[1]SACRAMENTO, Calif. (BP)–There may be more than 100 candidates for governor in California’s recall election, but for pro-family voters there are far fewer options — at least among the major candidates.
Randy Thomasson of the Campaign for California Families sees only two.
While actor Arnold Schwarzenegger leads in the polls, Thomasson said two other Republican candidates — Tom McClintock and Bill Simon — deserve a look by California’s pro-family voters.
“Pro-family and people of faith have to look at the moral issues,” Thomasson, executive director of the California organization, told Baptist Press. “It is wrong to worship any man, and what is happening right now is virtual idolatry…. People are getting all excited about an entertainment figure without any regard to any of his policies.”
Schwarzenegger is pro-choice and has made comments that seem to put him on the side of homosexual rights, although he has yet to say where he stands on specific moral issues such as parental notification for abortions by minors and same-sex “marriage.”
He once told Cosmopolitan magazine about his thoughts on homosexuality, noting, “I have no sexual standards in my head that say ‘this is good’ or ‘this is bad.’ Homosexual — that only means to me that he enjoys sex with a man and I enjoy sex with a woman. It’s all legitimate to me.”
[2]California Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, the lone major Democrat on the ballot, is “in the pocket of the homosexual activists,” Thomasson said. “We hope that Schwarzenegger is not, but it seems he’s supporting at least part of the gay agenda.”
Bustamante has finished second behind Schwarzenegger in polling. For any of the candidates to win on Oct. 7, the current governor, Gray Davis, must lose in the recall effort. A CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll Aug. 11 showed Davis losing by a wide margin, 64-29 percent.
McClintock is a California state senator who lost in a race for state controller last year, while Simon is a businessman who lost to Davis in the gubernatorial race. Interestingly, Schwarzenegger said in a CNN interview before last year’s election that he planned to vote for Simon.
Both McClintock and Simon are pro-life and against homosexual rights, although Simon got in hot water in last year’s campaign when his signature appeared on a questionnaire given to candidates by the homosexual group Log Cabin Republicans. Simon’s questionnaire said, among other things, that he would support a “Gay Pride Day” celebration and would support domestic partnerships laws as long as they were not based on sexual “orientation.”
Simon later disavowed the response, saying someone signed it without his approval. He has said repeatedly he’s against same-sex “marriage.”
“There are two candidates who are generally pro-family,” Thomasson said. “… [But] as far as pro-family credentials, McClintock leads.”
Thomasson said he is disappointed that both men are in the race and could split the pro-family vote. If poll numbers from both men are combined, they run either second or third behind Schwarzenegger
“But since we do have this [situation] it’s important for pro-family citizens to choose one pro-family candidate to support,” Thomasson said, adding that it’s a “foregone conclusion” that Davis will lose the recall, although “it’s not a forgone conclusion that Schwarzenegger will be the Republican frontrunner going into election day.”
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