Daniel Weintraub recounts the origin of the recall movement against Davis, writes a few very clear paragraphs on why the voters mistrust and dislike him, and explains why it is a race between Davis and Arnold. In order for Davis to win, he has to get over 50% of the vote on the first ballot. Davis can’t do that (he only won 47% last November). He’ll be lucky to get 37% of the vote. So the only question is how many votes will Arnold get? Will Arnold get above 40%? Yes, and he might go as high as 45% (I assume Bustamante will get no more than 28% and McClintock no more than %15).

And this will happen despite the fact that Democrats outnumber Republicans in registration (43.7% to 35.3%). Yet, almost 40,000 more Californians registered as Republicans than Democrats during the heart of the recall campaign, according to figures released by the Secretary of State’s Office. This shows that intensity and turnout are on the side of the anti-Davis forces; voter turnout will be much higher than the 50.6% that voted last year. The question is, will it rise to the 71% of registered voters who voted in the 2000 presidential election. The higher the turnout, the worse for Davis, in my opinion. Davis has not succeeded in persuading Democrats to come out and vote for him, and it is estimates that 25% of Demos who vote will vote to recall Davis. Even this Los Angeles Times story recognizes the insurmountable obstacle that Davis needed to overcome, but, of course, couldn’t. That obstacle is himself. He couldn’t give himself either a character or a personality makeover. Read into this article to get a good sense of the Al-Gore-like-wooden-and-all-too-boring-and-arrogant Davis speaking to a group of Hispanics, and hear his words land with a dull thud. Hasta la vista, baby.