Hugh Hewitt

THE STEPHEN'S KANGAROO RAT was listed as "endangered" by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on October 31, 1988. This little-noticed action launched a revolution in land use in southern California that has culminated in the fires that have now claimed at least 17 lives, destroyed close to 2,000 homes, and consumed more than 600,000 acres throughout the region.

WHO IS WILLIAM ARKIN?

For starters, he is the scribbler who launched the assault on Lt. Gen.

WITHIN MINUTES of the release of exit polls from California last night, Democrats had wheeled as one and began the hopeless attempt to spin the disastrous verdict. Senator Dianne Feinstein led the charge, but the refrain echoed throughout the party: This was a verdict on Davis's handling of the budget, a handling very similar to the fiscal mismanagement on the national level.

Howard Dean had the message on his website 18 minutes after the polls closed:

"Today's recall election in California was not about Gray Davis or Arnold Schwarzenegger.

THIS IS THE PART in the movie when the battering rams smash through the besieged town's much-reinforced-but-nevertheless-crumbling wooden gates, and the outsiders pour through the breach and then over the walls to loot and pillage at will.

Arnold and his forces are at Sacramento's gates. Think Alexander and Thebes. The gutter politics of the last few days won't make the hand-over pretty.

SUDDENLY Tuesday's election is more than a recall. It has also become a referendum on the Los Angeles Times.

In an astonishing story from page A34 of Sunday's Times, Readers Angry at The Times for Schwarzenegger Stories, the paper struggles to report the damage done to its reputation over the past three days while at the same time offering a lengthy apologia from editor John Carroll.

THERE ARE EDITORS and there are editors.

After a quarter century of punditry, I have come to appreciate the best of editors and to refuse to work with the second team. The second team seems intent on substituting their ideas for yours and dulling the sharpest points. The first team polishes and will rarely, if ever, steer away from controversy.

FOR GRAY DAVIS, old habits die hard.

A day after the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals postponed the October 7 recall, the California Association of Highway Patrolmen donated an estimated $50,000 to the governor. That was four days after the legislature approved a new contract--negotiated by the Davis administration--giving CHP officers one extra day per month of vacation or personal leave instead of a 5 percent raise.

AS THE RECALL rocks along, reporters continue to ignore the underlying causes of widespread voter disgust, including Gray Davis' the tripling of the car tax this past summer, and the tidal wave of special interest legislation that ranges from workplace protection for cross-dressing employees to the bestowal of land use authority on California's Indian tribes over sites they determine to have sacred significance.

HOW MUCH would you spend to protect and expand a business with $5 billion in annual revenues and no significant local competition? Is that protection worth 2 percent of one year's income? Or 5 percent? Maybe even 10 percent? Whether California's Indian tribes spend $100 million, $250 million, or even $500 million in the next 50 days is the biggest question in California's recall.

Sixty-one tribes already have deals with California on the specifics of their gambling operations. More such deals are on the way.

THE DAILY STANDARD welcomes letters to the editor. Letters will be edited for length and clarity and must include the writer's name, city, and state.

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Kudos to Irwin M. Stelzer for The Oil Mirage. The more said about the spread between competitive vs. market price the better.

However, there was no quid pro quo for the Saudi agreement to "pump enough oil to keep prices from spiking when strikes . . . political unrest . . .

CHARLES CHAPUT, the Archbishop of Denver, issued a stinging rebuke to Catholic senator Richard Durbin and concluded that "a new kind of religious discrimination is very welcome at the Capitol, even among elected officials who claim to be Catholic," and the national news media barely took note. A single Washington Times story cited Chaput's column on the William Pryor nomination, and the sole mention in the Washington Post was contained in a letter to the editor from C.

GEORGE GORTON, Ken Khachigian, and Sal Russo are the three best Republican political consultants that California has produced over the past quarter century. Today they work for Arnold Schwarzenegger, Darrell Issa, and Bill Simon, respectively.

All three have played the part of key strategist to one or more of the California GOP's legendary big names. Each knows every serious money man and county party operative by their first name, and every newspaper and television station from Eureka to Chula Vista.