Let the 1998 Governor’s Race Begin : Politics: Before Wilson has even been sworn in for his second term, candidates are posturing to replace him. John Garamendi is the first to publicly show his cards.

Before Gov. Pete Wilson even begins his second and final term, political maneuvering to replace him in the governor’s office in 1998 has gotten under way with John Garamendi becoming the first Democrat to go public with his interest.

Garamendi, who lost in the Democratic primary this year to Kathleen Brown, said after a Beverly Hills fund-raising dinner Tuesday that 1994 “was not my time to be governor” but made his interest in another try clear.

“Will that occur in the future? I would hope so,” said Garamendi, 49, who leaves office as state insurance commissioner in January and expects an appointment in the Clinton Administration, possibly in the Agriculture, Treasury or Interior departments.

Although Garamendi became the first to publicly show his cards, other Republicans and Democrats have begun preparing the political ground for 1998 campaigns, according to campaign consultants and party insiders.

Posturing for a run at California’s top office has started earlier than anytime in the memory of political veterans for several reasons. Wilson is the first governor who becomes an automatic lame duck the minute he takes the oath of office--the first to be barred from running again under the term limits initiative passed by voters, and backed by Wilson, in 1990.

Although California chief executives have rarely sought third terms, they often have postponed a public announcement of their political plans as long as possible to avoid the lame-duck status that could undermine their clout with the Legislature. With term limits, Wilson must leave office at the end of his second four-year term.

Another factor in the early positioning is the possibility that Wilson might get elected to national office in 1996, leaving the governorship in the hands of a Democrat, Lt. Gov.-elect Gray Davis, now the state controller. That would instantly scramble the 1998 electoral picture in California.

There is also the pressure on candidates to begin raising money early to fend off a wealthy wild-card newcomer--Republican Mike Huffington was this year’s example--willing to spend millions to win public office. Huffington, a virtual political neophyte, spent more than $28 million of his own fortune and nearly upset Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s bid for election to a first full term.

More important for Garamendi, his campaign manager Darry Sragow said, is the fact that Democrats are expected to undergo a massive reassessment of their party’s credo after the 1994 election debacle.

“If you are John Garamendi, you are in a unique position because you tried to do what it turns out would have been the right thing,” Sragow said. “The Garamendi message in the 1994 primary clearly would stand the test of time.

“If you are the author of that message earlier this year, it makes a lot of sense to pick up that message now that Democrats are looking for a message,” Sragow added.

That message, Garamendi emphasized in his speech to about 150 supporters at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel on Tuesday night, is that the Democratic Party needs to stand for “the working men and women of America. . . . We are going to have to keep that in mind as we develop our programs.”

Garamendi said he failed to implant the theme in the consciousness of enough Democratic voters because of the lack of funds needed to reach people via television commercials.

Garamendi said this week’s fund-raiser, the first major political event since the Nov. 8 election, was held to retire some of his 1994 campaign debt. He said the dinner, and a second one in San Francisco last night, are expected to gross $500,000.

Although Garamendi said he will pursue a public career in Washington in the near term, “my work in California is not done. I will return.”

A brochure celebrating Garamendi’s 20 years in elective office, beginning with the state Assembly in 1974, declared that his campaign for governor in 1994 “took the first steps to restore a bridge that has long since deteriorated in California” between people and their government.

“And this is a task that must be completed if our state is to ever regain its great stature,” the booklet says.

Davis and Republican Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren already are pinning down supporters for 1998 gubernatorial races, political insiders said. Another potential Democratic candidate is state Treasurer Kathleen Brown, who lost to Wilson by a wide margin in the Nov. 8 general election.

A Lungren associate said the attorney general, long considered the Republican odds-on favorite to succeed Wilson, has other opportunities, such as seeking the Senate seat of Democrat Barbara Boxer, also up in 1998, or to serve in the Cabinet of a Republican President should the GOP drive President Clinton from office in 1996.

But Lungren has “a strong interest in the governor’s office. You will see Dan and his campaign aggressively reaching out starting in January to, I think, expand the groundwork that has been laid,” the source said.

Among Democrats, Davis emerges from the 1994 election as the undisputed leader among statewide elected officials--a “father figure” of the state Democratic Party, said Gary South, who managed Davis’ campaign for lieutenant governor and who will serve as Davis’ chief of staff.

“I expect he will play a very major role in what happens to the Democratic Party in California from this point forward,” South said. “Anything beyond that is pure speculation.”

Brown’s position in Democratic politics is more open to speculation. After leading Wilson by as much as 20 points in opinion polls a year ago, she lost the governorship by about 15 points.

Insiders said a campaign appears to be under way by Brown loyalists to blame the loss on the strategies of her consultant, Clint Reilly, who was hired in spring after Brown dumped the campaign management team that had served her for a year.

But there also was criticism throughout the past year that Brown, in spite of her prodigious fund raising and her star media attention, failed to establish a clear political identity of her own in contrast to her father and brother, who were governors of California. Critics also said that she suffered from a fatally flawed campaign strategy by challenging Wilson on the crime issue throughout last summer.

Before going on vacation in Europe, Brown indicated that she planned to be active politically after leaving office as state treasurer, but she did not indicate in what fashion she would do that. Brown did not rule out another run for the governorship.

Sragow said a lot of Democrats still are fond of Brown, but “it has to be noted, she got drubbed.”