Gavin Newsom: A Californian's impression.

Gavin Newsom is acting like a presidential candidate-in-waiting.

I have warned in this blog that the California governor is too good looking to be elected U.S. president. Moreover, he was too "blue state." He was too reliable and doctrinaire a liberal. He is too Californian. He has a brand, and it has too much San Francisco associated with it. I have posted here that if he strikes me that way, he would surely strike voters in the battleground Upper Midwest states that way.

I asked a bone fide brand expert about the Gavin Newsom image and underlying reality, as he observed it from close up. Tony Farrell lives in Oakland and has been following Newsom for years. Farrell has done Guest Posts here. He is the college classmate who managed marketing for the Gap, The Nature Company and The Sharper Image.

Guest Post by Tony Farrell

Farrell

"Before Ukraine,” just to make conversation, I would casually ask friends who they thought should or would be the Democratic nominee for President in 2024. (No one ever said Kamala Harris.) I always suggested Gavin Newsom, but no one else ever did. And almost universally, those I spoke to regarded Newsom’s national reputation as fatal. I wonder.

It’s now “after Ukraine” and all’s changed. Now I believe Biden should run and will run.

Nonetheless, Peter asked me to convey thoughts about Gavin Newsom from my personal perspective, having lived in the Bay Area since 1978 (45 years), so I will offer my impressions.

For a long time, I did not take Newsom seriously, as he was too young, with practically no experience except as an entrepreneur; and he was linked to the Getty family, which is just weird. 

He was 36 when elected mayor of San Francisco (succeeding Willie Brown, mentor to both Gavin and Kamala Harris), after representing lofty Pacific Heights on the City’s Board of Supervisors (a powerful group). In the beginning, there was gossipy focus on Gavin’s bodacious pompadour; lots of spurious questions about his sexuality (and other aspects of that). After one of the most bizarre homicide cases in City history (a horrendous dog-mauling in an apartment hallway), Gavin married the prosecutor, Kimberly Guilfoyl--which is also weird.

Most memorably, about 20 years ago, SF Mayor Newsom earned national renown (if not infamy) for issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples, in clear violation of California law. All those marriages were annulled the following year in state court. At the time, I strongly believed it was very bad form for a mayor to be a flagrant scofflaw. But, ultimately, many here now see his action as a courageous move toward the right side of history. Perhaps he was a visionary, and his actions helped spur the changes the country now lives with comfortably. It's still very debatable, however.

I met Newsom only once, briefly, after his speech at a gala function in support of the environment. I hate to say it, but I could not stop looking at his pompadour. I think, like Trump, Gavin has an unreal personal aura. He stands six-feet-four, plus two inches for the hair. Moreover, when I closed my eyes during his speech, I swear I could not tell the difference between him and Bill Clinton! I later learned Gavin had been taking speaking lessons from Bill and somehow subconsciously adopted both an Arkansas accent and the rasp. Anyway, I was still not taking Gavin seriously.

That all said, in the 20-plus years that I’ve lived with Gavin on the scene here, I’ve come, day by day for thousands of days, to respect him immensely for his judgement; his political skills; his courage; his empathy; his down-to-earth common sense on almost everything I think about. That includes guns, climate, crime, fiscal prudence, health care, taxes, our propositions, you-name-it. His prompt, decisive actions at the beginning of Covid might have saved my ass. California had none of the medical horrors experienced in, say, New York City.

California has a cartoonish reputation in many parts of the country: The proverbial Left Coast filled with delusional Marxists spouting the worst kind of wokeness. And we have all that, but from the perspective of those of us who live here such craziness resides in minor players like school-board members who want to take the name “Lincoln” off of schools. It's renegade City Supervisors who block efforts to cut regulatory red tape or efforts to address homelessness. 

Tony Farrell and wife, Kathy

Among the “normies” I hang out with here in Northern California--educated and well-off, generally, who now see Trump as a treasonous criminal--our favored players are centrists. These would be people like Diane Feinstein (another former SF mayor); Willie Brown (ditto); Arnold Schwartzenegger (Republican former governor); Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta. I believe Gavin Newsom now fits into that pantheon of grounded, commonsensical, good-government types who help run and represent this most remarkable state. California is a state, I must point out, that boasts more Trump supporters than Texas and it sends Kevin McCarthy to Congress again and again. It might be hard to believe, but even Jerry Brown is seen here as a centrist. Brown was my mayor here in Oakland (and married the senior counsel for my old company, The Gap, where Newsom’s sister also worked) and our governor, too. As Oakland mayor, Jerry Brown was long past his “moonbeam” reputation from decades ago. Instead, he was just a super-smart and aware guy with excellent governing skills and a practical approach to leading Oakland and, later, the whole state. 

Gavin Newsom, like Jerry Brown, was educated by the Jesuits. Perhaps that says something about their rigor, truth and intellectual honesty.

Anyway, that’s my personal journey with Gavin Newsom. The question is, is there enough time for the country to make the same journey? Can the shallow, leftist image of Newsom be fleshed out? Can the cartoonish woke image be erased and replaced with one of an extraordinary leader who has demonstrated remarkable governing skills in perhaps the most complex governor job among all 50 states? 

Maybe. I hope so, because I don’t have any other ideas for a great Democratic president.

 

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