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In Southern Calif., Dream Gone Sour Fuels Recall Rage "I've never seen anything like this," said George Plescia, a Republican who was elected last year to represent Escondido in the state assembly. "People here tend to have a relaxed attitude, to be more patient with things. But I think their frustration has grown tremendously even since last year." That dismay is being stoked for hours every day on political talk-radio programs broadcast across Southern California -- and now it is being organized for the recall vote. Republican leaders in San Diego County have begun assembling and training more than 1,500 volunteers to swarm every precinct here before the election and inspire voters to go to the polls. The grass-roots campaign is the largest the county GOP has ever staged. Marie Waldron has no doubt that turnout for the recall will be strong. She serves on Escondido's city council and owns a small printing shop. Voter fury has been rising here, she said, since California's failed experiment with electricity deregulation created energy shortages two years ago that led to blackouts and steep increases in utility rates. That problem hit San Diego County first, and hardest. Waldron said that she has lost one-third of her business since then because clients fleeing high costs have relocated either to Arizona or Nevada. California's record $38 billion budget shortfall this year, which has forced the state to triple taxes on vehicles and slash many programs, and which has ruined its credit rating, is creating another exodus of businesses and residents, she said. "This has been a long time coming," Waldron said. "It's electricity costs, housing costs, insurance costs, the deficit, higher taxes -- the list just goes on and on. People are saying, 'Gee, the sunshine is great, but I keep paying and paying and not seeing much benefit anymore.' This election is about Davis, but for many people it's also about making a statement: Enough is enough." Many California residents came here, or have always stayed, for the endless summer, or the promise of good jobs, or for a way of life that looks to the future and rarely feels burdened by the past. Now, amid hard times, many complain of paradise lost: They're constantly stuck in traffic, or engulfed by suburban sprawl, or can no longer afford to buy a home. Candidates hoping to replace Davis are playing to the prevalent nostalgia here for the have-it-all California dream, even though many voters have only known it as fantasy. California historian Kevin Starr said that such longing has ignited many other political uprisings in the state. "People have always felt a utopian dimension to life in California," he said. "That creates high expectations and a psychological volatility when things don't go well." Michael Capaldi, chairman of the Lincoln Club of Orange County, Southern California's most prominent Republican group, characterized support for the recall another way: "We're a state that's always out of control, and that's good," he said. "Californians don't have roots. There's no political caste system. The parties are weak. The independent mind is welcome. Voters see the recall as another chance to exert their power, and they're never going to turn that down. They know that whoever is governor after this is going to be a humble man, because now there's always going to be this threat in the background." Here in Escondido, such sentiment dominates conversation about the recall.
Many voters may have signed petitions calling for the special election largely because they believe that Davis has been a bad governor, or to help return Republicans to political power in California. But many
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