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NewsBriefs.REV_April 5/8/10 12:05 AM Page 12 NEWS BRIEFS California Elections Pit People Power Against Corporate Cash CALIFORNIA s the nation's most populous state prepares for a June 8 primary election, nurses are mobilizing around a hotly contested governor's race and ballot propositions that will help determine the future of democracy in the state. This year's balloting is awash with corporate money, with two multi-millionaire gubernatorial candidates vying for the Republican nomination and companies using paid signature-gatherers to qualify ballot initiatives tailor-made to boost their profits. Nurses are pushing back, supporting Queen Meg, a ficticurrent Attorney tious candidate creatGeneral and longed to protest former time advocate for eBay CEO Meg Whitworking people Jerry man's run for goverBrown in the governor, arrives at a nor's race, candidates protest sponsored by for other state offices the California Nurses that will advocate for Association with her patients and nurses, sidekicks, Bishop and a ballot proposiMcCain and Lord tion that will provide Romney. public campaign financing to level the playing field in future elections. "There's only one thing that can overcome money, and that's people," Rose Ann DeMoro, Executive Director of the California Nurses Association and National Nurses United said at a recent staff-nurse conference on the elections. "And who is the best in the state of California at talking to people about politics? Nurses." A The Governor's Race Think a billionaire former CEO should be able to buy her way into the governor's office with a $150-million campaign treasury? Neither does CNA. When former eBay head Meg Whitman announced she was running for governor on a platform of firing workers, cutting benefits and repealing workplace regulations, CNA responded with a satirical campaign to show 12 N AT I O N A L N U R S E just how out of touch Whitman is with the reality of ordinary Californians. "Queen Meg," Whitman's imperious alter ego, has showed up at Whitman campaign fundraisers across the state, asking Californians to crown her governor because, well, she's rich. "California can't afford a democracy, but I can afford California," Queen Meg told the press outside a Beverly Hills event, after arriving in a horse-drawn carriage. Her platform: Healthcare for the Nobility, Education for the Few, and Prisons for All. The light-hearted campaign has a serious message, said CNA Co-president Malinda Markowitz, RN. "Nobody should be able to bid on California, whether it's a pretend W W W. N A T I O N A L N U R S E S U N I T E D . O R G queen or a billionaire CEO," Markowitz said. CNA's Board of Directors has endorsed Democratic candidate Brown, who in his previous terms as Governor in the 1970s and early 1980s signed into law nurse-to-patient staffing ratios for intensive care units, collective-bargaining rights for University of California employees, and a host of other workplace-safety and environmental measures. (For more on Brown's record of support for nurses and patients, see p. 15.) The Propositions CNA is supporting Proposition 15, the California Fair Elections Act, which would create a pilot program of public financing APRIL 2010