Homeless people egg California gubernatorial recall candidate rather than be used as a prop

I looked into this recently for something else and was pleasantly surprised:

You can register and list either a shelter or a corner or anything. Of course, there are other challenges to voting while homeless, but it’s not against any rules.

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The headline is:

Homeless people egg California gubernatorial recall candidate rather than be used as a prop

Given how this site recognises that California’s liberal establishment has failed to address the state’s housing crisis, the headline would be essentially the same if it had been Newsom who got egged, simply replacing “gubernatorial recall candidate” with “governor”.

Larry Elder, meanwhile, is who he is in the only parallel reality that counts in this discussion: a Libertarian member of the GOP death cult whose policies would make the state’s housing crisis even worse.

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Good point. Egg Newsom too.

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No, it’s not, but it’s damn hard for some folks. IDs tied to the individual would make things much easier.

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I apologize if you are a CA resident. This may seem a bit like mansplaining if you have the ballot in front of you and can see how it works.

The ballot has 2 questions.

  1. Shall Gavin Newsom be recalled (removed) from the office of Governor? Y/N

  2. (Choose a) Candidate to succeed Gavin Newsom as Governor if he is recalled: A list follows that includes over 45 names of candidates including the typical bevy of weirdos who are looking for some PR or notoriety.

It’s only if more than 50% of voters say ‘yes’ to the first question that the second question matters at all. So the whole idea here is to make sure that first question doesn’t get to 50% by removing the option to replace Newsom with some other Democrat. It’s thought that Democrat leaning voters will likely vote no to the recall if there are no reasonable alternative candidates on the list.

I think this is purely a political strategy. It’s easier to convince people to choose yes or no than it is to get them to all choose a single candidate when you have 40-some choices and half are Democrat.

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In part, it’s because the Dems had a bad experience during the 2003 recall of Gray Davis. Back then, the party ran the Lt. Governor as its backup candidate and advised Dems to vote for him in the second question. That led to some confusion, with the Dems voting yes to the recall and then voting for the official Dem candidate. They’re banking on the fact that Newsom is more popular than Elder (who himself doesn’t enjoy the popularity Schwarzenegger did in 2003) and that getting people to vote No on question 1 is the more important goal.

Additionally, the consensus from people who’ve taken the time to look at the platforms (if they exist) of all the question 2 contenders is that all the candidates on the list – including self-identified Dems running against the party’s wishes – don’t have much to offer in terms of positions, experience, education, or grounding in reality to liberals and progressives.

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Come On Reaction GIF by NBA

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Elder’s policy toward these people is “let them die and decrease the surplus population.” That is objectively more harmful to human life than someone throwing an egg. So I’m not exactly going to waste a lot of energy getting hot and bothered about the prospect of the guy getting a little yolk on his suit.

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Blinded as they are by their misapprehension that fascists are their natural allies in their struggle to preserve the “free” market, your more dimwitted Libertarians often forget that the liberal and progressive fight against right-wing sado-populist thugs will sometimes of necessity involve some degree of (usually self-defensive) violence*.

[* Historically speaking, an egging doesn’t merit that description. Right-wing violence, on the other hand, usually starts with fisticuffs and escalates quickly from there to clubs, bricks, knives, and firearms.]

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I mean, I’m okay if she has to pay for the dry cleaning and her mom makes her apologize.

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Yeah there’s a reason the expression “to have egg on one’s face” means a person made to look foolish or embarrassed rather than to be a victim of serious assault.

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Looked to me like his handlers were in a hurry to get him into the car, which appeared soon after the egg, before having to find out just how far the crowd would go.

I would like to know “why the gorilla mask?” If she’s a liberal or progressive, it’s unlikely she’s borrowing a page from the conservative racist playbook. Perhaps she’s a white supremacist MAGAt who doesn’t appreciate a Black man being her death cult’s standard bearer in California. Or maybe she’s a deranged attention-seeker and that was the first mask she grabbed at the year-round Halloween store.

The right-wing media, trying to distract from the real issue of the GOP’s complete contempt for the homeless, is latching onto the “librul racism” explanation as its talking point du jour (parroted lazily here). However, that’s the least probable explanation.

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They would have done that even without the egging. Politicians typically want to get away from Teh Poorz as fast as possible after using them as a photo op.

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Apparently the Dems think that the huge list of crappy candidates is a confusing turn off to voters and the Dems think that a simple “Vote no and go” message will increase Dem voting.

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That is also a form of violence, and one that I find pretty horrific. So the question isn’t if “violence is okay”, because this isn’t Sunday School and we’re not stupid. It’s how much violence is to be tolerated under which conditions.

Throwing an egg at (this or any) politician: I wouldn’t do it, and I wouldn’t encourage it, but under the circumstances I just gotta smirk. They should be punished accordingly, maybe by getting sent the dry cleaning bill. But nobody got hurt, and we’re talking about how awful Elder is, so it’s all good so far.

Electing Elder as governor: fuck that, don’t let it happen.

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Agreed. And from everything I could find, it was a pink gorilla mask, which…I don’t know, makes me think it was less a racist thing and more a, “oh, I happen to have this old pink gorilla mask in the drawer with my pink pussy hat,” or something?

Also…(it’s not letting me quote directly, but your words):

usually starts with fisticuffs

Such a quaint turn of phrase! Next they’ll be upending dust bins in the alleyways, and from there it’s just a short ride to (here’s where it gets depressing again) a fascist misogynistic ethnostate :frowning:

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It is mah constitutional right to open carry as many eggs as I want.

Define what constitutes an extra large egg anyway,

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Depends on the politics. In some cases it could be viewed as self defense IMO.

Also, I don’t consider egg on a suit to be violence. He was never at any point threatened with bodily harm.

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As a few people have already suggested above it’s possible she’s affiliated with or inspired by the Guerilla Girls (a feminist activist organization known for wearing gorilla masks).

ETA: The linked website provides this explanation for the masks:

We wear gorilla masks in public and use facts, humor and outrageous visuals to expose gender and ethnic bias as well as corruption in politics, art, film, and pop culture. Our anonymity keeps the focus on the issues, and away from who we might be: we could be anyone and we are everywhere.

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