The California gubernatorial recall was launched by a group called the People's Advocate, an anti-tax organisation operated by Paul Gann and Ted Costa, the alleged brains behind the 1978 Jarvis Amendment, a.k.a. Proposition 13 (the granddaddy of California referendums, bonanza for property owners - see over page), and the outgoing state Republican chairman, Shawn Steel. In accordance with Article 2, Section 14 of the California Constitution, Gann and Co were obliged to collect signatures equal in number to 12 per cent of the last vote for the governor's office, an effort that initially floundered. But in May 2003, Congressman Darrell Issa of San Diego started his own recall effort, with a view to becoming governor himself, bankrolling the petition drive with $1.3 million of his own money, or at least what he claimed was his own money. What had begun as a quixotic canard then became a surrealist juggernaut, culminating in the ousting of Governor Gray Davis and the risible election of Arnold Schwarzenegger, action figure, as the custodian of the world's fifth largest economy.

LRB 6 November 2003 | PDF Download