PLEASE FEEL SORRY FOR ME….Poor Gray Davis. I guess at some level you have to feel sorry for the guy if he’s reduced to this:
“I have plenty of regrets,” Davis said. “But you know leadership is being positive and optimistic and always seeing the glass half full. Even if you have doubts you can’t convey those doubts because you can’t lead.”
Davis added, “I regret deeply that people are out of work. I feel very badly about that. I don’t think I caused it, but I know that I get the blame because I’m the leader. I regret deeply that people are paying more for electricity now than they were three or four years ago. But we had a lot of obstacles. I won’t run through those again, but at least our lights have stayed on.
“I regret that in some cases, bills I signed didn’t turn out as well as I thought they would. But at the time I thought I was doing the right thing. But it didn’t work as well. But as a leader, I can’t just say I’m full of doubt and regret. Then no one will rally behind you when you say we have to go in this direction.”
….Pressed further, he finally said: “I take responsibility. Just blame me. Blame me. I’m captain of the ship.”
Translation: yes, I suck, but I don’t think I suck quite badly enough to be recalled.
On the other hand, Davis has collected $2.4 million in the past few weeks for the anti-recall campaign, compared to $418,000 for the pro-recall campaign, so I guess we can all dry our tears.
Here are the fundraising numbers for the rest of the wannabes. Note that these numbers include only contributions over $1000:
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Cruz Bustamante: $526,000
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Arianna Huffington: $222,000
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Tom McClintock: $325,000
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Arnold Schwarzenegger: $3.2 million
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Peter Ueberroth: $2.4 million
The only surprise here (for me, anyway) is Ueberroth’s healthy fundraising number. He may not be doing too well in the polls ? a mere 7% in the most recent survey ? but with money like that he’s likely to stay in the race and continue to be a factor.
