On the Right - California Targeted.(Republicans seek to gain footing in California)(Brief Article)

NEW YORK, JUNE 22

Somebody, it is widely thought in California, should replace Gray Davis as governor. He is a Democrat, he is a little boring, and he is seen as the master of ceremonies of the energy crisis in that state. To be short of electricity in the capital state of visual entertainment is a paradox that should not be allowed to happen. As a wag dolefully put it, if this goes on they're going to have to watch television by candlelight.

An aspirant executioner is William Simon Jr., son, as one would expect, of William Simon Sr. He was a great 20th century figure, individualist, philanthropist, secretary of energy, then of Treasury, a man of adamant views and expressiveness. Bill Jr. gathered the forces, and in New York City, at the Waldorf Astoria, raised $2 million. "People make reference to my own resources," he told a fellow diner, "and I don't deny them, but as I told the reporter in California, if I don't raise $40 million, I will pull out of the race."

The GOP has not recovered from the Proposition (187) that proposed dealing with illegal immigrants as though they were actually illegal. That was interpreted by the Hispanic community as a slight on any man's right to be illegal in America; and although GOP governor Pete Wilson endorsed the proposition, and it was carried by a substantial majority, Republicans have suffered enormously from its shadow. The excellent Dan Lungren lost California mightily to Gray Davis in 1998, and the comeback now attempted will be costly.

Bill Simon's competition isn't only the incumbent governor. It is the possible candidacy of GOP mayor Richard Riordan of Los Angeles. Riordan, like Simon, could finance his own campaign, but he has a rich- man's ambivalence to the whole idea of all of that exertion. He is 71 years old and there is that other ambivalence, which is ...