Now that Tuesday night’s 10th CD primary election has put Democratic Lt. Gov. John Garamendi on the fast track to Washington, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is likely to find his phone ringing pretty regularly from now until Nov. 3.
The governor, you see, will get to appoint a new lieutenant governor if Garamendi wins his expected victory this November and there will be plenty of people with names to suggest.
Now the governor’s office, in true “keep moving, folks, nothing to see here” fashion, is declining any comment on a possible appointment, arguing, not unreasonably, that there’s still an election to be won first.
But while strange things can happen in politics, they usually don’t. And it doesn’t take a political genius to notice that four of the top five finishers in the Contra Costa County-area primary were Democrats and that they outpolled the GOP candidates nearly 2-to-1 in a district where Democrats have a 47 percent to 29 percent registration edge.
On top of that, Garamendi has run twice for governor, been elected three times to statewide office, spent 16 years in the state Legislature, served as a top federal official and was even a football star at the University of California.
The top Republican vote getter, attorney David Harmer, is a former congressional staffer whose only previous run for office was in Utah, where he lost a congressional primary in 1996.
Even Harmer admits he’s a big-time underdog, which may be overstating his chances.
But filling Garamendi’s Sacramento office already has the look of a major political headache for the Republican governor, since anyone he appoints needs to be confirmed by the Democrat-controlled Legislature.
That just about eliminates any of the battalion of Republicans who have signed up for the 2010 primary, since there is no way Democrats in the Legislature are going to allow any of them to use “appointed incumbent” as their ballot designation. And Schwarzenegger and the Republicans are just as unlikely to give any Democrat a leg up in that race.
Democratic legislators also won’t get behind a Republican who could use a yearlong stint as lieutenant governor to burnish the resume for a future run for some other office. And since it’s only a short-term gig, it’s unlikely that any politician is going to give up his or her current job to take the appointment.
And then there’s also the problem that the “light gov” office, with its 20 or so employees and nebulous duties, is not exactly a power center in California politics. Sure, Gray Davis moved to the governor’s office from the number two job, but it’s more typically been a political dead end, as witness Garamendi’s eagerness to flee after less than three years in the job.
For example, when rumors suggesting that San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom might lower his sights to the lieutenant governor’s race started circulating in Sacramento, Garry South, the former Davis advisor who’s running Newsom’s campaign for governor, was quick to stomp them out.
“I would have Newsom kidnapped by one-eyed aliens from Pluto if I ever thought he would make that decision,’’ he told Carla Marinucci of the San Francisco Chronicle.
But the lieutenant governor’s office still is one of only seven statewide constitutional offices, which means there won’t be any shortage of eager applicants.
Former state Sen. John Burton, chairman of the state Democratic Party, already has made the first suggestion: former Los Angeles Mayor Dick Riordan.
Riordan, who lost the GOP primary for governor in 2002, fits the profile for a political seat warmer. He’s smart, well known and well liked and, at age 79, unlikely to have too many electoral ambitions left.
But since political name-dropping is a game anyone can play, let’s add another: former Secretary of State Bruce McPherson. McPherson is a one-time Republican legislator from Santa Cruz who in 2005 was overwhelmingly confirmed by his colleagues after Schwarzenegger appointed him to replace Secretary of State Kevin Shelley.
John Wildermuth is a longtime writer on California politics.