We come from all walks of life. Some of us are students, some are workers, and some are jobless. Some of us are laden with student debt. Some of us work to support our children, some work to support our parents. Some of us have had to postpone starting a family, and some of us have had to move back in with our parents just to make ends meet. But we all have one thing in common — we are the young voters of California. And it’s time for us to flex our muscle at the polls, take control of California’s future and fight off the right wing’s attempt at a hostile corporate takeover of our state.

Our generation has been hit disproportionately hard by the recession. According to a recent report from the AFL-CIO, a third of all adults under age 35 cannot pay their bills, and 70 percent don’t have enough saved to cover even two months of living expenses. We just can’t afford to sit back and wait for things to get better, because if corporate candidates like Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina triumph on Tuesday, things will undoubtedly get worse.

These Wall Street candidates have spent hundreds of millions in order to buy this election, and if elected, they plan on doling out massive tax breaks to the wealthiest individuals and corporations in California, while at the same time slashing the vital services, education, health care, unemployment benefits, civil liberties and much-needed jobs for young people trying to enter the workforce.

So what’s at stake in this election?

Our jobs. Both Whitman and Fiorina have extensive track records of outsourcing tens of thousands of jobs as corporate CEOs, and Whitman’s plan for California centers around laying off 40,000 state workers, which could cause our unemployment rate to jump a full percentage point. Whitman also believes in the categorically untrue concept that giving tax breaks to the rich will somehow create jobs. It didn’t work when Bush did it, and economists agree that the concept is totally bogus.

Our education. Meg Whitman plans to cut another $15 billion from the state budget, and nearly half of the budget goes to K-12 and higher education, which would inevitably mean more draconian cuts to schools and universities that have already been decimated under Schwarzenegger.

Our health care. Carly Fiorina vowed to repeal the new health care law that has allowed so many of us to go back on our parents’ health insurance while we finish school and look for work in this tough job market.

We can’t allow these extreme right-wing candidates to trample all over our generation. We’ve got to take matters into our own hands, and the best way we can do that is to hit the polls en masse on Tuesday, just like we did in 2008. Let’s not forget, it was the young people – both voters and volunteers — who secured Obama’s triumphant victory. And we have the power to do it again, if we commit to vote and getting others out to vote as well. As the President said last week to more than 37,000 Californians at a rally at the University of Southern California:

You’ve got to talk to your friends.  You’ve got to talk to your neighbors.  You’ve got to make phone calls.  You’ve got to knock on doors.  You have to make sure that you are as fired up and as excited now as you were two years ago – because the work is not yet done.

If you’re like me, you’re sick of the tired rhetoric from the media that young people just don’t vote as often as older adults. It seems like that message has become a self-fulfilling prophecy – many young people mistakenly feel like their votes don’t count as much, and subsequently they’re less inclined to vote.

But with an election as close as this one, our votes are more valuable today than ever before. If we do the expected and stay home on Election Day, we’re essentially handing the reins over to the mega-wealthy corporate shills whose Big Business agenda will make their super-rich friends even richer, while the rest of us are left fighting for the crumbs. It’s on every single one of us to vote, and do everything we can to get out the vote to our friends, family, co-workers, classmates and neighbors.

Writer Mike Hardcastle said it best:

Don't vote and you effectively kiss away your ability to have any influence as to how the issues play out in your world, and dude, that's just lame.

Even lifelong Republicans who recognize the importance of the IHSS program are voting for Jerry Brown for Governor.

Check out these comments from Meg Whitman’s own website:

“I’m being forced to vote Democrat for the first time in my life…. I am shocked that a Republican would make me go to the Dem side, but I have been informed that you intend to do away with or seriously cut “I.H.S.S.”  K. Jones, Roseville

“Meg Whitman doesn’t get it…. Every day I have to feed my daughter and help with toileting and think about what Meg says about us ‘criminals’. It is despicable. At least Jerry Brown can do the simple math and he knows that this is one program that saves money. ”  C. Rose, Riverside

“I am a single father with a son who suffers a disability and needs round the clock care. IHSS provides me the resources to act as my son’s caretaker…. I make less today (a little over minimum wage) than I did 20 years ago, but the important thing is that my son is properly cared for…. Just as current governor Schwarzenegger has repeatedly attempted to dismantle the IHSS program, Meg Whitman threatens to do the same. I will be voting for Brown this November!”  A. Fietz, Grass Valley

This is NOT a partisan issue.  IHSS was signed into law by Republican Gov. Ronald Reagan and has been supported by legislators from both parties ever since.

But Meg Whitman wants to follow in Arnold Schwarzenegger’s footsteps by continuing to attack IHSS, one of the most humane and cost effective programs in state government.

Last year, when Schwarzenegger claimed that the fraud rate in the IHSS program was “as high as 25 percent,” his claim was disproven and widely ridiculed. The Sacramento Bee accused the governor of “spouting misleading rhetoric about waste and

fraud,”  while the San Jose Mercury-News called his allegations “phantom claims.”

Yet in her campaign commercials this year, Whitman pledges to “save $1 billion” by eliminating IHSS fraud. Since the total budget for the program is $1.4 billion, she is telling us that the fraud rate in IHSS is more than 70 percent!  That would be funny if it wasn’t so unfair and nasty.

The future of IHSS is at stake on November 2nd.

Kenneth Jones, a homecare provider from Roseville, mounts a strong defense of the IHSS program and says that Whitman’s attacks on the program will force him to vote for Jerry Brown for governor.

And he does it on Meg’s own web site.  

Here’s Mr. Jones’ powerful post:

Guess I’m Being Forced to vote Democrat for the 1st time of my life !

Posted by kenneth jones on October 6, 2010 at 6:08pm on TalktoMeg.com/ Forum

I am shocked that a  republican would make me go to the dem side, But I have been informed that you intend to do away with or seriously cut  “I.H.S.S”.

Well I will tell you that  is one program I have thanked and praised the state for – BECAUSE my daughter was hit by a worthless repeat affender still out driving when she was just 14. She had to have part of her brain cut out because of the injuries. She has been disabled since and requires help with everything physically but surprisinly is very mentally aware and remembers being normal.

I have given up the home I owned at the time, my marrage, and have struggled with many head on challanges to keep her at home with me and family just to get her whatever therapy and care possible so that I can persue the things she needs to  improve her life instead of excepting her condition when she came home as perminit as we were told. She has come a long ways now 29 and is happy to be with us instead of stuck in a care home surrounded by non-caring strangers and lots of other sick people

SHE didn’t commit a crime to be condemed to that which by the way would even cost the state more than it does now for the I.H.S.S. I did’nt commit a crime but I excepted my role as her dad to be there for her no matter the cost, I had to except not being able to grow my business any longer, down sized to be able to make sure she is my priority as she desirves,

I am  50 now and have nothing towards retiring but that is my problem and except the worries. However The “only” way I have been able to make it as long as I have and afford to keep her home and not abanden her for full time employment is I.H.S.S.  I can’t make the money iI use to and we are always barely making the bills month to month but with out I.H.S.S.

I would not be able to afford being available for my daughters needs and she would have to go into a care home . For us it’s not about money – WE WOULD BOTH GIVE UP EVERYTHING TO HAVE HER BACK ON HER FEET AGAIN AND LIVING A NORMAL HEALTY LIFE !!  But we don’t get that choice so we are stuck with major changes and challanges to our lives that neither one of us ask for or want.

I can’t believe that you would distroy our lives futher  SO am I to vote for Brown to save my daugters life as she knows it now?

http://talktomeg.ning.com/foru…

Rather than come clean with the public about her mistreatment of her former housekeeper, Meg Whitman lied to cover it up. When attorney Gloria Allred caught her in a lie, Whitman still refused to apologize. Whitman even stooped so low as to wrongly accuse the housekeeper, Nicky Diaz Santillan, who she employed for nine years and said was a “member of her extended family,” of stealing her mail.

At a time when voters are desperate for their leaders to be accountable for their actions, Whitman has failed miserably to live up to the standards by which we should hold anyone running for elected office. She’s blamed Nicky, Jerry Brown, his allies and others, but has never once admitted any wrongdoing or taken any responsibility for her own actions.

Today in front of Whitman’s East LA office, a group of domestic workers joined SEIU United Service Workers West (USWW) President Mike Garcia, Assemblymember Hector de la Torre and State Senator Gil Cedillo to call on Whitman to open tomorrow night’s debate with an apology to Nicky and the people of California for the mistreatment and hurtful allegations she directed at Nicky, and the lies she told in an attempt to cover up the scandal.

The domestic workers, on behalf of millions of Californians who live in the shadows because of exploitation and mistreatment from the Meg Whitmans of the world, demanded that Whitman own up to her mistakes immediately.

Julia Moreno, who worked as a live-in maid for 25 years:

Everyone who works hard in California deserves to be treated with dignity, but Meg Whitman thinks she can use people when it’s convenient and then turn her back on us when we need help.

The domestic workers also unveiled a new petition demanding that Whitman apologize, and allowing Californians to stand in solidarity with Nicky and all exploited workers. The petition, which can be found at www.ApologizeMeg.org, will remain live until Whitman finally does the right thing and apologizes to Californians for her actions.

SEIU USWW President Garcia:

Whitman has blamed everyone else for her own mistakes, going so far as to accuse her housekeeper of being a felon who would steal the family’s mail, and Meg Whitman needs to apologize for this accusation. We’re demanding that in the last debate before Election Day Meg Whitman apologize to Nicky, the Latino community, and all voters in California.

Latino leaders Cedillo and De la Torre said that elected officials bear a special responsibility to the public, and Whitman’s actions – and the subsequent lies she told to cover them up – raise serious questions about her fitness for any public office, much less Governor.

The mistreatment and accusations Nicky suffered at the hands of billionaire Whitman are unfortunately all-too-common obstacles immigrant workers face. Lelis Juarez, who spoke at today’s press conference, is a housekeeper who is owed over $3,000 in back wages by her former employer.

We are here today on behalf of Nicky and all the people who live in the shadows so that their families can have a better life. The fact that Meg Whitman, a billionaire, was willing to cheat Nicky out of her hard-earned money shows she has no idea what it’s like for people like us who earn just enough to scrape by. If Meg Whitman can’t even treat those who work in her home with respect, dignity and compassion, how do you think she’s going to treat California workers if she becomes Governor?

It’s been nearly two weeks since Nicky came forward to bravely tell her story. It’s past time for Meg Whitman to issue a public apology for the hurt she’s caused Nicky and so many others. Join the call for Whitman to apologize at www.ApologizeMeg.org.

Governor Schwarzenegger leaves behind a legacy of devastating budget cuts and huge tax giveaways for corporations. In the last two years  alone, Schwarzenegger has slashed $32.5 billion from the state budget– and now our schools and roads are crumbling, public safety is at risk,  and vital state services have been decimated. And while state workers  have endured deep wage cuts, corporations have enjoyed massive new tax  breaks.

Now, Meg Whitman is on a mission to ratchet up the pain on  working people in California — above and beyond the misery that Governor Schwarzenegger has already imposed.

State Workers’ Jobs

In February, Schwarzenegger announced two-day-a-month furloughs for state workers, which  effectively reduced worker pay but did little to help our long-term  economic crisis. In fact, economists report that the furloughs will result in a loss of $503 million over the subsequent years. When asked at the time what she would do to balance the budget, Whitman said that she would double the furloughs to four days a week, even though the furloughs actually caused the state to lose money.

When Schwarzenegger increased  the furloughs to three days a month (resulting in a 12.8 percent pay cut and loss of an estimated $2.1 billion in wages and benefits for hundreds of thousands of state workers), Whitman went one step  further. She announced that she plans to fire 40,000 state workers because she believes the state is “over-staffed” (In fact, California ranks second to last in the number of state workers per capita, and the ratio of all government employees to population in California is 28 percent below the national average.) This mass layoff would cause unemployment in the state to spike a full percentage point.

Public Employee Pensions

Schwarzenegger  has made pension takeaways a major issue and has threatened to not sign a budget without reforms. But despite his rhetoric the Governor has been forced to negotiate directly with unions representing state workers to get agreement on any changes to current pension benefits and contributions.

Whitman supports Schwarzenegger’s proposals, which include raising the retirement age, increasing what workers pay into the pension and ending defined-benefit pensions for new hires and sticking them in risky 401(k)-style retirement plans. But she doesn’t stop there. She’s willing to circumvent collective bargaining, and the elected legislature, by putting a pension cuts initiative on the ballot, and using her personal fortune to fund the ballot measure.

Regulations and Worker Protections

Schwarzenegger has continually attempted to roll back vital workplace protections including daily overtime and meal breaks, and he recently vetoed a bill  that would give farm workers overtime rights. But Schwarzenegger did institute some regulations to protect outdoor workers’ health and  safety. In 2005, after four workers died from heat-related illness while  working outdoors, Schwarzenegger ordered emergency regulations  for workplace standards for heat-stress prevention and treatment, making California the first state in the nation to adopt such  regulations.

On the other hand, Whitman stated in an editorial board meeting, “On my first day in office, I want to put a moratorium on all new regulations.” That means that regulations to protect workers, consumers, the environment and governing almost all aspects of the state would be put on hold so that Whitman could make a political point. And she’s also expressed that she will continue to push for worker takeaways on meal  breaks and overtime pay.

High-Speed Rail

Schwarzenegger didn’t do much in terms of job creation during his time as Governor, and subsequently unemployment has shot up to Great Depression-era highs.  But Schwarzenegger has done one positive thing on jobs — he whole-heartedly supports  construction of California’s high-speed rail, which would create more than half a million new jobs, speed the movement of goods and people throughout the state, reduce pollution and lessen our dependence on foreign oil.

But unlike Schwarzenegger, Whitman has voiced her unequivocal opposition  to the high-speed rail system in California, which was approved by  California voters in 2008. She claims that California “can’t afford” the high-speed rail project, even though the costs for the project wouldn’t come out of the state’s budget, and any delays could jeopardize over $2.2 billion in federal stimulus money.

While high-speed rail would seem like a no-brainer for a candidate for Governor, a closer look at Whitman’s opposition to the project reveals a potential ulterior motive. Whitman lives in a multi-million dollar home in the  wealthy enclave of Atherton, which has led the charge  against the planned high-speed rail project. Along with other wealthy  cities, Atherton has even filed suit to halt the project, despite the  clear economic benefits and broad support, simply because they don’t  want train tracks in their ritzy town.

Capital Gains Tax

Schwarzenegger pushed some very unpopular changes to California’s tax code in the last year. His tax commission recommended a plan that would flatten the personal income tax  and give the wealthiest Californians a massive tax cut while shifting a  larger share of taxes onto the middle class. The commission’s recommendations were largely opposed by labor, business and most  legislators, though he has tried to resurrect the idea of extending the  sales tax to services and reducing personal income taxes.

None of Schwarzenegger’s proposals, however, have been as blatantly self-serving as those that Whitman is proposing. She wants to completely eliminate the tax on capital gains,  which is money that wealthy investors rake in on things like stock  dividends, bonuses or property sales (as opposed to the payroll income tax that the rest of us pay).

The Los Angeles Times called  Whitman’s capital gains tax proposal “a pure handout, and a costly one, to the wealthy, a group that includes the billionaire Whitman herself”, concluding the Whitman plan would do little, if anything, to create jobs,” (and) is “just offering a menu of handouts to favored industries and  the rich.

According to the Franchise Tax Board, 82% of the $56  billion in capital gains earned by California residents were reported by  the top 1% of income earners (those making about $500,000 or more) in  2008. George W. Bush pushed through a similar tax cut, which went into  effect in 2003, that didn’t create jobs or save the economy from  collapsing in 2008. Whitman’s proposal would mean that she and her wealthy friends would get a massive tax break that would cost the state $10.8 billion.

Whitman  repeats the false Republican claim that cutting taxes for the wealthy  will increase investment in new jobs, but according to a broad coalition of economists and academics, that just isn’t true. In an open letter to Californians, economist Michael Reich wrote:

Eliminating  the state capital gains tax would do very little to spur investment in  the state. Most California investors’ portfolios are diversified  nationally and internationally. Consequently, the vast majority of  private income retained by investors would be spent on stock purchases  of companies outside the state.

We’ve seen what Schwarzenegger’s polices have done to our state. Once the envy of the  nation for our schools, infrastructure, world-class universities and  booming economy, California now is at the bottom of many measures of  quality of life, as public funding for the most basic services are  slashed and more tax breaks are given to multi-national corporations.  Whitman would take the pain to a whole new level by eliminating taxes on the very rich, halting regulations to protect workers, slashing jobs and pensions.

The future of California is in our hands this November 2. Don’t forget to  vote, and be sure to remind everyone you know what’s at stake in this  election.

                                                                                       by Richard Rapaport

“The rich are different from you and me,” novelist F. Scott Fitzgerald reputedly told his friend, Ernest Hemingway. Who is supposed to have responded, “Yeah, they have more money.”

Observing the behavior of California Republican Gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman regarding revelations that she illegally employed a Hispanic  housekeeper, it seems that Fitzgerald and Hemingway were both right. Meg Whitman is different from you and me, even absent her billion in the bank, she regularly exhibits the “vast carelessness” of great wealth that Scott Fitzgerald identified with such jarring precision in “The Great Gatsby.” It is true. Whitman fairly oozes that blinding, self-assurance and untrammeled glow of entitlement. Hers is a psyche that puts her so weirdly out-of-touch with the push and shove of electoral democracy and, in this most recent case, threatens to transform a campaign boo-boo into the electoral death penalty.

What we witnessed last week is the product of the same mantle of privilege that has caused Meg Whitman do and say things that would get the rest of us dismissed from our jobs, if not locked up in county jail. Ms. Whitman is, however, so used to buying her way out of trouble that she seems to be clueless that most of her fellow Californians don’t have access to that same ‘get-out-of-jail-card’ luxury. It helps explain why Whitman’s initial response to her nanny-gate troubles was to blame Jerry Brown, Gloria Allred, the Democratic Party, her staff, literally everyone except herself.

Whitman’s breathtaking lack of familiarity with the lives of we the ordinary pops up frequently enough to suggest an unsettling pattern. There was, for example, Whitman’s smacking around an E-Bay employee in 2007, when she felt she had been under-prepared by that staffer for a television interview. After buying her way out of that tantrum, for a private mediation settlement of $200,000, Whitman left it to her spokesperson Sarah Pompei to clean up the droppings. Not with an apology, mind you, but rather with back-of-the-hand insouciance dismissing the incident because, according to Ms. Pompei, “a verbal dispute in a high-pressure working environment isn’t out of the ordinary.”

Earth to Sarah: It’s called “battery” and has a tendency to land us regular-type folks in anger management class. It was this same otherworldly arrogance responsible for Whitman campaign’s near-suicidal exculpatory press release weirdly titled, “In Case You Missed It: There Is No Meg Whitman-Housekeeper Scandal.” Wanna bet?

It was this lack of social modulation that was similarly responsible for Whitman’s involvement with Goldman Sachs. These were the sinister plunderers who felt so at one with Meg that they put her on the board of an investment firm that, through sheer avarice and arrogance, nearly sank the American economy. Goldman advanced a golden step further, making Meg more millions by allowing her to invest early, often and secretly in Goldman-backed initial public offerings. In the superheated world of new-millennium, high-tech investing, they and she knew that share prices would double, triple, quadruple their value in the minutes and hours after going public.

It was an activity known on Wall Street as “Spinning,” and when, in 2005, Whitman’s Spinning was revealed, annoyed eBay stockholders, revolted, contending that what she had done was wrong, greedy and immoral. The perception that Whitman had put her own greed-fueled “spin” ahead of the interests of her company, its employees and shareholders also, not surprisingly, turned out to be illegal. A Delaware judge, in fact, ordered Meg and fellow “spinners” to return more than $3.3 million to settle activities that the court termed “a breach of fiduciary responsibility.” For mere mortals, that’s a fancy term for “stealing.” As usual however, Whitman was able to waltz, or rather buy, her way out of trouble, announcing that she would give half the ill-gotten proceeds to the Boys & Girls Club of California, a transparent bit of lèse majesté, and a common tactic of wealth caught with its knickers down.

Another “spin” emanating from the Whitman campaign in late August, was a website called “Truth for Nurses.” Among other assorted nastiness, it denounces Rose An DeMoro, Executive Director of the California Nurses Association for having earned, according to the Whitman campaign, “five-times more than the median salary of a nurse in the United States.” Unremarkably, there was nothing in the site acknowledging that Meg Whitman’s $1,300,000,000 net-worth was something like 22,000 times the average nurses salary. As usual in Whitman’s campaign, the cascade of zeros trumped humanity and common sense.

Equally unsurprising, Meg Whitman, who had based a large part of her campaign on getting tough with California’s illegal workers, was caught having employed an illegal worker in her home for over a decade. Panicked, Whitman offered to take a like detector test, shifted blame onto her husband, and enlisted experts to testify that she had not actually broken any immigration laws. In perfect Gatsby fashion, Whitman missed entirely the fact that her eagerness to reapportion blame and willingness to sacrifice others was exactly the kind of cold-hearted carelessness that Fitzgerald pinned forever on those Gatsbyesque malefactors of great wealth.  

Californians have a peculiar taste for the politically novel, but for seven years now, the State has been ruled, if not run, by a Governor who commutes daily by jet to the Capitol from his manse in Los Angeles. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s “boy in the bubble” routine has helped neither him nor the State. The question thus remains: Can we afford the ascension of another rich amateur, particularly one who evinces such disdain for the “little people” and especially if they stand in the way of her election to office. Ask Meg Whitman if she has a clue about what was truly devastating about this latest dust-up over hiring an illegal. She will likely freeze you with one of those haughty, wrothful “Queen Meg” looks and dismiss it and you out of hand.

But then this is also unsurprising. Because as Fitzgerald told us: “The rich are different from you and me.”

###

Richard Rapaport is a Mill Valley-based writer, He can be reached at [email protected]  

This Labor Day, California is at a crossroads. We can either continue the economic race to the bottom – exacerbated by corporate policies and Gov. Schwarzenegger’s slash-and-burn budgets – or we can chart a new course to rebuild California from the bottom up. The heart of California’s economy, our workers, are struggling with near record unemployment, stagnating wages and devastating budget cuts that are eroding the California Dream.

This November, Californians have a critical choice to make about which direction our state should take to deal with the enormous challenges we face. This election is simply a battle for the soul of California.

In the race for Governor, the choices couldn’t be starker.

Meg Whitman epitomizes the disastrous corporate policies that fueled the collapse of our economy. Her proposals to give the rich tax breaks at the expense of middle class programs and public safety would choke off any hope of economic recovery. Her promise to eliminate 40,000 state jobs would spike unemployment and force businesses to shutter. Her long record of outsourcing and eliminating jobs in the private sector to boost CEO profits shows how dangerously misplaced her priorities are.

Jerry Brown has spent his entire career fighting for working families. As Governor, he created 1.9 million jobs. He proposes to create a half million new clean energy jobs, positioning California to be the national leader in the new green economy. He supports investment in infrastructure and education, the two most critical areas in driving job growth. He respects the contributions workers make to the economy and would prioritize an expansion of the middle class.

California voters face a similar choice in the race for US Senate. Barbara Boxer is a champion for California’s workers. She’s led the fight to rein in Wall Street, prioritize good jobs and pass national health care reform. Failed CEO Carly Fiorina , on the other hand, thinks our economy should be more like China’s. She calls outsourcing of American jobs “right sourcing.”

Labor Day marks the beginning of the final push by California’s workers to elect Brown, Boxer and other leaders who will create jobs and restore hope of broadly shared economic prosperity. In the coming weeks, more than 25,000 union volunteers will lead the largest grassroots voter mobilization in California history. Workers will be out in force every week between now and the election to combat Whitman’s avalanche of campaign spending by doing what we do best – talking one-on-one with friends, neighbors, co-workers and members of our communities about the stakes in this election.

Every generation has a defining moment. This election is ours. And California’s workers stand ready to take a leading role in rebuilding our economy and restoring our once vibrant middle class.

As millions of Californians continue to struggle in this economy, Meg Whitman will spend her evening today collecting huge checks from corporate insiders at the posh Corona Del Mar mansion of fellow billionaire CEO Henry Samueli.

Of course, there’s nothing unusual about candidates holding fundraisers, even billionaires like Whitman. But there’s more to meets the eye with this particular fundraiser considering the host’s background. And there’s some serious questions that need to be raised about whom exactly would have Whitman’s ear if she were to be elected governor.

Among the most burning questions raised in relation to tonight’s Whitman-Samueli cash bonanza is: Why would Whitman draw herself further into the web of corporate greed and corruption epitomized by Broadcom, the company Samueli led until forced out amidst the nation’s largest stock backdating scandal?

California Labor Federation Executive Secretary-Treasurer Art Pulaski:

Meg Whitman’s decision to hold a high-dollar fundraiser with another billionaire CEO whose questionable practices have drawn the attention of federal investigators is both troubling and illuminating. It’s clear that Whitman is growing bolder in her shameless attempt to buy this election. The fact that she would consort with controversial corporate figures like Samueli to fatten her already bloated war chest shows a serious lapse in judgment.

While many corporate insiders are aware of Broadcom’s troubles, Samueli’s past isn’t on the radar of most Californians. But given Whitman’s close ties to him and other corporate CEOs, it probably should be.

A look under the surface shows Whitman and Samueli have more in common than being billionaire CEOs. Both were corporate insiders whose companies were involved in questionable insider deals that made millions for executives at the expense of shareholders. Both Whitman and Samueli’s companies have been targets of federal investigations into the very same kind of shady Wall Street dealings that drove the economy into meltdown.  

Samueli’s Broadcom was involved in the nation’s largest stock backdating scandal after it failed to disclose to investors that the company had reset the dates of company stock grants to executives in order to artificially boost profits. Broadcom’s backdating scheme resulted an SEC investigation, Samueli’s ouster, and Broadcom eventually paid $160.5 million in investor settlements. Samueli pleaded guilty to lying to federal investigators before, in an unusual move, a judge threw out the guilty plea. Samueli returned to Broadcom earlier this year as chief technology officer.

Of course, Whitman is no stranger to corporate scandals. Back in 2001, she was a Goldman Sachs board member who was directly involved in the decisions about executive bonuses and mortgage-backed securities that are now cited as major causes of the economic meltdown and the ensuing jobs crisis. Whitman pocketed almost $ 2 million by “spinning” sweetheart stock deals she scored as a reward for bringing Goldman lucrative investment banking contracts, a practice that soon became illegal.

Whitman resigned from the board after a Congressional probe into spinning but Goldman is still dealing with the aftermath of SEC investigations into the company’s shady dealings and recently coughed up more than $500 million to satisfy the charges.

It’s pretty easy to imagine the enormous influence corporate types like Samueli would have in a Whitman administration. It’s also deeply troubling that it’s that very type of influence Wall Street had with George W. Bush, and we all know the end to that story. If we’ve learned anything from the economic meltdown caused by Wall Street’s greed, it’s that when corporate insiders get too close to government power, working people pay the price.

Pulaski:

The last thing California’s working families need is more of the same corporate greed and corruption that destroyed our economy. Cozying up to corporate insiders in order to get elected shows that Whitman remains tone-deaf to the growing concerns voters have about her Wall Street ties and agenda.

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

Where does Meg Whitman stand on immigration? Well, that all depends on when she’s being asked, where she’s being asked, and who is doing the asking.

* Last year, in an attempt to cater to her Republican base as she prepared for a heated primary, Whitman told reporters she believes the state should “prosecute illegal aliens and criminal aliens in all of our cities, in every part of California.”

* This spring, in a stark reversal, Whitman spoke out against the Arizona immigration law when it first passed in April.

* When Whitman’s primary opponent, Steve Poizner, began gaining traction by veering far to the right on immigration, Whitman’s campaign advisor, former Governor Pete Wilson, produced an anti-immigrant radio ad, touting Whitman’s opposition to “amnesty” and her plan to block immigrant families the having access to education, driver’s licenses and other vital services. He said she’d be “tough as nails” on immigration. Gov. Wilson is the notorious architect of Proposition 187, the initiative that sought to deny immigrant families these same basic rights.

* Whitman’s hypocrisy became even more evident when she told a reporter, “You haven’t seen an ad from me with the border fence,” while at the same time airing TV ads across the state that prominently feature the border fence.

* Just one week after winning the primary, Whitman again changed direction, and began airing Spanish-language ads during the World Cup, indicating she was against the Arizona immigration law.

* But in late July, she went on a conservative talk radio station and said she thinks the Arizona law should stand.

* One week later, Whitman opened a “Latino outreach” office in East LA, and was greeted with a mob of protesters, furious over her perpetual flip-flopping on immigration.

* At the same time, she was also being lambasted by the right-wing John & Ken show, again for flip-flopping on immigration.

[Edit by Robert: Click through to read the rest!]

By our count, Whitman has changed her position on immigration at least five times since announcing her candidacy. And in her cynical ploy to mask her true positions, Whitman managed to alienate both the left and the right… and certainly isn’t making a case to Latinos. A recent poll shows that Jerry Brown still has a commanding lead among Latinos — 42 percent for Brown compared to just 18 percent for Whitman.

That’s because California Latinos remember that Jerry Brown stood up for immigrant workers when he marched with Cesar Chavez and gave farmworkers the right to form and join unions to collectively protect themselves from being exploited at work. And they also remember that Whitman has been changing her mind on Latino issues whenever it suits her.

Columnist Thomas D. Elias points out this example:

In one of her Spanish-language ads, Whitman says “The Latino kids attending public schools in California today will be tomorrow’s doctors, engineers, businessmen and teachers. I want them to have the opportunity to go as far in life as their God-given talent will take them.”

Unless, notes Democratic Party communications director Tenoch Flores, “their hard work and talent take them to a California institution of higher learning.” If they make it there and their parents are illegal immigrants (regardless of the kids’ own status), Whitman’s policy statements say they shouldn’t be allowed to stay long. In the spring primary, she said such “Latino kids” should be banned or removed from community colleges and the Cal State and University of California systems. Will Latinos remember those declarations?

Our answer is yes, they do remember. And they will still remember in November, regardless as to how many more million-dollar ads Whitman airs.

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