduates who don't go on to college.

"When you're lieutenant governor and you do the job you're supposed to do, you can really have an impact on education, in particular as the regent of UC or trustee of the CSU system," he said. "You can have an impact on our preservation of natural resources being on the state lands commission. You can have a strong influence on economic development and job creation as chairman of the economic development commission. Those are the things that interest me."

McPherson said the job of lieutenant governor will take on even greater importance over the next four years if Davis runs for president. Republicans and many Democrats "would rather have Bruce McPherson than Cruz Bustamante be the acting governor," he contends.

McPherson is hanging his election hopes on the possibility that many voters will reluctantly vote for Davis over struggling Republican gubernatorial candidate Bill Simon Jr., and then try to balance their decision by voting for a Republican lieutenant governor.

"It's a challenge when you have an incumbent Democrat who's a Latino for an opponent," said McPherson. "I've been told so many times I can't win, and I'm here, four elections and nine years later, to say you can."

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