GOV. CAMEJO?

If There's No Democrat On The Ballot, Green Party Candidate Could Win

It's Oct. 8, the day after California's historic election in which the
voters have recalled Gov. Gray Davis and replaced him with . . . Peter
Camejo? Don't rule it out.

This election will be organized differently from all others. On Oct. 7, the
candidate who gets the most votes will win the highest office in a state
with an economy (admittedly battered) equivalent to the fifth-largest
nation in the world. There will be no party primaries to select nominees,
which would leave a tidy general election ballot of six or seven names
before the voters. Rather, dozens of candidates -- perhaps as many as 100
or more -- will file for an opportunity to become captain of the California
Titanic. With so many candidates, someone could win with as little as 10 or
12 percent of the vote.

So how does that turn Green Party candidate Peter Camejo into Governor Camejo?

The recall ballot will have two parts. The first question will be whether
the voters want to recall Davis. The second question on the same ballot
will ask voters to choose from a long list of replacement candidates in the
event that Davis is recalled.

Imagine that the Democrats actually stick to their game plan and refuse to
field any candidate of note. At the same time, a dozen or so well-known
Republicans and lots of others place their names on the ballot along with
Camejo. Now the plot thickens.

Imagine that Davis loses his recall fight and that sizable numbers of
Democrats who voted to retain the governor cast their votes for Camejo. For
some, it will be because Camejo is the choice closest to
moderate-to-liberal Davis. For others, it will be a way to stick it to the
Republican conservatives who created this mess in the first place. Add the
Democratic vote to the 5 percent that Camejo received when he ran for
governor in 2002, and it could be a runaway for the most liberal candidate
in the bunch.

How liberal? Camejo favors a statewide ``living wage,'' rejects Ward
Connerly's racial privacy initiative, supports the legalization of
marijuana, opposes capital punishment and was an early, vocal critic of the
invasion of Iraq. Result: While conservative Republicans may succeed in
tossing out their nemesis, they may pave the way for election of the most
liberal governor in the state's history.

Think it's out of the question? That's what they said in Minnesota in 1998,
when the voters chose former Navy Seal and professional wrestler Jesse
Ventura over mainstream candidates from the Democratic and Republican
parties. That's what they said in 1998 when Green Party Candidate Audie
Bock -- who may be on the Oct. 7 recall ballot as a Democrat -- sneaked by
former Oakland Mayor and Assembly member Elihu Harris to capture an
Assembly seat. In politics, no matter how people may wish to choreograph
outcomes, sometimes the unpredictable happens.

On Oct. 7, under not such outrageous conditions, conservatives could oust
Democrat Davis only to be stuck with someone who makes Davis look like a
(gulp) conservative.

Moral to the story? Conservatives had better be careful what they wish for
- -- they might get a lot more.

Larry N. Gerston is a professor of political science at San Jose State
University and a political analyst at NBC11. He wrote this column for the
Mercury News.