An Open Letter from Meg Whitman About Voting
If you're coming in late:
Meg Whitman, the fourth richest woman in California, thinks she should be governor, presumably because the three richer women are busy. She freely admits that this idea just popped into her head about 18 months ago. Before then she wasn't a member of any party and hadn't even voted very often. That's the kind of delightful English-style eccentric she is. She might as well have decided she was Lara Croft: Tomb Raider.
Then a funny thing happened to another part of her brain, the area where memories are stored: It became less and less clear if she had voted before 2002 -- she claimed she had -- or if she had ever registered as a Republican in another state -- another claim she'd made and frequently repeated.
No one had seen any evidence to support either assertion. A reporter asked Multipersonality Meg if she could help.
"Go find it," Meg snapped. Charmingly. I have to feed these birds tuppence a bag.
So the Sacramento Bee tried to find it. But they couldn't. In fact, the Sacramento Bee couldn't find a record of Meg Whitman voting anywhere. Or even registering to vote.
This led to Meg Whitman having a very bad press conference. Her advisors, who had already been paid close to two million dollars, gave her some very cheap advice: Say you take full responsibility. If questioned further, repeat.
This didn't go over well.
So, the next day, they gave her a new answer: She didn't vote because:
"I was busy raising kids, running businesses, being married to a neurosurgeon."
The one who did my lobotomy.
This answer ("Between 1974 and 2002 I was in surgery") didn't hold either. So yesterday they came up with something else:
Nothing is knowable.
Here's an open letter from the Whitman Campaign:
Dear Amy:
That would be Amy Chance, political editor of the Sacramento Bee.
Thank you for our conversations in recent days regarding The Sacramento Bee's September 24th story on Meg's voting history. As we discussed, the campaign has been in the process of reconciling its information and Meg's recollections with The Bee's coverage.
Nothing says "moral high ground" like "we're reconciling our recollections."
What did Meg know, and which of her personalities knew it?
So far, we have found a number of disturbing discrepancies that raise serious questions about the quality of The Bee's reporting and the integrity of your newspaper.
The reporting that the candidate didn't dispute last week.
For starters, The Bee reported that while Meg lived in San Francisco from 1981 to 1989, she was not registered to vote and did not vote.
The Bee didn't report that. They said they "found no evidence that she participated in elections" and that neither the candidate nor her campaign would provide any.
The problem we have with this is that Meg clearly remembers voting on multiple occasions, including the 1984 and 1988 presidential elections.
She just never told the Sacramento Bee, or another living soul.
Because voting for Reagan and Bush made her ashamed. Makes sense to me.
How dare the Bee not report what she didn't tell them?
As Meg prepared to enter the race, our campaign requested her voting records from the San Francisco registrar and was told that no records were available from 1981 to 1989. We have a letter from the registrar confirming that fact.
Proving the existence of the post office, and our mailbox.
After your story ran, we went back to the San Francisco registrar and asked them to confirm your assertion that Meg had not registered or voted in San Francisco between 1981 and 1989. They could not. The registrar's office again confirmed in writing that it no longer has records for voters prior to 1992. Records from that period were never transferred and they simply don't have them.
The Bee didn't assert anything. It said there was no record, and Meg wasn't talking.
The registrar's office also doesn't have a record of Meg Whitman's whereabouts on the nights of the Zodiac killings. This proves something, but it's not clear exactly what.
In an attempt to confirm our findings,
There aren't any findings.
We then asked the registrar to provide voting information for several prominent San Franciscans, including Dianne Feinstein and Nancy Pelosi.
Because we hate registrars.
(Dianne Feinstein was Mayor of San Francisco from 1978 to 1988. Nancy Pelosi has lived in San Francisco since 1969 and was elected to Congress in 1987.)
I'm sure the Sacramento Bee was glad to hear that.
The registrar's office came back in writing with the same result. There are no records in any system of Dianne Feinstein or Nancy Pelosi voting in San Francisco prior to 1992.Clearly, Nancy Pelosi and Dianne Feinstein voted in San Francisco during the 1980s, and so did Meg Whitman.
Take a moment and let that settle in.
The frontrunner for the Republican nomination for Governor of California just proved she votes using the argumentum ad ignorantiam and the transitivity of implication.
Now that's a candidate who values education.
That which cannot be disproved must be believed. The evidence that Meg Whitman voted sometime between her 18th birthday and her 46th is that there's no proof she didn't. (Except her own admission, before she began the process of reconciling her recollections.) The other evidence that Meg Whitman voted is that Nancy Pelosi voted. The evidence that Nancy Pelosi voted is that there's no evidence that she did.
And in a tomb in Hanover, Leibniz's head explodes.
My head hurts too. But here's what I think. I think Meg Whitman misled her campaign advisors. (And why shouldn't she? She's the boss.) I think she told them she voted when she didn't. I think she never registered to vote because when you register to vote you get called for jury duty, and when you get called for jury duty you miss work, and work's where the money is.
I think she didn't think it was going to be a big deal, but it is, because she's handling it so badly.
I think she's a bad liar and the people who work for her are insulting liars.
But then, how can I be sure? I only know what I read in the paper, and perceive with my senses.
Arianna Huffington: Thank You, Glenn Beck!
Thank you, Glenn Beck. By helping force the resignation of Van Jones, you have done a great service to your country. But in the exact opposite way than you intended.
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Whitman's voting record is, in her words, "atrocious." Meg Whitman should not have stepped down from CEO of Ebay.
She mentioned, would issue an executive order suspending the law that restricts emissions of greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming. I find that incredulous since California has the worst air polution from fuel.Her position on education she links to the work force but not other fields as medical, teaching,scientist, and etc. True that the work force can be affected by lack of education.
Her platform: Give students and parents more choice and control by expanding charter schools
Reward success by giving more pay to high-performing teachers
Make California’s schools the nation’s leaders in Math, Science and the other bedrock skills needed to succeed in the 21st century economy.
California is broke, will she donate a billion to cover the cost? They have the highest state of illegal working people paying no taxes.
Voting for members of your Board of Directors does not count.
Many thanks Chris for the article on Meg Whitman as a prospective gubernatorial candidate. The article mentioned a number of Meg's characteristics.
The sampling of information was sufficient for me to determine that there are in fact millions of women (or men for that matter) who are vastly more qualified than Meg Whitman to be governor of California.
who cares let her be governor, neither she or anyone else can fix california's problem. maybe i shouldn't can't but rather won't. thirty years ago the parents of today's tea baggers lead a tax revolution and thus began the long slow downward slide of our state government. and in propositions that take the budget out of the hands of elected officials and you have a perfect mess. only the repeal of prop 13 and our ridicules government by proposition can we be saved.
Oh Meg, I'm so embarrassed for you.
Her idea for solving California's huge prison crisis is to build more prisons and send inmates to other states. That is not sustainable and amounts to kicking the prison crisis down the road for the next group of politicians.
Jerry Brown has not stated any good ideas for solving the prison crisis either.
Unreasonably long sentences; almost automatic parole denials to ex-offenders of serious crimes who are not, or no longer are, a threat to society; replacing mental hospitals with prison time; and the overwhelmed, broken parole system, are ruining salvage lives, not making us safer, and cost lots of money. The huge big business of incarceration is bankrupting California.
She should team up with Palin they have the same level of credibility.
Well why shouldn't someone who's not even a natural-born citizen, a newbie regarding civic participation, and up till now, a self-described dilettante lightweight, run for high office?
She's rich and conservative.
Considering the caliber of Republican candidate fare of late, I see no inconsistencies.
Where do you get the idea that Meg is not a natural born citizen????
She hasn't shown us the long copy of her birth cretificate.
Where do you get the idea she IS?
You make a compelling case that Ms. Whitman is "memory challenged" and I couldn't see myself voting for her, even if I lived in California.
But. Your tone is really way too sexist. Taking her on as a woman who is running as the fourth richest female in CA because the three richer women are busy, saying that the woman who built one of the most powerful Brands in global business is a delightful eccentric who might have decided to be "Lara Croft: Tomb Raider" and then the predictable insinuation of mental illness in this woman who would seek high office by describing her as "Multipersonality Meg."
Meg Whitman on her own seems to be providing the good scribes and voters of California with plenty of reasons not to vote for her. This type of line of attack just makes her sympathetic.
Oh, I don't know. Acknowledging that a woman is, in fact, a woman, is not sexist in and of itself. And is it sexist to when comparing a woman to a fictional character to choose a female character? It seems logical to me.
Maybe you feel sympathetic to Whitman, but this does nothing to make me feel sorry for her.
So if he had written "the fourth richest man in California, thinks he should be governor, presumably because the three richer men are busy" would this also be considered sexist? Or is it just listing an identifier like "4th tallest building", "2nd shortest word".
Whitman's letter isn't quite A by I. They say she voted in the 80s, but she can't provide proof of this because no one can. That's reasonable.
Conveniently for her, it also means that no one can prove she's lying, either.
~~
But I'm not sure why she's bothering. "Running for Governor despite not voting for 20+ years" is still thoroughly underwhelming, and only marginally improves on "running for Governor despite never voting."
I believe the reason it is A by I is that she stated publicly that she never voted. Then thought better of it. In other words we have an omission against interest followed by what appears to be a lie. The lie's support, contradicting the specific statements prior is A by I. You can't prove I didn't vote so I voted. Nancy Pelosi can't prove she voted either so I voted.
I mean, since we're logic and latining it up how about ad hoc ergo propter hoc. It isn't a direct example but I like it for this logic train wreck more than transitivity of implication.
sorry I just reread my comments, I meant
post hoc ergo proptor hoc obviously... note to self, never write latin until after coffee
You'd think a CEO might know what's really important in their community, and it looks like voting, and good citizenship are mostly afterthoughts, at least in Meg Whitman's opinion?
Good article about Meg Whitman. FYI, names for jury duty are drawn from DMV records, not voter registration. At least they are in California. Not registering to vote doesn't get you out of jury duty. Not driving might get you out of jury duty. Or, driving without registering your car might get you out of jury duty (but you'd get a ticket). Or, if you're as rich as Meg Whitman, you might just get out of any responsibility whatsoever.
See Chris Kelly's Profile
In California, jurors are selected from random lists of registered voters and from the Department of Motor Vehicles.
According to the California Voter Foundation, "there is a perception among a significant number of Californians that one can avoid jury duty by remaining unregistered to vote." Because of this, nearly one in four eligible Californians don’t register.
Another factor? Fear of Phil Spector.
Other states where Meg Whitman may or may not have registered to vote (God only knows) have other systems, but more than half use either voter registration alone, or among multiple sources.
And she did live in other states including Mass. Wonder what voter registration records show for her pre-motherhood and university periods?
I have been a registered voter for 39 years first in Louisiana and now in Maryland. While registered in Louisiana I was called once but excused because I was out of state in college. I have been called once in Maryland and served one day. Serving jury duty doesn't seem that much of a burden on one's life. Any patriotic American should be proud to serve.
Oh, OK. Thanks for setting the record straight. By the way, like Swift2, I'm also a California resident, and ALSO was on a two-week jury for a gang murder. Swift2 must also live in Los Angeles. Scary? Or are we just good citizens? Or maybe we were on the same jury.
What exactly are her qualifications to be governor - what exactly has she done besides run an internet -based flea market?
I want to see the long form of her voter's registration card.
Seriously though, as a proud citizen of these United States, by choice, I revel in the opportunity for my single little voice to be heard. I have never not voted. I take great exception with any candidate who would have the cheek to want me to cast my vote for them, when they have never exercised their civic duties. The right to vote, for women, was fought for and won. It is a privilege.
Birthers, what say you?
"...Meg ***clearly*** remembers voting on multiple occasions..." But it wasn't clear to her when first asked the question. I know. She suppressed that voting incident because it was very traumatic for her. Better to recall that pseudo-traumatic incident now than to admit that she did not really vote. Wow, playing dirty politics already, eh? That's what handlers are for.
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