Now We’ll See If There’s Substance Behind the Legend of Pete Wilson

Hometown chauvinism aside, San Diegans have good cause to be overjoyed that Pete Wilson has been elected governor.

At last, we are being offered a chance to see something that has not been seen in more than a decade and the memory of which has grown to mythic proportions in the interim:

Pete Wilson as Dynamic, Dedicated, Decisive Executive.

This is no small thing.

It’s akin to being promised proof of something that a handful of people swear to have seen but that most of us have only read about: The Loch Ness Monster, affordable housing in La Jolla, a Padres team that plays like a team.

Maybe it exists, maybe not. Get your barroom bets down early.

Wilson was mayor of San Diego from 1971 to 1982 but, truth be told, the civic vehicle was largely on automatic pilot in those latter years.

Those of us who arrived in San Diego after, say, 1979, never had the opportunity to see Wilson as the fully engaged political boss. Mostly he was out of town running for higher office.

I covered City Hall in 1981 and 1982. It was like covering the Civil War after Appomattox.

The great battles had all been fought. True, insidious social and economic forces were seeping into the political fabric, but they were invisible, like carbon monoxide leaking from the floorboard.

Old-timers told great stories of Wilson’s early years. Like a scythe cutting down tall weeds, he was.

Whack. Uncontrolled growth was laid low. Whack. Political reform was accomplished. Whack-whack-whack. The city budget was made lean and cost-effective, bureaucrats were ordered to shape up, a thousand flowers bloomed.

To hear tell, Wilson could accomplish more by breakfast than most men could in a lifetime.

When Wilson left for Washington in 1983, the major dispute between Roger Hedgecock and Maureen O’Connor was which one of them was the legitimate heir to Wilson’s legacy.

Alas, as a U.S. senator, Wilson’s image has not been the stuff of legend: Saying tough things about foreign policy; protecting agribusiness; being wheeled post-surgically onto the Senate floor to vote in favor of freezing Social Security.

Loyalists have whispered: Pete is a take-charge executive, not temperamentally suited to the drudgery of being a legislator, like the slow accumulation of seniority and the need to carry water for the Republican Party.

Locally, his currency as the icon of municipal government has never deflated.

A week ago during the Wilson victory celebration at Golden Hall, both of the major contenders for mayor in 1992, Susan Golding and Ron Roberts, were on the stage. Sticking very close to Wilson, like a two-on-one defense in basketball.

If Wilson does well in Sacramento, the tendency of San Diego candidates to bathe in his reflected aura will probably increase.

There’s even talk of a presidential bid in 1996 if Wilson the governor comes close to matching Wilson as mayor.

Think of it: From a condominium in Clairemont to the White House, with stopovers in Washington and Sacramento. Now there’s a myth worth considering.

Sticks and Stones and Legal Brickbats

Words, words, words.

* Victor Najor, the San Diego grocer compared to Saddam Hussein by a labor union in flyers distributed to would-be shoppers, has asked a Los Angeles law firm about possible legal action.

Among other things, he’s steamed at being called “an Iraqi businessman.” He was born in Detroit.

* North County bumper sticker: “You Tickle My Fancy. I’ll Tickle Yours.”

* Saud Nasir Al Sabah, Kuwait’s ambassador to the United States, has canceled tonight’s talk at UC San Diego’s Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation.

He’s off to Saudi Arabia to prepare for the visit by President Bush.

* Sports programs at Camp Pendleton are feeling the pinch of Operation Desert Shield.

Of 20 wrestlers on the championship wrestling team, 17 have been deployed with their units to Saudi Arabia.

* The Pacific College of Oriental Medicine in Pacific Beach is offering free acupuncture for smokers as part of Thursday’s Great American Smokeout.

As you know, it’s hard to keep those things lit when they’re stuck with needles.