Paddling Straight Down the Middle

There has been much punditry about Gov. Gray Davis’ paddling this week. Navigating through 958 bill signings and 170 vetoes before Monday’s deadline, on which side was Davis paddling his canoe?

You remember that old canoe. Used to belong to Davis’ former boss, Gov. Jerry Brown. Advised Brown: “Paddle a little on the left, paddle a little on the right and keep on going right down the middle.”

Or, as Davis put it more conventionally upon taking office in January 1999: “I will govern neither from the right nor from the left, but from the center, propelled not by ideology, but by common-sense.”

Common-sense politics.

So in inking bills, was Davis paddling on the left to secure his Democratic base in anticipation of a reelection race against Richard Riordan, a Republican centrist? That’s the conventional wisdom.

Or was he paddling on the right to please big-bucks contributors in business. That’s the view of liberal Senate leader John Burton (D-San Francisco), who says Davis’ veto for the third straight year of legislation to increase workers’ compensation benefits was “outrageously shameful.”

My take: Davis merely was paddling--on the left and the right--back in the direction of the votes that elected him governor in 1998. Indeed, he was paddling in the same waters that have sustained every successful top-of-the-ticket California politician for more than a decade.

Recall: Democrat Davis and Republican Gov. Pete Wilson--and Democratic Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer--all got elected as supporters of abortion rights, environmental protections and gun controls. (Wilson later backed away from major gun control.)

Davis reasserted his abortion rights stance by signing, with great fanfare, a bill making it a state crime to threaten abortion clinics.

He freshened up his environmentalist stripes by placing a $2.6-billion parks bond proposal on the March ballot and signing a bill to close a loophole that real estate speculators have used to inflate the price of coastal land.

It’s not surprising that after a self-imposed moratorium on new gun controls, Davis signed legislation requiring a safety exam and license to buy a handgun. The governor hinted to me last year that he’d eventually sign such a bill, noting: “You have to take a driver’s test to drive a car. . . . That’s a concept people are comfortable with.”

And that’s a key to predicting this governor: Are people comfortable with it? Davis is not one to force-feed the public an unpopular policy--or, as chief strategist Garry South says: “He’s not going to put a bigger pig in the python than it can digest.”

Before signing the gun licensing bill, for example, Davis insisted on amendments that would make the measure acceptable to most law enforcement groups.

Like Wilson, Davis campaigned as a crime fighter. He’s currently racking up a long list of law enforcement endorsements, the kind Republicans used to get when Wilson and Gov. George Deukmejian were running.

Democratic consultant Kam Kuwata once told me something about Wilson that also applies to Davis: “He’ll never be a hero to any one ideological group, but he understands how to put together the winning combination.”

Davis, mindful of an important party constituency, long has supported gay rights. But he opposed same-sex marriages because, he said, the public wasn’t ready.

It was not a shock when the governor signed a bill substantially expanding the rights of domestic partners. Davis had approved a narrower bill in 1999 and asked the author, Assemblywoman Carole Migden (D-San Francisco), not to press for an expansion until this year.

“He felt the same way he did about gun bills,” Migden says. “He wanted a break. But he consistently said he’d sign a bill, and he did. He signed the strongest bill in the nation.”

On labor and business, Davis often is conflicted. Unions were his crucial backers in 1998. But if he remains acceptable to business leaders, it will be almost impossible for a Republican to beat him.

The biggest priority on business’ agenda was a veto of the workers’ compensation bill, and Davis delivered. He’ll try to work out a compromise next year. Meanwhile, the governor did sign legislation that labor fought for, including bills to increase unemployment benefits and expand the prevailing wage law.

Business and labor, therefore, both tolerate Davis.

“There’s no question he takes our views into consideration,” says Allan Zaremberg, president of the state Chamber of Commerce.

Asserts Thomas Rankin, president of the California Labor Federation: “Clearly he’s better than any Republican.”

Davis still isn’t through the energy mess. And he’ll face a huge budget deficit next year.

But right now he’s cruising in his canoe in well-chartered waters.