Rescue California

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Transcript of gubernatorial recall debate

September 24, 2003

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organizing to recall the next governor if it's a Republican. I think that's a bad way of doing politics. I think it's a perpetual type of politics. I agree with my colleagues that there is some good that could come from this as a result. But I think that to do it in this way, even Hiram Johnson as Arnold talked about in terms of him creating the recall process, even in his inaugural address said that it wasn't the panacea. The recalls are not the panacea for government. I really think that we have a situation here that we have to deal with in terms of the budget crisis. That's true. ... But this recall could end being an era of perpetual politics that I think would be bad for California.

CITIZEN QUESTION: What should California's top priority be right now?

SCHWARZENEGGER: I think that our top priority right now should be turning the economy around. We have the worst economic atmosphere, worst business atmosphere in California. And what we see is that because businesses are leaving the state and jobs are leaving the state. We have the have highest workers' compensation costs. We have the highest energy costs here. We have the worst money management. We have the worst credit rating. We have all of those things that drive business away. And we are over-regulated, over-taxed, over-burdening our businesses. And so no matter where I go in this state it is the same thing -- that workers' compensation is killing business and we have to stop and reverse that.

HUFFINGTON: Actually, you know, I agree with one thing you said, that the worker's comp system is broken. But everything else you said is simply untrue. In the last year, there is an increase in business in the state of 3.7 percent. This state right now is taxed at a lower rate than when the chairman of your election committee, Pete Wilson, was governor. This gloom and doom statistics about business leaving are simply a perpetuation of the Republican idea that if you simply do everything that businesses want, if you simply let them have all the loopholes they want, that all will be well. And we saw in the 1990s that was not the case. You ended up with Enron, Global Crossing and billions of dollars lost in shareholder wealth and in pensions. And I would really like you to tell the people the truth because these illusions are simply hurting us.

McCLINTOCK: Arianna, if I may, the statistics that we're seeing reported across California directly contradict what you have said. We've had a net loss of nearly a third of a million jobs in the last two-and-half years. We've had the first net out-migration of domestic population in our state's history. And a lot of that is going to Arizona and Nevada. Now that's a pretty profound development in the history of the state -- when families looking for a better future, a better place to raise their kids, look at our beautiful state with all of the blessing that God could bestow upon a land and find a better future out in the middle of the Nevada and Arizona deserts than they found here in California. When Fidelity National announced they were leaving for Jacksonville, Florida, their CEO, taking 400 jobs with them, their CEO was quoted on local TV. He said this wasn't a complicated decision. In Florida there is no income tax. The sales tax is 6 percent. It costs 40 bucks to register your car. Why is everybody surprised we're leaving?