Sacramento — One look around a state Democratic convention hall Saturday provided proof that recent polls have been on target: Roughly half the likely voters still haven't decided which candidate to support in the party's gubernatorial primary.
It wasn't exactly morgue-like when the two contenders spoke to the nearly 2000 delegates. But aside from the paid staffers and volunteer recruits who were whooping it up on cue, there wasn't a lot of enthusiasm from the party activists, who seemed glued to their seats -- certainly not like they'd normally exhibit for a popular, charismatic candidate.
State Treasurer Phil Angelides later did win an overwhelming formal party endorsement, capturing 67% of the delegates' votes to Controller Steve Westly's mere 28%.
This was the best news Angelides had received since his struggling campaign began. Indeed, it's practically the only good news except for developer-pal Angelo Tsakopoulos' recent decision to pump $5 million into an "independent" TV ad buy promoting Angelides. That was to partially counter Westly's infusion of $22.5 million in personal cash into his front-running race.
The endorsement should halt Angelides' slide by allowing him to claim the mantle of true-blue Democrat and benefit from party mail promotions.
But these delegates are liberal ideologues who agree with Angelides' long, outspoken opposition to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's policies and the treasurer's demand that corporations and the rich "pay their fair share" to balance the books, improve schools and "invest in the future." Even so, the Angelides delegates I spoke with were tepid supporters, disappointed with his soft campaign and fearing he couldn't beat Schwarzenegger in November.
Democratic voters as a whole lean more toward the center and favor Westly by 33% to 20%, according to a Times poll published Saturday.
The most telling poll number in that matchup, however, was the 47% undecided or wanting to vote for another candidate. Moreover, the "decided" weren't all that decided; 53% said they "might end up voting for somebody else." This is an unusual amount of indecision and ambivalence for this close to an election -- six weeks when the poll was taken.
