Word: whitmanic
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Spine of SteelAgainst a backdrop of a crippling statewide financial crisis and a national Republican Party civil war, Whitman is attempting her greatest balancing act yet: running for governor of the country's most populous state as a fiscally conservative, socially moderate woman. As an accomplished business executive, she claims she is in the best position to create jobs and control spending in California, while playing down her pro-choice, socially moderate views. But at a time when GOP elements are conducting a witch hunt to purge moderates from the party, she may have to pass ideological litmus tests...
Then there is the matter of carving out an identity as a female candidate, a tricky proposition when Sarah Palin, for all her flaws, is the rock star of the party. Whitman is fashioning herself as sort of anti-Palin. Whereas Palin can be catty, superficial and outrageous, Whitman is wonky and almost humorless, as if too many consultants (she has about two dozen) have massaged and smoothed over her imperfections so effectively that she's as brittle and shiny as a Christmas tree ornament. She presents herself as a pragmatist who doesn't much care about tightening gun-control...
That's particularly true in California, a state in almost perpetual crisis - it's "effectively bankrupt," as Whitman likes to put it - with a budget deficit befitting Argentina and crises with water, highways, prisons, schools, immigration and unemployment. The legislature and the governor are openly hostile to each other, and the electorate is disgusted with both of them. (Their approval ratings are 18% and 28%, respectively.) This state of affairs is alternately described as the end of civilization or America's bright future, depending on whom you ask. Driving around the state, you'd never know that California...
Over coffee before a speech in a San Diego hotel, Whitman ticks through her plans. "Let's try to get a few things done at 100%, as opposed to trying to solve every problem," she says. To that end, she proposes three ideas: creating jobs by slashing taxes and regulation; improving the education system by grading schools and launching more charter schools; and reducing government spending, primarily by firing thousands of state workers. (She won't say which ones.) And - surprise - she intends to reap big savings from the state budget by eliminating "waste, fraud and abuse" through the introduction...
...Whitman offers some commonsense ideas that few people could take issue with - but the way she talks about them makes it all sound just a little too easy, as if she thinks she'll be able to breeze into Sacramento and simply decree that the government be run more efficiently. This last point seems to particularly irk members of the political chattering classes, some of whom groan or sigh when you mention Whitman's name...