When thinking about the California recall election, the image of Danny DeVito in "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" leaving the rainy world of reality and driving into the sunny world of Toon Town comes to mind.
This month in California, Jessica and Roger Rabbit have been replaced with Arnold Schwarzenegger and Gary Coleman -- and Toon Town seems to be invading the gray and very real world of politics.
California's upcoming recall election was prompted when the Sacramento Bee, a local newspaper in California, published an "Intent to Recall" in the newspaper last February.
Proponents of the recall say that Davis understated the huge California deficit ($34.8 billion, more than all other states combined) in last November's election. In their opinion, Davis deserves to be recalled for misleading the public about the state of the economy.
"Davis should have known that avoiding difficult questions on energy and budget would lower his approval ratings, but he is an endemically short-sighted, risk-averse politician who rarely looks beyond the current situation," Dan Walters said in the Sacramento Bee.
While many Californians agree that Davis has not been productive while in office, many feel strongly that a recall is neither appropriate nor productive. "The rules state that you don't replace a governor before his time is up unless he has committed some crime," said Political Science Professor Michael Goldman, who is also the president of a communication consulting firm located in Boston that specializes in campaign consulting and government liaisons.
"Incompetence is not a crime," Goldman added. "If it was, then Herbert Hoover would not have completed his term in office as the Depression struck."
Although Goldman does not particularly approve of Davis's methods in office, he does believe that "democracy functions because everyone understands the rules; you run, you win or lose, you serve, and then you run again." In his opinion, that process, not the recall election process, "is when the public gets to choose whether you are retained or removed."
Though the Tufts campus is hundreds of miles away from California, the recall election has had an impact on it as well. Many University students from California must now decide if and how they will vote through absentee ballot.
This summer, junior and California native Loreal Lynch could not help but notice all the attention this election has received from the media. "At first I thought it was a joke because of all of the funny people running," Lynch said. "It was all over the news, and very entertaining."
Lynch knows firsthand, however, that there is nothing funny about what the newly elected governor must do once in office. Recently, Lynch's aunt, also from California, lost her job as a teacher due to cuts in the education budget.
"I don't think that Grey Davis has done a great job, but it is not all his fault; the national economy is bad," Lynch said. "Yes, my aunt lost her job because of cutbacks, but I don't think that Arnold Schwarzenegger could have changed that."
Junior Kerry Strapazon, a native of Los Angeles, is not thrilled with the recall election either. "I think it defeats the purpose of having elections if we can recall politicians and are always questioning results of elections," Strapazon said.
Not all California students have been affected by the recall. Sophomore Ashley Berman, another Los Angeles resident, spent some of her summer in California. "It's not that I am uninterested," Berman said. "It's more just that I am uninformed."
Whatever its outcome and impact on Tufts' students, the recall election has certainly turned the usually dull world of politics into a three-ring cirus.
"It's so sad being from California right now," Strapazon said. "We have always been thought of as Hollywood and surfers, but now we just look crazy."
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