Just in case you didn’t know, Meg Whitman has a lot of money.  Her gigantic pile of money includes that she which made from eBay and her little dalliance with Goldman Sachs.  Heck, even Steve Poizner thought it was skeezy.  But, at this point, she doesn’t see any reason whatsoever to stop making every effort to purchase the governor’s gig.  And why not, $104 million is really only a down payment, and it’s just one step away from the White House, her intended destination anyway.

So, she really doesn’t need any added financial resources, but why the heck not?

Days after California’s  political watchdog agency said it would not crack down on issue advocacy ads until after the Nov. 2 election, a business group took aim at Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jerry Brown with a blistering example of such ads.

The Small Business Action Committee, backing Republican Meg Whitman for governor, launched a new television ad attacking Brown’s record on job creation and spending. (SacBee)

Of course, Joel Fox, the leader of this committee is quite supportive of Whitman.  He should be anyway. Just a few days after she paid $10,000 to be on his slate card for the primary, the committee endorsed her. How convenient. Must be good to get the green stuff coming in from Whitman and going out from the big corporations.  And there are cuts to be had at each stop.

Now, I would post there ad, but I think I prefer this Steve Poizner ad about Meg a lot better.

I do not have a statewide role in the Jerry Brown for Governor campaign — and I certainly do not speak for it!  I do volunteer for the campaign, though, as one of the people out in the local areas.  I’m trying to make sure that people in the grassroots can find each other, help whip up the campaign’s visibility and enthusiasm, and get out the message.

In that role, I’ve gotten some feedback: a lot of people, including young people who weren’t paying close attention to politics from 1974-1982 (not yet existing, after all), don’t yet know much about Jerry Brown.

The good news about that is that it’s a problem we can fix!

Now, the campaign is putting out a lot of information, and it’s working the Facebook page, but they keep telling us volunteers that we have a lot of latitude in how we organize our communities.

And that’s when I thought of all of you.  I think that you can help Brown win, from your own computers.

I stress: what I’m doing here is a wildcat, grassroots effort — which I construe to include the netroots.  The campaign doesn’t know in advance that I’m doing this; my understanding is that I don’t have to ask their permission.  So this is the initiative of one volunteer-activist who is trying to elect Brown, not of the overall campaign.

In the various campaigns on which I’ve worked, I’ve generally been (with varying success) an evangelist for the netroots.  People here are smart, you’re good writers, a lot of you have the time and energy to do research and write up something amazing, and most of you are yearning to contribute where you can.  While the state campaign will do its own messaging, I think that the netroots can offer a separate creative channel that may produce materials that dazzles even them.

So, I want to see what you all can do.  I’m “commissioning your work” at the median Jerry Brown Campaign salary of $0.00 (rounded down).  If what you produce is good, I will try to get it into as many hands as possible.  (I’ve already found that the campaign is responsive to good ideas from outside of its central command — and as a grassroots organizer with lots of latitude as to how to manage my area I’m making part of my task getting good ideas and work product from the netroots and trying to get the best of it into the right hands.

I make no promises as to how your work will be received by the campaign, but if it looks good I will do my best to ensure that it will be received.  That’s not an offer you can get from just anywhere!  And, of course, you can do this from anywhere, whether or not you’re in California.

Here are some things on which I’d like your help:

(1) Introducing people to Jerry Brown

The campaign has some materials introducing voters to Brown.  I’d like to see what you can come up with.  In particular, I’m interested in single-page flyers to help introduce Brown to students, to ethnic and racial minority communities, etc.  The man has a pretty great record, especially on environmental issues and human rights!  He’s got strong issues on education, labor, and fundamental economic fairness.  These would be positive pieces, talking solely about Jerry Brown rather than his opponent, the two-faced, lying, autocratic plutocrat Meg Whitman.  (Whoops!  Well, at least I can back up all of those words!)

(2) Collecting and consolidating netroots knowledge of Meg Whitman

Brown’s advantages and disadvantages in running against Whitman are well-known.  There’s only one major disadvantage: she has already spent around $110 million on the campaign; going past $150 million is a given and it would not be shocking if she went over $200 million.  Brown’s advantages are that he has a good record and he doesn’t have to pay people to like him.  But there’s another great advantage that we can help take advantage of, if we play our cards right:

Meg Whitman is an abominable candidate!

She hides from the press, she ducks debates, she doesn’t want anything to do with real people who are hurting from policies she supports.  But more than that, she lies and misrepresents and contradicts herself in ways that people can keep track of!  So that is what I’m asking you, collectively, to do: help keep track of Meg’s awfulness — both her gaffes and her awful policies — in a place where everyone can see it, write about it, organize it, bear it in mind, and spread the word about it.

We actually have a tool for that, one that gets used too infrequently: DKosopedia.  You’ll need to create an account and then you can weigh in and help keep a tally of Meg’s atrocities — past, present, and promised.  I’ve set up the “Meg Whitman page” here; once you’re there you write and edit it just like Wikipedia.  I’d like this to become a major resource for those opposed to Meg Whitman!  Wouldn’t you?  (Then sign up and start using it!)

(3) Help make more accessible Jerry Brown’s strong record as AG.

Calling my fellow lawyers and those interested in Law!  Jerry Brown has been a good Attorney General, especially compared to any conceivable Republican, and we need to get out that word!  I’d like to have a one-page flyer spelling out Brown’s accomplishments on behalf of consumers, the environment, civil rights, and more.  If you’d like to take notes by adding to Brown’s DKosopedia page, please do — it’s a great place to gather information!

(4) Brainstorming on visibility

Much of what we volunteers in local areas are supposed to do is to maintain the campaign’s visibility with the creative deployment of volunteers.  I’ve got some ideas about that; chances are that all of you have better ones.  Let’s hear them!  Extra points for activities that would be lots of fun.

I think that four tasks like that should be enough for a first diary asking for this sort of help.  But if you have more that you’d like to say about how to beat Meg’s Millions, speak up!

Here’s what I am not going to do in this diary, though: I’m not going to debate Brown’s record, whether he’s progressive or moderate enough, etc.  There’s a time for that — and the last three months of the election isn’t it!  So, please, contribute what positive suggestions about how to reach people.  I want to be able to show people from the campaign that the netroots is as creative and brilliant as I say it is.

I look forward to seeing what you’ve got!

Note: As I say in the diary, this election really is that important.  Whitman would be a disaster for the state.  You can contribute to Jerry’s campaign at the Calitics ActBlue Page.

If you’ve read this blog much, you’ll have seen Robert’s excellent writing on the flawed economic vision that Meg Whitman is espousing.  Her stated goal of cutting 40,000 jobs is unrealistic, at best, and at worst could push the state economy into an even deeper recession.  Heck, even the Governor questions whether that number is at all possible, saying something to the effect of that it was all a big campaign pledge with no real meaning behind it.  Let’s be honest, if Arnold is calling your campaign cynically out of touch, well, dang, you are that and then some.

But beyond that mere gamesmanship of that 40,000 number, her fundamental principles of her economic plan are just plain flawed. Sure, she can dress them up in a pretty magazine with glossy pages. But the stinker remains the stinker.   Or, as a panel of economists wrote in a new Center for American Progress Action Fund report (PDF) highlighted in the LA Times today:

In short, Whitman’s diagnosis of the California economy is deeply flawed and her “solutions” would be deeply damaging. Her approach to economic policy, which she calls “my kind of supply-side economics,” is wrong for California. As we document, the economic “studies” she draws upon are unscientific and an unsound basis for policy. If implemented, her policy proposals are likely to have negative effects on jobs and economic growth and to deepen the state’s budget crisis.

Just as Meg’s glossy magazine is a worthwhile read, even if only to get an idea of how the other side thinks, this brief report should be universally read by progressives.  Jerry Brown has articulated a vision that seeks to grow the economy through innovation, but in and out of government, while Whitman wants to simply burn the whole place down.

The report calls out the gaping wholes in her plan, which she has been touting as some sort of panacea.  But, the math just doesn’t add up. She wants to cut $15 Billion in spending while decreasing taxes. Yet the deficit stands at about $20 Billion, so how in the world does she think that this math adds up?  This isn’t one of those corporate gigs where you can just toss a billion here, a billion there.

Furthermore, when you talk about shaving $15Billion off a $86 Billion budget, you aren’t talking about easy fixes.  You are talking about ending services that save lives, and slashing education in ways that will continue to decrease our state’s ability to compete in the new knowledge based economy.  The cuts that have been made already are shocking enough, to further imply that cuts alone are the solution belies a thorough misunderstanding of the California budget.

So thorough is her misunderstanding that the simplest review of facts can put the lie to her statements.  First of all, you simply don’t just cut 40,000 workers without a major impact on government’s ability to function.  While she may beleive all the right-wing hooey about “waste, fraud, and abuse”, the fact is that goverment workers work just as hard as other workers, and there is no real evidence to show that waste is any higher in government than the corporate world. (Like, for example, go try asking a state worker if he or she has ever had some of the lavish lunches or private jets that Whitman got at eBay.)

Or another area, she argues that the state government is bloated, but the numbers just don’t bear that out.

In 2008, the most recent year available, California’s government employment per capita was 28 percent below the U.S. average, ranking 48th among the states, and California state employment per capita has not increased since the early 1980s.

So, is it all really as simple as Arnold has pointed out? She’s just saying this stuff to get elected, and that she’ll lurch towards sanity after November? Perhaps, but there are no sure bets, and Whitman is simply too dangerous to be complacent.  Jerry Brown’s victory is imperative for the state’s continued vitality.

UPDATE by Robert: It’s as clear as day: Whitmanomics doesn’t work for California. We already have 12% unemployment – over 21% if you go by the U6 measure. The absolute last thing we need is more unemployment, and the main thing we DO need is more investment in working people and the infrastructure that supports them. Whitman instead will continue a pirate economics of robbing the middle class blind.

Tom McClintock is certainly not one known to hold his tongue for any reason, but he’s let it all hang out with his feelings about the GOP nominee for Governor, Meg Whitman.

McClintock went on, “If it comes down to a choice between Arnold Schwarzenegger’s third term with Meg Whitman, or Jerry Brown’s third term with Jerry Brown, anyway you cut it, it’s going to be a long four years.” (SacBee)

I can’t say I really blame him, but this is all rather public. And he doesn describe the situation rather fairly.  The best the GOP, or the state really, can hope for from Meg Whitman is four more years of Arnold Schwarzenegger-style governance.  And really, it’s hard to think of any ways that Meg is either more capable or more knowledgeable about the problems than our current Governor.  

On a side note, if somebody asked me ten years ago whether I thought I would ever write the sentence above (about a CEO of a major corporation not being more knowledgeable than a former action movie star), I would have laughed.  But such is the situation that we find ourselves in.

As for the second clause of McClintock’s analysis, well, Jerry Brown would be Jerry Brown part III.  Now, while he had to spend much of his second term trying to patch together a system of governance that could last a few years in the wake of Prop 13, his record is really rather positive.  Sure, that Prop 13 is a bit of a downer, but he managed to somehow build a system that lasted nearly 25 years before it really broke under the weight of the super majority requirements.

But, all in all, I’m with Tom. Why would California want another term of Arnold Schwarzenegger?

It’s no secret that Meg Whitman is wealthy beyond most of our wildest dreams. But few know the true cost of Whitman’s wealth. Today, the California Labor Federation launched a new online video and video game that highlights Whitman’s job-slashing corporate history.

Labor Federation Executive Secretary-Treasurer Art Pulaski:

Meg Whitman has made a game of downsizing workers and outsourcing their jobs, and walking away with a very real fortune for herself in the process. The record shows that Whitman is a one-person weapon of mass job destruction. By attempting to buy the California Governor’s Office, Whitman wants to take her game to the next level, but we can’t forget there are real lives at stake with every jobs she cuts, outsources or downsizes.

While Whitman touts her business savvy as her primary qualification to become governor, a closer look at Whitman’s corporate background reveals a troubling portrait of someone who got rich at the expense of her own employees. Whitman is a career corporate executive who built a personal fortune by eliminating and outsourcing jobs and slashing workers’ benefits. Everywhere she’s been, she’s made out with lucrative bonuses, stock options and other compensation. And workers have suffered hardships as a result.

EDIT by Brian: Check out the flip for more…

Whitman’s pattern of mass job destruction is clear:

   * While Whitman served as an executive at Stride Rite from 1992-1995, the company closed two manufacturing plants in Massachusetts and fired 450 workers — and Whitman collected $568,000 in compensation and stock options. The Wall Street Journal reported that during and prior to Whitman’s tenure, the company closed 15 US plants, moving manufacturing to “low-cost Asian countries.” During Whitman’s time at Stride Rite, the company cut its unionized workforce by half.

   * While Whitman served as president and CEO of Florist Transworld Delivery (FTD) from 1995-1997, the company eliminated 475 jobs and gutted retirement benefits for workers — and Whitman collected $1.2 million in compensation and stock options.

   * While Whitman served as an executive at Hasbro from 1997-1998, the company cut the workforce by 23%, laid off 500 U.S. workers and sent manufacturing jobs to Mexico.

   * While Whitman served on the board of directors at Gap Inc from 2003-2006, the company closed down a distribution facility in Maryland, outsourced dozens of merchandising jobs and fired 100 tech workers in California.

   * While Whitman was CEO of eBay(1998-2007), the number of overseas workers at the company increased by 666%. By 2007, nearly 40% of eBay’s jobs were outsourced. Whitman also ordered layoffs during her tenure, claiming that the company had “fat that could be trimmed.” By 2008, the company had laid off more than 10% of its workforce. Under Whitman, while laying off workers, eBay repeatedly lobbied for increasing H-1B visas to foreign workers, who are often paid less and have fewer rights than workers hired in America. During her time at eBay, Whitman received about $500 million in compensation and stock options and charged the company and its shareholders nearly $3.2 million for the use of a company jet.

   * While serving on the board of directors at Goldman Sachs (2001-2002), where she was on the executive compensation committee, she doled out $79 million in executive bonuses and participated in decision-making on a range of issues relating to the firm. Goldman is now under investigation by the US Department of Justice for its role in the mortgage crisis that led to millions of home foreclosures. While at Goldman, she received more than a half a million dollars in compensation, along with insider access to new hot stocks worth millions, a practice called “spinning,” which is now illegal.

At no point in Whitman’s extensive corporate career did she prove that she could create and sustain good jobs here in the U.S. With a track record like this, we’re left wondering what exactly Whitman has to gain by becoming Governor… and we don’t have to look too far to find the answer. Whitman’s proposal to eliminate the capital gains tax would benefit millionaires and billionaires – taking money away from schools, public safety and programs for the elderly and people with disabilities. And that’s just one in a laundry list of tax breaks, giveaways and sweetheart deals she has in store for California’s biggest companies and wealthiest individuals, without regard for how that loss of revenue would affect our already cash-strapped state.

When you connect the dots of her corporate career, it’s crystal clear her priority has always been profits, at any cost, above people. Based on her proposals for California – like cutting 40,000 state jobs, opposing the job-creating high-speed rail project and scaling back workers’ overtime pay and meal breaks – it’s evident that she would bring the same corporate agenda she’s advocated throughout her career to the governor’s office. That spells disaster for California.

Whitman’s corporate mentality would lead to higher unemployment, lower wages and fewer benefits for workers – in both the public and private sector. In fact, the only group that would benefit from a Whitman governorship is the exclusive club of large corporations and millionaires and billionaires from which she comes.

We cannot afford to let Whitman and her Wall Street agenda run the show in Sacramento. It’s up to us to fight her attempt at a hostile corporate takeover of our state. Learn more, play the game and get involved at www.WallStreetWhitman.com.

Paid for by the California Labor Federation. Not authorized by a candidate or committee controlled by a candidate.

As Robert just mentioned, the latest Field Poll (PDF) is showing a dead heat between Whitman and Brown. (Though a Reuters poll yesterday showed Brown up by 6, 45-39.)

In terms of favorability, well, these folks seem less popular when the whole affair started.  Brown is at +2 (42-40) and Whitman at 2 (4042).  The big difference is in how the two got there.  Since Brown has been in (and sometimes not so in) the campaign, his favorable numbers have hovered around the lower forties, with his unfavorable gradually growing from 25 in March 2009 to 40 today. A slow but steady rise that is the indicator of a Republican electorate now viewing him as the enemy. No real shock there.  The bigger movement has been in Whitman’s numbers. While she was a relative unknown in March 09, the big change came from March of this year to now.  Back then she was at +13 (40-27), so a net 15 point swing in that unfavorable number. Thank the IEs and Steve Poizner for that one, I suppose.

In terms of the demographic numbers to the right, the one that gives me the most optimism and the most pessimism is the 18-39 year old numbers.  This is a lean-Democratic voting bloc, generally very socially progressive, but Whitman has a statistically small lead.

There are a slew of reasons for this. Of course, Brown is new to us in that age bracket. We don’t remember his last terms in office and he has been hoarding his resources in an attempt to go all out in the fall.  That has meant that Whitman has been dominating the airwaves, even with the IEs throwing out some anti-Meg commercials. This is a demographic that knows eBay and knows Whitman, at least with some notion of her public persona.

Brown clearly needs to do better here. That’s done partially through social media, which has been mentioned around these parts, but also through on the ground organizing that the Obama campaign specialized in.  As of now, there hasn’t been an effort to do a real field campaign from either candidate, but expect that to change fairly soon.

But as CalBuzz points out, there is grounds for optimism for Dems here.  Take the numbers on independents. Whitman needs to at least tie if not win there. She’s heading in the wrong way right now:

Whitman has not done as well as might have been expected with independents. She leads Brown marginally now, 42-39% among non-partisans compared to 50-36% in March. That’s a 3-point lead, down from 14 points. Both candidates are holding their party bases, although Whitman is doing better among Republicans (80-9%) than Brown is doing among Democrats (74-16%).

It’s going to be an interesting four months as we head into Nov. 2.

Meg Whitman has lots of money, so she’s been able to buy all the TV time that she would want. Why would she accept debates when she could just buy all that?

Well, that doesn’t mean that she isn’t worried about appearances of rejecting all those debates. So, she’s gone on the offense.

The two have tangled publicly over debates, with both accepting one appearance together. Brown, a Democrat, has challenged Whitman to nine more.

“We’ll look at some of these other debates. But I’ve got to tell you, he is talking about 10 debates. I would be glad if he had 10 ideas to fix California,” Whitman said to applause from the 75-strong audience. (LA Times)

Meanwhile, what are her ideas? Well, I’ll let Arnold Schwarzenegger summarize her “bogus talk.”

He didn’t mention her name, but in brief remarks at the Los Angeles Press Club’s annual awards gala on Sunday night, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger swiped at Republican gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman, calling her proposal to eliminate 40,000 state worker positions “bogus talk” and praising journalists for asking where those cuts would be made.(SacBee)

Whitman doesn’t have the ideas, and that which she has are “bogus.” Sounds about right.  Nonetheless, she’s got money, so the whole Buy It Now Plan is still in operation.

The Governor campaign has apparently began in earnest, with rival attack ads.  First, here’s California Working Families ad against Whitman, over the flip you’ll find eMeg’s ad. What do you think?

Flip it…

As a student who is currently enrolled in a California State University, I have witnessed the devastating effects that the higher education crisis is having on this state. My student fees have increased with the coming of each new semester. My professors have had to completely redesign their courses so that they can teach as many students as the fire code will allow in a classroom at a time. My fellow students and I are “crashing” any open classes left and right, trying to get enough units to reach full-time status so that we can qualify for financial aid and health insurance.  

My fellow students and I are idealistic and optimistic. We believe in hope and change. And we want a candidate for governor who will make higher education reform the top priority in their campaign. As the situation stands Meg Whitman has not made higher education a priority in her plan to govern California and it is doubtful that she will ever see the direct correlation between the health of the state’s higher educational system and the condition of our state’s economy.

Jerry Brown, however, still has the time to make higher education reform the pinnacle of his gubernatorial platform. Brown should learn from San Francisco Mayor and Democratic candidate for Lieutenant Governor Gavin Newsom’s campaigns for Governor and Lieutenant Governor. As a candidate for both offices, Mayor Newsom made higher education reform one of his top concerns. And as a result, Students for Gavin Newsom established chapters at 36 colleges and 35 high schools up and down the state, making it the arguably the largest grassroots student movement ever organized in the state of California.

While it is true that the majority of people who are most likely to vote in the upcoming gubernatorial election are senior citizens, it is far more beneficial for Brown to court the youth vote by running on higher education reform. We are living in an era where a bachelor’s degree is no longer preferred-but required-in order to land most jobs. So not only is this higher education crisis threatening the economic well being of California’s students now but it will threaten the economy of this entire state and this whole country in the future, if something is not done to solve it.

There are several solutions to help combat the state’s higher education crisis. One of the most obvious is adopting an oil severance tax-which would tax the oil as it is pumped from the ground. California is the only state in the country that does not have this tax and it is costing us dearly. Another solution is to repeal the requirement that the state legislature must have a two-thirds majority in order to raise taxes or pass a budget. We are all familiar with the culture of partisanship and greed that plagues the politicians in Sacramento. It is high time that we make these politicians work for us, their constituents, rather than working against their colleagues in the halls of the State Capitol Building.

There are no small or easy ways to solve California’s higher education problems. The time has come for audacious, sweeping higher education reform. The time has come for candidates who embrace the big and the bold and are unafraid of taking risks.

Students are too often accused of being politically apathetic and blissfully ignorant of what is going on in the world around us. But as anyone who has recently stepped foot on a college campus knows, times have changed. We want a candidate for governor who recognizes that higher education reform is the answer to the problems that California has been dealing with for far too long.

California’s young voters, myself included, need to know that Jerry Brown has a plan to truly reform higher education in California. Jerry Brown needs to know that if he wants young people to turn out and vote for him in November, higher education reform is the way to get us into the voting booth.