Seeing Simon
Impressions of a campaign and its first victory night.

By Alan W. Bock, senior editorial writer & columnist for the Orange County Register
March 8, 2002 9:25 a.m.

his is highly influenced by my having spent Tuesday night amid mostly jubilant Republicans at the state GOP's shindig in Los Angeles. But I'm almost convinced that political novice William E. Simon Jr. has a chance to upset Democratic Gov. Gray Davis in November.

Certainly Simon's victory over former L.A. mayor Richard Riordan and current secretary of state (and party veteran) Bill Jones was remarkable. And while he benefited — as Arnold Steinberg has noted — from mistakes and events beyond his control, Simon also made the most of his opportunities and avoided serious mistakes himself.

It's worth recalling just how completely most political observers believed that Dick Riordan had a lock on the nomination only a few weeks ago.

Four years ago, the Republicans lost with former attorney general and social conservative Dan Lungren. They also conceded control of the state legislature for the next decade, with a reapportionment deal that left almost all seats safe for one party or the other, and a solid majority of them Democratic. The California GOP was desperate for a fighting chance at winning something. Democrat Gov. Gray Davis — who has a level of charisma befitting his name, and who fumbled (and was widely perceived as fumbling) last year's electricity crisis — seemed potentially vulnerable to the right candidate.

For a long time, Dick Riordan seemed like that candidate. He had just finished two terms as mayor with something of a reputation intact. He knew how to operate in majority-liberal Los Angeles. He was widely perceived as socially moderate and inclusive, though he had some conservative credentials — as a supporter of the recall campaign against former chief justice Rose Bird, and as the only major political figure to back Prop. 227, the 1998 initiative that effectively ended bilingual education in California public schools.

Riordan had his own fortune and access to serious political money. Early on conservatives like Reps. Dana Rohrabacher, Chris Cox, and David Dreier endorsed him, essentially on the theory he could win, and a governor who's right half the time is better than one who's always wrong. The Bush White House never formally endorsed him, but a number of White House operatives quietly made it known that Riordan was "the Man" in the California GOP.

But Riordan managed to alienate the conservative GOP base rather thoroughly. He got the Nixonian maxim — run to the right during a primary and veer to the "center" in a general — exactly backwards. He made it a point to argue that the GOP would be a footnote if it didn't become more inclusive and welcoming, and came close to equating a pro-life position with a lack of compassion and sensitivity (although he is a churchgoing Catholic who is apparently still personally opposed to abortion).

Even so, as recently as the last televised debate (Feb. 13) almost everybody still believed Riordan would take the nomination. Bill Simon, son of the former treasury secretary, was a businessman and philanthropist who had fallen in love with California and moved here a dozen years ago. He had a solid conservative platform and some money. When he came by our newspaper's editorial board in mid-January, we pegged him for a solid policy wonk who had no chance and who was probably positioning himself for a run at the Senate. After the February 13 debate, we wrote, "[I]t's doubtful whether he broke out of the box among primary voters."

If anyone seemed positioned to take advantage of any Riordan stumbles, it was Secretary of State Bill Jones — a Central Valley stalwart, with long experience in the state legislature, who is the only Republican elected to a statewide office. More a party loyalist than a movement conservative, he was nevertheless on the right side of most issues (though some faulted him for a late endorsement of Ariz. Sen. John McCain during the 2000 primaries, and for having been former Gov. Pete Wilson's legislative manager for the tax increase that was enacted in the wake of the 1990 downturn).

Jones led the attack on Riordan for having given money to an array of Democrats over the years. Former Gov. George Deukmejian, long underappreciated but now widely admired, endorsed Jones and attacked Riordan, even saying he wouldn't vote for Riordan if he were the nominee. And Gray Davis, one of the most remarkable political fundraisers of our era, spent big bucks — about $8 million, eventually — on TV ads attacking Riordan's inconsistency on issues ranging from abortion to the death penalty.

But Bill Simon had money: some his own, some donated. And possibly because of his flirtation with McCain, Bill Jones didn't have enough for a serious TV ad campaign. Simon introduced himself with "soft" ads featuring former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, for whom he had worked as a federal prosecutor in the late 1980s. He then moved to criticism of Riordan for having said that Clinton and other Democrats were worthy of admiration, explicitly positioning himself as "the conservative Republican who won't raise your taxes" and whose heroes are Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush, and Rudolph Giuliani.

In the last week, statewide polls showed Simon first pulling even with, then overtaking Riordan. Though excited, Simon supporters were careful not to claim a premature victory. Turnout at the primary was low — 36 percent, the second-lowest in the state's history — but the voters spoke, giving Simon 49.4 percent to Riordan's 31.4 percent and Jones's 17 percent. In a Public Policy Institute of California poll taken in early January, Simon had been at only 4 percent — 37 percent behind Riordan.

With that as background, here are some of my impressions of life among the Republicans Tuesday night:

Even as the results showed Simon widening his lead, the Riordan people remained upbeat and enthusiastic. It wasn't quite fair to compare the Republican scene with the occasional TV pictures of near-empty Democratic conclaves; except for controller and insurance commissioner, there simply weren't any real contests to stir passions. Still, the Republicans came early, stayed late, and made lots of noise. The Simon people were especially excited — even before the polls closed and results started trickling in.

I talked with Martin Anderson, former "domestic policy czar" in the early Reagan years and now at the Hoover Institution at Stanford. Anderson has made something of a project of restoring Reagan's image as an intelligent, focused politician through the In His Own Hand books and CDs. He has been on the Simon team for about a year now and told me he saw some parallels between his candidate and Reagan — especially in the almost uncanny way Simon has begun to connect with voters through television. Furthermore, "he beat the mayor of L.A., the secretary of state, and the White House. Who's to say he can't take the next step?"

The Simon campaign hadn't been only about the election; it included 18 policy task forces (Martin's wife, Annaliese, heads the high-tech task force). This gave Simon a solid base of knowledge from which to discuss issues. And on all the important issues, Martin Anderson says, Simon has taken policy positions virtually identical to those you would expect from Ronald Reagan or George W. Bush.

It wasn't just the positions, however, but a connection with voters. Simon almost looks too young to run (he's 50), but that might be an advantage. If he can seem a bit wonky, he also comes cross as a person who means what he says. Anderson thinks people instinctively trust him.

Matt Fong, the former California state treasurer who ran well but unsuccessfully for Senate, told me that Simon connects especially well with women and that women voters are turning out to be one of his strengths. In the debates, his comments to the effect that "after all, I have five sisters" sounded a little clunky. But maybe it worked. Fong thinks he communicates a certain basic decency that people can sense, even if they're not sure they agree with his policy positions.

Dick Riordan's concession speech was remarkably gracious and fairly enthusiastic. He did have to get in some of his campaign lines about the need for the GOP to become more inclusionary, to "welcome women back," to reach out to minorities. But he stressed that the GOP must unite and that "Bill Simon is the hope to bring glory back to the Golden State."

(Simon and Riordan attend the same church and have been friends — politics aside — for years. In fact, Riordan urged Simon to run some 18 months ago, before he decided to jump into the race.)

Before the acceptance speech, my experience with Simon consisted of a few TV commercials and debates, and an editorial board meeting in which half a dozen of us peppered him with questions. He was fairly impressive in the small group, showing familiarity with California issues, an essentially free-market approach to issues, and an ability to move beyond canned statements during a discussion. But I had thought Bill Jones actually did better during debates; Simon seemed stiff, and he refused to beat up on Dick Riordan.

So his ease during an acceptance speech that had to stir up both the troops in the ballroom and voters watching on TV surprised me somewhat. About a dozen Simon supporters told me later that he has been steadily improving on the stump and they expect him to get better.

He also managed to package the idea of a "California dream" to which many Californians still cling in an essentially conservative, but broader and more inclusive rhetoric. Ronald Reagan was able to do that too. Simon's formulation wasn't bad:

The idea that here in the Golden State, if you work hard and live by the rules, your hopes and dreams can come true. You can climb as high and go just as far as your God-given talents will take you. It is the idea of freedom and boundless opportunity, guided by a strong sense of community, service, kindness, and generosity of spirit. This idea is our California dream.

Of course, it's too early to tell if that kind of campaigning will resonate beyond the Republican primary electorate. But we may be seeing the emergence of a major political figure here.

It won't be easy. Gray Davis has a war chest of about $30 million, and can raise much more. The buzz is that he'll spend some right away, in an attempt to define Bill Simon as an out-of-touch extremist, before Simon can define himself to the broad electorate. On election night, Davis described Simon as a "true-blue conservative think-tanker" (perhaps one of the most accurate things he has said about an opponent) and himself as a practical problem-solver. If the race is close, it will probably get nasty.

But Gray Davis — who spent his life cautiously climbing the political ladder, and who has the mentality of a staffer — really did mishandle the recent electricity crisis; and most Californians would agree. Early in his term, I heard more complaints about his penchant for micromanagement and control from Democratic staffers and legislators in Sacramento than I did from Republicans. He is vulnerable and he is not lovable.

Bill Simon could be the man to take him.