Mark DiCamillo Quotations

Working on the infrastructure bond is a productive activity. That's what's improving the governor's ratings and the Legislature's rating.

We've seen this before. It's like murder-suicide both of them get voted down.

There is clear confusion on Prop. 78 as to who is backing it, which means it's the one with the greatest potential for change in preference.

We're looking at things that are new and different, issues that weren't here 10 or 15 years ago. They are transforming California.

So many seats in California are safe, and that's true nationally, too. So the opportunities for the out-of-power party to gain (seats in Congress) is really not that great. Most observers would say that only a few seats could change hands.

She's a very divisive figure. In my opinion, most people either like her or hate her.

So many voters are undecided that it's still a wide-open race.

No one penalty jumps out. Even looking at Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres fans, they want him to play.

What will be more influential on the outcome of (this year's) election is the shape of the turnout: Who will (vote)?

He's getting more people to be open to his re-election.

I would suspect his tone would change significantly if they don't make it onto the November ballot. If that happened, I could see calling the Legislature all sorts of names by the end of the campaign.

I think it's a two-step process and it looks like he's successfully getting people over in terms of step one to the undecided column. But there's a segment of voters who are withholding judgment. They know who Schwarzenegger is, but they are not sure.

I think you will see a bigger than expected turnout among Latinos because of this one issue.

It is a modest improvement. But it is moving in the right direction.

I think there has been an overarching re-evaluation of Bush among some members of his own party.

People have pretty much adjusted to the risk factor of earthquakes and go about their daily lives.

That's the most ominous finding. That could have a fairly significant effect on the state's economy if retail spending starts to be hit.

Wilson did a masterful job of talking about illegal immigration -- anything but economy and education -- and that was the No. 1 issue.

Those are pretty rough numbers, the level of cynicism. He just has not communicated with voters in making his case.

The overall trend for Arnold Schwarzenegger is favorable, but there are a lot of people still in play.

What you see is kind of a balanced assessment. There are some policy positions where some voters are fairly lenient to illegal immigrants and on others they're supportive of tougher approaches.

There is a vein of the public that is leery of big industry.

Voters are saying we need someone there who's not going to rock the boat.

The question always presents itself: How formidable are the challengers? Early measures show them leading by very narrow margins, and the preferences are party based. It's way too early to say whether the challengers will be formidable.

When politicians try to move from negative to positive, it really is a two-step process. People don't go straight from negative to positive. They go from negative to undecided, and then maybe to positive.

The president, in our perspective, is in uncharted territory because he has a really long tenure left and yet he has very low job performance ratings in just his sixth year. Whether he is able to turn it around depends a lot on Iraq. But the events in Iraq seem largely out of his or U.S. control.

There are large-scale differences between voters here (on the coast) and voters inland. Within California's borders, there's a red-state region that looks a lot like the Midwest.

When we tell voters Proposition 78 is supported by the pharmaceutical companies, it weakens support even from the people who are backing it,

The governor's image is a negative drag and it is directly related to how people are going to vote on these propositions.

The governor has never been able to sell them on the idea and have questioned his motives,

(Brown) still remains among the top tier of personalities in California in terms of name recognition. Eighty percent could offer an opinion one way or the other, even though he has been Oakland mayor and off the statewide scene for many years.

Even though various groups hold very different attitudes, it's important to all sides. It's an issue that can cut both ways.

As the special election has dragged on, one of the side effects have been greater voter cynicism about the reasons the governor called the election, ... The governor has never been able to sell them on the idea and have questioned his motives.

Different groups of people view this issue very differently. Voters tend to be older, whiter and middle class, while unregistered voters tend to be young and immigrant.

There's not a lot of knowledge about the two initiatives. History shows that voter confusion ... can lead to changes in their preferences.

There's not a lot of awareness of most of the down-ballot candidates. Generally speaking, the one who are better known are in the early lead.

I've never seen a proposition start out this far behind and pass. It's monumental the amount of work (the governor) needs to do on this one.

These elected officials just can't believe their recognition levels are so low. But this state is so big that to be known to a majority is a real accomplishment.

The story is not a good one for the governor, ... There seems to be a common thread across all the proposition - if Arnold Schwarzenegger has endorsed it, Democrats and nonpartisans are reacting negatively and by turning off those two groups, it has made things very difficult for the governor.

The survey just looked at registered Latino voters. Had it included non-voters and non-citizens, the numbers likely would have been different.

The thing that's most striking to me is the impact that Schwarzenegger himself is having on his own initiatives. It's got to be disastrous from the governor's standpoint.

People feel very strongly about this initiative. I don't anticipate a lot of movement. It may come down to who turns out on Election Day.

Some folks think a real large proportion of players were using them, and there's widespread belief that Bonds was one of them.

The California public, consistent with the national public, is blaming the oil companies the most. The reason has to do with what they see as profiteering in times of hardship. When prices run up, the oil companies make more money. They're already having record profits. The public doesn't like that situation. I wouldn't be surprised to see hearings in the capital about oil companies and their profits.

This is an issue that could easily arouse Latino voters. Immigration could be a single issue that could bring out more Latino voters in November.

This issue wipes out all the divisions in the state. It's an issue whose time has come. Voters are behind it.

They were just about to be voted out of office, or in the case of Richard Nixon, he was about to resign. Bush still has more than two years to go, so I think we're in somewhat uncharted territory.

There's a clear consensus that we should give (undocumented workers) a path to citizenship. There's bipartisan support.

they haven't made any real moves toward organizing a campaign.

As we get around to the election, voters will know which side the pharmaceutical companies will be on, and that could have a negative effect.

It's a two-step process. First, people want to know who you are, why you're running, the whole nine yards. Then there's the second stage, where they ask the tougher policy questions about what you believe and what you'd do.

It wasn't meant to be a partisan reform initiative, but it is clearly perceived that way and I think that has to do with the governor.

It's the direction of change that's more important in a final poll than the actual numbers. Unfortunately for the governor, the direction of change is moving against him.

It's always more difficult to change somebody's mind once they have a negative impression of you. But he can run against an opponent and try to bring him to the same level or even a lower level than where his negatives are.

That's one option voters and non-voters embrace. It puts undocumented immigrants into some kind of accounting system.

The barrage of negative ads seems to be influencing voters and helping to defeat Proposition 79,

slipping ... and it's the direction of the change that is more revealing than the actual numbers themselves.

at this stage are still inclined to vote for it.

In late 1993, (Wilson) was at 31 percent, which is even lower than the governor's numbers today, ... He went on to win by 10 points in 1994. There was a lot of grumbling about Pete Wilson, but he was able to distinguish himself from (Democratic candidate) Kathleen Brown, latched onto illegal immigration as an issue and it propelled him to victory. The quality of the campaign, the way candidates raise the salience of issues - all those things matter.

If the opponents keep hammering away on that, it's hard to imagine a scenario where this thing turns around.

Clearly, he's in a vulnerable category. His core is sticking with him -- and just about everyone else isn't.

Changes in the economy are relatively slow to hit the man in the street.

Generally speaking, Californians tend to be more open to allowing an individual to make a decision rather than having something prohibited through government fiat.

If he granted clemency, I would say, it would be a very divisive opinion. Large segments of the public would take him to task.

This is a group that supports very basic government services like education and health care, and they see him as someone who was talking about cutting them back.

The level of concern has declined, especially compared to a decade ago. And the concern about the loss of jobs, we are definitely correlating to the unemployment rate.

The last time we were this anxious about the future it preceded a few years of recession. The warning flag is out. . . . A couple years of this would lead to some economic consequences that would be easy to spot in the economy.