recall

HEALDSBURG, Calif. — Luxury sedans and SUVs decanted well-heeled passengers into two Alexander Valley vineyards on a recent evening for fund-raisers that reaped promises of about $300,000 for Arnold Schwarzenegger’s gubernatorial campaign.

“We feel that he’s got a lot of guts, a lot of courage to step away from the lucrative movie career,” said Kevin Barr, 46, a Healdsburg grape farmer and one of 100 guests at a $1,000-a-head event at Hoot Owl Creek Vineyards. Another 40 supporters showed up the same night at nearby Jordan Winery for a $5,000-a-plate dinner with the actor-cum-politician.

Although Schwarzenegger enjoys support in this bucolic corner of Sonoma County known for prestigious wines and Republican politics, much bigger players in the state’s wine industry — including E.& J. Gallo, Robert Mondavi Corp. and the California Wine Institute — are actively opposing the recall of Gov. Gray Davis. Gallo, the nation’s second-biggest winemaker, has pumped $100,000 into a committee dedicated to keeping Davis in office.

“We are very concerned about the recall process and what it means for good governance in California,” said Milo Shelly, Gallo’s vice president.

“There are always two wine industries represented in Sacramento,” said Mark Murray, spokesman for Citizens Against Waste, a recycling lobby group that regularly butts heads with wine interests, most of whose bottles are exempt from California’s recycling law.

“There’s all the picturesque Napa and Sonoma wineries who are mildly influential in the Legislature. And there is Gallo, which is as significant a major power player as anyone in Sacramento. Sometimes the two work together; sometimes they are apart.”

“Vintners are a very independent group,” agreed Mondavi’s vice president, Herb Schmidt. “Half the time we can’t even decide which way the sun will come up in the morning.”

Whatever their political differences, the men and women who run California’s wine industry have some common interests in the outcome of the Oct. 7 election: They don’t want higher taxes on their products, and some, particularly here, don’t want Indian casinos in their midst. And so far, they have given $297,000 to candidates and committees in the recall campaign, state records show.

Healdsburg is one of the few Republican strongholds in wine country, said Sonoma State political science professor Donald Dixon. “In terms of voting, it is the most conservative area.”

Both Russ Green, who hosted the Hoot Owl Creek event, and Tom Jordan, host of the $5,000-a-plate dinner, made their money in the oil business before buying wine properties.

Green has previously hosted fund-raisers for former Gov. Pete Wilson and 1998 GOP gubernatorial candidate Dan Lungren. Jordan bankrolled his son’s unsuccessful GOP race for a state Senate seat.

But potential tinkering with regulations that affect the wine business gets everyone’s attention here.

Davis never proposed raising liquor taxes to help solve the state’s fiscal problems. But three of the candidates to replace him if he is recalled — Democratic Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, independent Arianna Huffington and Green Party member Peter Camejo — have liquor tax increases in their budget plans.

Bustamante proposes raising the tax on wine from 20 cents a gallon to 45 cents to bring in about $210 million.

The industry is also concerned, said Michael Falasco, lobbyist for the California Wine Institute, that a new governor might seek to grant local authorities the right to set liquor taxes. Such a policy once was pushed, but subsequently withdrawn, by Wilson, co-chairman of the Schwarzenegger campaign. The Wine Institute gave $45,000 to anti-recall efforts.

A nightmare scenario, said Falasco, is a proposal by the California Medical Assn. that a nickel-a-drink charge be added to bar tabs to fund the state’s beleaguered trauma centers.

That is contained in a bill by state Sen. Gloria Romero (D-Los Angeles) and, argued Falasco, could open the beer, wine and liquor industry to the same kinds of lawsuits currently plaguing the tobacco industry.

Then there is the local distaste for casinos, the crowds they attract and the traffic they bring. Veronica Citti, 37, is a bartender from Healdsburg whose family has grown grapes for generations. Since last year’s building of the new River Rock Casino on a hill overlooking the Alexander Valley, Citti said, she has been run off the road five times by reckless drivers.

“Because of the casino … “ Citti said as she served drinks at the Alexander Valley Store and Bar, “we are getting all kinds of undesirable people.”

Healdsburg Police Chief Susan Jones said that although auto theft and home burglary rates are up, she could not say how many such crimes, if any, were due to the presence of the casino.

Citti said that Bustamante’s acceptance of casino contributions and his advocacy of higher liquor taxes have turned her against him. “I’m for Arnold,” she announced.

She’s not alone in her alienation from Bustamante. “I do not accept the fact that sovereign Indian nations can give donations to U.S. politicians,” said Hank Wetzel, proprietor of the 600-acre Alexander Valley Vineyards.

Wetzel, 52, supports Schwarzenegger, who has labeled tribes as special interests and criticized candidates who accept their money. Wetzel’s father, a former Los Angeles aerospace executive, bought the vineyards in 1962, and his mother, Margaret, attended one of Schwarzenegger’s recent fund-raisers.

Still, with the California wine industry suffering from the slow economy and a grape glut, some here find any potential change in the status quo suspect.

“I think there is a rising tide against the recall,” Schmidt said, “because of the chaos that will ensue if it is successful.

“The message is getting through even to Republicans that it is not a panacea for the state’s problems to just switch the governor.”

Sonoma State political science professor Andy Merrifield said that despite the casino issue and the strong pocket of Schwarzenegger support in Healdsburg, he expects the recall effort to fail in Sonoma County. More than 50% of voters there register as Democrats, fewer than 30% as Republicans.

“With typical voter turnout,” Merrifield said, “the ‘no on recall’ side should be successful. Among the candidates, Bustamante should still come out first, with Schwarzenegger second.”

Meanwhile, folks are fairly low-key about their political differences. As guests pulled into the Schwarzenegger fund-raisers, several of them exchanged friendly jibes with protesters standing outside.

One of the demonstrators, Mario Lopez, a 30-year-old naturalized U.S. citizen from Guatemala, said he worked for years in the Alexander Valley grape fields before landing a job at a local food bank.

Lopez said he feels the recall effort is unfair. “They are blaming the governor for things that were out of his power,” he said.

Islamabad, Pakistan – At about 12:30pm (07:30 GMT) on Tuesday afternoon, Khalid Khan, a 25-year-old lawyer, was waiting for his lunch with his friend, Fawad Khan, at the cafeteria of Islamabad’s District Judicial Complex.

Suddenly, a loud boom shook the cafeteria and the entire judicial complex.

“I first thought that the roof will collapse on me,” Khalid told Al Jazeera outside the complex, two hours later.

The complex had been hit by a suicide attack. According to official figures, at least 12 people were killed and more than 30 were injured, several of them critically, when the bomber blew himself up at the entrance of the court complex.

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif blamed “India-backed proxies” operating from Afghanistan for carrying out the attack.

India, where a car explosion on Monday evening killed at least 13 people, said that it “unequivocally” rejects the “baseless and unfounded allegations being made by an obviously delirious Pakistani leadership”.

In a statement issued on Tuesday evening, Randhir Jaiswal, the spokesperson for India’s Ministry of External Affairs, said Islamabad was attempting to “deflect the attention of its own public from the ongoing military-inspired constitutional subversion and power-grab unfolding within the country”, appearing to refer to the 27th constitutional amendment being debated in Pakistan’s National Assembly.

“The international community is well aware of the reality, and will not be misled by Pakistan’s desperate diversionary ploys,” Jaiswal added.

The constitutional amendment has sparked criticism from activists, sitting judges and opposition parties for granting lifelong immunity from criminal prosecution for the country’s senior-most military officers, and for setting up a parallel Federal Constitutional Court, which many fear could undermine the Supreme Court.

But on Tuesday, it was the District Judicial Complex in Islamabad that was shaken, as the impact blast there reverberated across South Asia.

The sound of the explosion was heard in nearby residential areas and office buildings. Soon after, videos of the incident went viral on social media, showing flames and plumes of smoke rising from a charred vehicle near a security barrier at the compound’s entrance.

In other clips, lawyers were seen rushing out to help those on the road as security personnel surrounded the premises.

Witnesses said that at the time of the blast, nearly 2,000 people were inside the complex, including judges, lawyers, litigants and court staff.

They described an explosion so powerful that windows in several courtrooms were shattered, and body parts were strewn across the site, including the head of the suicide bomber.

With different gates for entry and exit, and the main gate closed immediately after the blast, police initially instructed people to stay inside before allowing them to leave about 25 minutes later.

Muhammad Shehzad Butt, a 52-year-old lawyer, was among them. He said he had been heading towards the cafeteria when the explosion occurred.

“It was utter pandemonium, and in the panic, most of the people were trying to exit the complex, causing havoc at the gate, while many others tried to get back inside the building,” he told Al Jazeera outside the complex.

After the attack, authorities cordoned off the area, placing barriers to keep the media from entering or approaching the site where the suicide bomber detonated the explosives.

A large number of journalists gathered outside the compound, hoping to capture visuals, but officials initially denied them access.

By then, most litigants had left, though some lawyers lingered nearby, speaking with reporters and YouTube vloggers recording their accounts.

Butt, the lawyer, said that when he arrived at court in the morning, security checks appeared routine but thorough. However, he heard from colleagues that there was an additional layer of screening that day.

This was corroborated by Khalid, the lawyer from Quetta who has worked in Islamabad for the past five years.

“This morning, when Fawad and I reached the court premises, we had to wait slightly longer as there was extra checking at the entrance. There was no concern, but we just felt that maybe some VIP might be visiting the court or some delegation,” he said.

Despite the dozen people killed, including one lawyer, both Khalid and Fawad, who is originally from Swat, said they felt no fear about returning to work the next day.

“We have seen enough of this [violence],” Khalid said. “These things don’t scare us.”