Ask the 'Geek Candidate' for California Governor 1109
No, not Arnold Schwarzenegger. We're talking abut Georgy Russell, who studied computer science at UC Berkeley, often wears ThinkGeek clothing, has a blog, reads Slashdot, and knows how to run Linux. Since this California electoral free-for-all has turned into a worldwide spectator sport as bizarre as any other 'Reality TV' show currently airing, Slashdot might as well get in on the media frenzy and interview a candidate, and Georgy is the obvious choice. We'll email Georgy 10 of the highest-moderated questions, and publish her answers (and, yes, the chosen questions in the same post) as soon as she replies.
questions about the campaign. (Score:5, Interesting)
While I believe that as more and more "young" people run for and are elected to office, these items might come to pass, don't you think that it is a little early to be attempting to make these strides?
My other issue is your stance on Health Care. The fine State of CA has many illegal immigrants on its soil, (in fact it depends on those people for many "lowly" jobs IIRC). Are you planning on REAL citizens covering the insurance costs for these illegal immigrants and their children? Don't you see this as a large enough burden on the population as it is?
Economy (Score:5, Interesting)
* ABC News last night
Obvious question (Score:4, Interesting)
RIAA vs. America (Score:5, Interesting)
Hope to win or shake things up? (Score:5, Interesting)
So... (Score:5, Interesting)
How do you think your involvement in technology can translate to leading California, and indirectly, the rest of the country? I see here [georgyforgov.com] that you have filed for several patents. How do you feel about companies such as PanIP using patents as a basis for lawsuits rather than innovation? Will you make intellectual 'property' a campaign issue?
Do you actually think you will win? (Score:2, Interesting)
Illegal Imigration (Score:4, Interesting)
Likewise, will the funding of benefit programs to imigrants (legal or otherwise) be cut, maintained, or increased?
Against Arnold, why? (Score:5, Interesting)
Pundits would be quick to point out that "obviously, he'd not run if he didn't think he had a chance"...but I doubt that ~130 miscellaneous people really think they have a chance against Arnold, or even Gary Coleman. Gary Coleman even said he doesn't expect to win, and that he supports Arnold.
Technology (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:questions about the campaign. (Score:5, Interesting)
Marijuana (Score:2, Interesting)
My questions (Score:4, Interesting)
Seriously (Score:3, Interesting)
qualifications (Score:5, Interesting)
My Question(s). (Score:3, Interesting)
How would you deal with this?
The environment (Score:3, Interesting)
Can you make the difference and take a lead on these issues to generate more respect for your country ?
Microsoft.... (Score:2, Interesting)
Free Software California (Score:5, Interesting)
Energy & Presidents (Score:4, Interesting)
2. Why do you continually attack Bush and supposed administration policies in all of your literature? Wouldn't it make more sense to discuss the intentions of candidates who are actually running for governor of California? If the current governor of California cannot prevent Bush from influencing the state, how would you?
Re:questions about the campaign. (Score:4, Interesting)
It is this kind of small minded opinion that always amazes me - especially on
Surely you can see that the whole "blaming the imigrants" thing is nothing but spin - and fundamentally not that different to the anti-semitism happening in Nazi Germany pre WW2.
Immigrants come to rich countries for a reason - a better quality of life. It is surely human nature to better ourselves as individuals and groups - this is how we have achieved so much as a species. We have to accept that we are living in a capitalist world - and as capitalism dictates that money is proportional to quality of life then people in poorer countries will naturally want to migrate to richer ones. This is not because they are evil, lazy or stupid, but simply the human desire to better ones self.
One thing that is never mentioned by any politician in western governments is the cause of dissatisfaction that causes illigal immigration. It is naive to assume that becoming an illegal immigrant is a "easy option", but as long as the richest countries keep exploiting the poorest countries (and hence keep the poor countries poor) there will be individuals who refuse to live the life they are born to.
The craziest thing of all to me is that the western world now insists on beaming its sanitised and idealised version of western life into the poorer countries via television channels - simply highlighting what they haven't got.
</soapbox>
Re:questions about the campaign. (Score:3, Interesting)
Your point is valid, though. If they were all to be declared "legal" overnight, this issue would not go away.
Geek Jobs (Score:4, Interesting)
That being said, what would you do to help stem the tide of hi tech jobs leaving our country as Governor, and what would you try to do if you were eventually elected to congress?
Do you believe in your candidature? (Score:2, Interesting)
Greetings from Brazil. The forthcoming Californian election is drawing a lot of attention here. We are curious to see what's going to happen. =)
California's dismal education system (Score:5, Interesting)
As governor, this is one of the areas that you would have a lot of control over. What are your ideas for improving our state's schools?
Debate? (Score:3, Interesting)
Do you support the state using open source/linux (Score:3, Interesting)
Voting behavior (Score:3, Interesting)
Given that it is likely much of Arnold Schwarzenneger's electoral support will come simply from his celebrity status, do you feel it would be okay for people to vote for you simply because you are beautiful ( *and smart!* )?
Thought experiment (Score:5, Interesting)
Can you do a little thought experiment for us? I think it would provide some insight into your understanding of your opponents and the issues.
I want you to play devil's advocate for a moment, and imagine yourself in turn as the candidate for the Democrats, Republicans, and Green Party. What would your issues be, and what tactics would you use to gain the governorship?
Probably a tall order, but I think it would really highlight your grasp of the issues and political climate.
Is electrinic voting secure? (Score:3, Interesting)
What is your opinion of the suitability of electronic voting in California elections?
Dot Bomb? (Score:4, Interesting)
The budget (Score:3, Interesting)
I realize that these are specific and uncomfortable questions to ask, but California is in the midst of a major budgetary crisis, and any Governor will have to make specific and unpleasant choices to deal with it. So far, the answer the current Governor has chosen has been to pick and blame political opponents.
Energy Security (Score:5, Interesting)
As governor, will you insist on clean energy at the risk these never get built or are built in an insufficient number, or would you be willing to compromise and build fossil and/or nuclear plants to ensure that the 2001 fiasco which cost CA billions is never repeated?
Transport policy (Score:5, Interesting)
Short-sighted planners still cling to the unbelievably outdated notion that you can reduce traffic congestion by building more roads and making existing ones wider. Are you aware of the phenomenon of 'induced traffic' or will you allow this destructive and self-defeating practice of runaway road-building to continue unopposed? Will you strive to overcome the political wrangling that has hampered efforts to build a European style high-speed rail link from San Francisco to Los Angeles?
Single-use zoning laws have led to the vandalism of California's built environment. It has transformed her 'cites' into a vast, ugly sprawl of strip malls, gas stations and fast food drive-thrus. Building a pedestrian-friendly city is well nigh illegal in most places. Will you speak out against the malling and sprawling of the west and advocate the growing North American movement known as 'new urbanism?'
Thanks.
Election spoiler (Score:4, Interesting)
How do you feel about the possibility that you as a candidate (as well as those that vote for you) could be tarred with the same brush as Nader in 2000, namely, that you 'gave' the recall election to someone distasteful to the accuser, merely by being less distasteful but still participating? What do you think this says about democracy in California and the US when so many individual candidates could be similarly accused?
Re:Do you think the recall is fair? (Score:3, Interesting)
This is opposite to how presidents and vice presidents are elected, which is as a part of the same ticket.
Participation or Representation? (Score:5, Interesting)
Also, do you feel that the elected governor is assisted or confounded by the slew of ballot initiatives that come through every election cycle? If elected, would you seek to expand this participatory government because it empowers the people, keep it at the same level, or rein it in because it makes effective long-term strategy so difficult?
Re:This country was built by immegrants ok Dick. (Score:1, Interesting)
If they are legals then they can form unions, demand minimum wage and basic safety measures on the job.
We wouldn't want that now would we?
So if you agree that immegrants keep America strong then maybe you should be pushing for relaxed immegration laws instead of being a racist and blame brown foreigners for ruining America.
(Last time I checked most of America's problems actually came from greedy old white men...)
It wasn't some evil mexican laborer who was causing the energy crisis in California, it was a bunch of patriotic all american white folks.
How does it feel... (Score:4, Interesting)
About the deficit problem (Score:3, Interesting)
The states made a big mistake when they started using sales taxes to pad their incomes. This is one of the key problems with a national sales tax to replace the income tax, a system that keeps being promoted.
When spending is high, the ecconomy is good and the sales tax revenues are quite large. The state runs a surplus and the voters demand increased services.
Then spending declines and just when people get laid off, at the time when demand of services is highest, the state has to make dramatic cuts that prove to be unpopular.
The message? Sales taxes are a bad idea.
One idea I like is the circulation fee system. Instead of rewarding the non-use of money it rewards trading it quickly, thus creating a much higher amount of consumer spending, the engine that makes money powerful.
Constitution (Score:1, Interesting)
that means (Score:2, Interesting)
In California, the police can take Mexican consular IDs or in registering children for school, issuing drivers licenses, etc.
Now, if you disgree with the immigration policy, you don't break the law. If you don't think a speed limit is bad, that does not exempt you from speeding tickets when you are going 50mph in a school zone.
5,000 votes might be the difference... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:no confidence votes (Score:3, Interesting)
1/2 the responses refer to you as male (Score:4, Interesting)
You are being positioned, at least in this community, as the "geek candidate". (I'll omit the quotes from now on, and hope you're not offended by the word geek.)
It seems to me that a female geek holds the best hope for getting a technologically-competent politician into an important office, because female geeks escape from many of the negative stereotypes that plague male geeks in the public perception.
How do you think being a female geek vs a male geek affects your chance to win the election? (Better? Worse? Non-issue?) Along the same lines, do you believe being female in general will make the election easier or more difficult for you?
The reason I asked this question is this -- over half of the replies to this interview post have referred to you as "he", "him", or otherwise as a male, when even the short article blurb clearly indicated you were a "she".
Affirmative Action (Score:5, Interesting)
As a college student in the UC system, but a politically rightist town (LA), I hear a lot of different views on the subject. I am also, however, a white guy that grew up in an upper-middle class neighborhood. Now, I'm all for diversity, but do you think affirmative action is really the right way to get diversity into schools? If so, why? If not, what do you propose? Would you try to do anything to solve racial diversity issues at a lower level than that of the university?
Re:questions about the campaign. (Score:5, Interesting)
The truth is this: California WANTS illegal immagrants there so that they can have farm workers, people to clean up hotels, and (most importantly) a scapegoat for all the problems that exist in the state. It's WAY too easy to "illegally" get into California and work there for it to be a simple mistake. If they wanted to get rid of the "problem", then they'd start throwing employers in jail for hiring illegal workers. But they don't do that, and the fact that they don't is quite telling. The often white, republican farmers, wouldn't want their labor force to be depleted -- and to be fair, most every illegal immagrant would rather be doing that than living in northern Mexico.
I left California in 1995; after being born and raised there. I miss it at times, but not at the moment... Proposition 187 was supposed to "fix" all of this; it was passed right as I left the state, but it looks as though it didn't do much.
Oh, and my current state's budget was balanced this year.
Re:Do you think the recall is fair? (Score:5, Interesting)
I personally also think the 12th Amendment should be repealed.
Age (Score:5, Interesting)
The constituency aside, should you get voted governor, do you believe the older California lawmakers will take you seriously? How do you intend to gain their respect?
Re:What part of illegal don't you understand? (Score:1, Interesting)
As John Adams said:
"Yes, they are citizens. They are people and they are here. If there is any other requirement, I've never heard of it."
Do you have the time? (Score:3, Interesting)
Is that really a sufficient amount of time to repair (or make a positive dent in) California's budget problems? If so, how do you plan on doing that?
Will more government really fix health care? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Do you think the recall is fair? (Score:1, Interesting)
Further, he wasn't ELECTED by a majority (48% [cnn.com], in fact), why should his replacement be required to get a majority?
The candidates ALREADY face a more difficult standard to get him OUT of office (majority vs. plurality) than it took him to get in. If you look at it honesty, the recall procedure is slanted IN FAVOR OF the incumbent, not against.
The recall and the subsequent election are separate issues and should be treated as such.
Content vs. Tech (Score:5, Interesting)
If so how?
I realize that this is mostly a federal matter as far as the law and politics go but there are many that believe that California kind of sets the standard for the rest of the nation to follow(at least economically and politically) so I am intersted in your ideas on this matter.
THANK YOU CHEEZEDAWG (Score:4, Interesting)
Think about it, why do we tax the rich? Is it about punishing them for being rich, or trying to get whatever out of them they're willing to pay? Because if it's the ladder, California should really reexamine their tax system.
Over taxation leads to less revenue and hindered economies. It's a lose lose situation, unless you just really hate the rich.
Re:questions about the campaign. (Score:3, Interesting)
a) The cost is only $10 in taxes. Dubious. Health care, as you note, is expensive. To move to a Canadian-style system would cost loads more money and would make up the difference, as Canada does, by rationing services.
b) Kids with bullets in their stomachs are checked for insurance. Obviously you haven't spent much time in the US. Emergency room care is free for all, and a big source of our medical costs. Free or reduced cost medical care is available for indigent people through the Medicaid program. The service is underutilzed, and people who make slightly more than the qualifying income level tend to opt to save money for other things than health insurance, and they don't do it for ever. Many of these are young people with middle-class or better parents just starting out. The 43 million figure also includes people whose coverage under one job runs out before they start a new job, so it's not as if these people are permanently uninsured. "Under-insured" is very much a loaded term--some people (like me, 10 years ago) choose cheap catastrophic coverage because we're young and healthy and can manage our money well enough to keep the $1000 deductible lying around rather than spending it on beer.
I know, heresy, but there you go. Question authority.
Great leaders have great advisors... (Score:5, Interesting)
Given your presumed lack of experience and ability to hold the office you are seeking, who will you be appointing as your advisors upon becoming governor and what are their qualifications?
Voter apathy (Score:3, Interesting)
Okay given that, a big reason for voter apathy is often that people can't see any difference between the candidates. In holland we got about a dozen parties withabout half of them big enough to make a difference. In america it is only 2. However in this election you have a couple of dozen candidates and not even the greatest cynic can claim they are spouting the same old lines.
Also a cause for voter apathy is said to be that the voter can't see what the goverment is doing. Well with all the brownouts and the enron/worldcom trouble I should this could have woken the voter up that they need a good goverment to represent them.
Nonetheless on youre weblog you say that you expect the turnout to be oven lower then when gray davis was elected. If all this can't get the voter intrested then what can? You now got superstars, nutcases, pornstars and (sorry about this) you and yet you expect even fewer people to give a damn. Is democarcy ultimatly always going to go down to a minority voting or is it perhaps time to introduce mandatory voting?
Imigration (Score:3, Interesting)
Are you in favor of making borders more accessable?
Are you in favor of eliminating Green Cards in favor of blanket Citizinship?
Why should Slashdot readers vote for you? (Score:2, Interesting)
You may make your answer to this question as long as you wish...
What we really want to know. (Score:4, Interesting)
- The Oracle fiasco cost the state millions of dollars.
- Davis said in his "State of the State" address that if he found that the electric companies were ripping us off by shutting down power stations to artificially raise prices then he'd take over the stations via emminent domain. Sure enough, the electric companies were found to be manipulating the prices. Rather than fullfilling his promise he formed a 5 year plan to buy electricity at a high rate and to pay for it from the general fund thereby bankrupting the state. That plan cost us billions of dollars.
- On top of all that he increased spending by (depending which source you cite) 30% to 48%. Government spending increased roughly twice the rate of the population increase. And now he tells us the only way we can get out of this mess is to cut police, fire, and school budgets.
- Because of all this our bonds have been downgraded to one level above "junk".
So we know why he's a bad governor. What we want to know, what we need to know, is how do you propose to fix this mess? Don't tell me how other people have failed, don't give me some generic line about how "special interest is running this state". Give me specific points of your plan to fix our financial problems.What would you have done differently than Davis? (Score:1, Interesting)
How would you have handled the state's budgets? Since you were in the tech industry, would you have been more likely to be aware of the impending collapse or would industry optimism led you to spend as Davis did?
Meetup (Score:1, Interesting)
Would you switch emphasis to the technology, economics and business regulaton? Would you feel that your business experience with in the California tech market be a key distinction against the other canidates?
Would you be willing to use the slashdot effect
on the next major internet poll to boost name recognition?
diff you electorate /dev/null (Score:2, Interesting)
How do you plan to govern a people whose beliefs (based on past initiative success) strongly differ from yours on "the death penalty", and "de-criminalization of drug use".
How to balance the budget (Score:4, Interesting)
Tax the rich even more is your answer? (Score:5, Interesting)
Currently, the wealthies people pay the highest percentage of their income in taxes. Yet your solution to the budget crisis seems to be to tax these people even more? Why do you feel it is ethical to unfairly tax the most productive members of Califoria society, to solve California's budget problems, but are unwilling to make the average person take some responsibility for providing tax revenue for service rendered by California govt. for all Californians? As a practical matter, do you think this solution will drive these people away from California, and create an even greater budget problem, rather than solving it?
Re:Transport policy (Score:3, Interesting)
Single-use zoning laws have led to the vandalism of California's built environment. It has transformed her 'cites' into a vast, ugly sprawl of strip malls, gas stations and fast food drive-thrus.
This from someone who obviously has never been to, say, Dallas. Dallas is the sort of place where planners decided that large swath of land X (i.e. a few square miles) would be best suited for gas stations while swath Y would be best suited for Fast Food, etc., etc. The result: Huge traffic jams while people struggle to get gas in the only section of town that has it, then traffic getting to work (the areas of which again are concentrated), then huge traffic getting to the KFC where you grab dinner on the way home (because the traffic has kept you from having the time to cook a proper meal), then ... You get the idea.
I've mostly lived in Phoenix (which is planned reasonably well, though it is in full-sprawl-mode), and in Silicon Valley, and I must say it's not that bad, considering the constraints we have. While I think it rediculous that I'm a well-paid tech worker and still don't have a prayer of owning a house here (and am not willing to live in Sacramento or Hollister and commute), it's important to remember that most techies will eventually burn out and need to do something else at some point==moving elsewhere anyway in all likelihood.
If you want a real city to live in, there's always San Francisco. Knock yourself out. In the meantime, California's got bigger problems that need fixing.
Re:Do you think the recall is fair? (Score:1, Interesting)
How is it any less democrat that a majority vote should bar a person from office than that a majority vote should elect someone to office?
Remember, the ballot has TWO questions on it. One recall yes/no and one for the replacement candidate. They're separate votes--on the same ballot strictly for convenience--and no one is being disenfranchised here.
Fall back plan (Score:1, Interesting)
a) What do you plan to do following the election?
b) How do you intend to further your cause?
c) How do you intent to help California if your not elected?
d) Are you planning to stay in politics and to run in another election?