Approach of War Reveals an Alienation in California

Approach of War Reveals an Alienation in California


By DEAN E. MURPHY


SAN FRANCISCO, March 19 — As Americans braced in recent days for a war against Iraq, many Californians were feeling strangely out of it. The great expanse between the two coasts appeared ever vaster. The sense of threat, so acute in the East, was real but less immediate here.

The University of California Board of Regents canceled a meeting in San Francisco today because of "concerns about travel," but the National Guard soldiers posted at the Golden Gate Bridge amounted to a small fraction of the deployments in New York or Washington.

Even when the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences decided to forgo the traditional red carpet entrance to Sunday's Oscar ceremonies in Los Angeles, officials said it was more a matter of wartime propriety than battle-eve jitters.

From stockbrokers in San Francisco to software engineers in Silicon Valley to studio executives in Los Angeles, many Californians were puzzled by the connection between the terror attacks of Sept. 11 and the danger posed by Saddam Hussein, something taken for granted in many other parts of the country.

"I am hoping the administration has so much more knowledge that it can justify its actions, because on the face of it, I can't see a reason for doing this," said David Randall, a philanthropic fund-raiser in San Francisco.

"There are many good reasons to get rid of Saddam," Mr. Randall said. "But when did the events of Sept. 11 get transformed into going to war with Iraq? Why war with this one country, right now? I can't figure out how we got to this point."

That confusion is evident even though California has contributed more men and women to the call-up of reservists and National Guard forces than any other state. The defense industry pumps about $30 billion a year into California's economy. And while 29 military bases were closed in the 1990's, 61 installations remain in use statewide.

But California's isolation from Washington, both geographically and, in recent years, politically, has helped foster a sense of alienation. The state, which had such an affinity for Bill Clinton, voted decisively against President Bush in 2000.

"There is a growing disbelief among Californians that the White House is really representing their views and interests," said Mark Baldassare, the director of research at the Public Policy Institute of California, a nonpartisan group in San Francisco that recently conducted an opinion poll of public attitudes toward President Bush, the war, which was then imminent, and other issues.

Mr. Baldassare said this attitude had been building for several years, starting with the state's energy crisis and the administration's handling of it. "Because of this disconnect," he said, "many Californians don't give the president the benefit of the doubt on the issue of Iraq any more than they give the president the benefit of the doubt on whether we really need to do away with taxes on dividends or whether a tax cut will lead to a better economy."

In fact, many people acknowledged that they might feel differently if a Democrat were leading them into battle. "I was wondering if I would feel more comfortable if it were Bill Clinton and Al Gore saying we needed to do this now, and I think I would," said Felicia Marcus, who was the regional administrator in California for the United States Environmental Protection Agency in the Clinton administration.

During some lunchtime and office-cooler chatter there has even been longing for President Clinton, a Hollywood favorite, who, the reasoning goes, would never have allowed a war to play havoc with Oscar night, one of the state's most hallowed traditions.

By some accounts, the chasm in attitudes between East and West is new only in its intensity. Many residents have always enjoyed thinking of themselves as different from the rest of the country, especially those working in the Hollywood pop-culture factory.

"Californians love that sense of distinctiveness," said Peter Bart, editor of Variety. "We're not going to see the 60's again, but I think we are going to see a lot of rebellion against the mandates of Washington. This is an unpredictable and bizarre place, and I think we are definitely heading into an intensely politicized time in Hollywood."

Since many of the most prominent antiwar spokesmen in recent months have been Hollywood celebrities, this has further bolstered California's self-image and the state's image around the country as the epicenter of antiwar sentiment. The Academy Awards on Sunday night, if they come off as planned, will probably only harden that perception.

Robert Greenwald, a Hollywood producer and director who helped found Artists United to Win Without War, said a number of celebrities had committed to wearing antiwar pins at the awards, including Ben Affleck, Kirsten Dunst, Jake and Maggie Gyllenhaal, Dustin Hoffman, Jessica Lange, Meryl Streep and the entire U2 rock band.

Doubting in California, however, is not the sole province of Hollywood, or even of the career leftists and peace advocates who were among those blocking streets today in downtown San Francisco. The police said one peace demonstrator died when he jumped from the Golden Gate Bridge in an apparent suicide.

"There is less fear of conforming here," said Warren Langley, the former president of the Pacific Stock Exchange. "People are more willing to question what the president says."

Mr. Langley found himself in an unusual place last week: At the San Francisco jail after being arrested for blocking the entrance to the exchange in an antiwar protest. The blockade was his first act of civil disobedience — he even attended an evening of training in preparation — but probably not his last, he said.

"It has been 30 years since I even had a traffic ticket," said Mr. Langley, who led the exchange between 1996 and 1999 and was arrested in a suit and tie. He also happens to be a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel who was once an instructor at the Air Force Academy, "We are not going to stop this war. I know that," he said. "But I have to find a way I can help others, help us as Americans become good citizens of the world again."


It is also the case, some say, that Californians do not feel as unsafe as people in other parts of the country.

"We didn't feel or see any of the shocks of Sept. 11 except on television," said Steven Maviglio, a spokesman for Gov. Gray Davis. "We don't have anything like they do in Washington, where trucks are rolled up on the grounds of the Washington Monument, or where there was a mad rush for duct tape."


Robert J. Waste, a professor of public policy at California State University, Sacramento, said the state's ethnic and racial diversity and large immigrant population also played a part, making it distinctive — and less receptive to the president's message.

"The deepest penetration of the president's case for war is among white males and Republicans," Professor Waste said. "That is not the whole of California."

An opinion poll conducted last week in the Sacramento area by the university's Institute for Social Research pointed to diversity as a determining factor on the war question.

The poll showed that support for a war was weakest among racial minorities and strongest among men. In El Dorado County, a mostly white and conservative area in the Sierra Nevada, 65 percent of respondents favored military action. In Sacramento County, where there are large immigrant and minority communities, support was 49 percent.

"California is more diverse than the rest of the country, and this diversity is the hardest part of the sell for war," Professor Waste said.

Mr. Baldassare of the Public Policy Institute said an opinion poll conducted last month by the group showed that the troubled California economy had colored the views of residents about many subjects, like the popularity of Governor Davis (he registered a 60 percent disapproval rating; to the state's future (only 28 percent said the state was headed in the right direction), to President Bush's handling of the situation in Iraq (50 percent said they disapproved, while 46 percent approved).

"People are in a kind of nervous mood I haven't seen since the early 1990's," Mr. Baldassare said. "They are very wary of the state's vulnerable position economically right now. That has made people cautious about things they might view as extraneous events, including going to war with Iraq."

It is not just Californians who view themselves as different and apart. So do some of their visitors.

David Houston, a self-described conservative from Tampa Bay, Fla., who was on a monthlong vacation in California, said many people in the state struck him as out of touch with the rest of America. "It is obvious a lot of people here are against the war," he said. "Of course, if a lot of them went to visit the World Trade Center, they might think differently."




Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company