I seem to remember the turkey had some ethical problems too but haven't found them yet, still looking:
http://www.prospect.org/print-friendly/webfeatures/2003/08/blumenthal-m-08-13.htmlCalifornia Confidential
Who are the mystery men behind the recall push?
Max Blumenthal
"It's a victory. A total victory!" Howard Kaloogian exclaimed on the right-wing Worldmag.com after hearing that the petition to recall the election of California's embattled Gov. Gray Davis had gained enough signatures to qualify as a ballot question. Kaloogian, a former Republican California legislator, had plenty of reason to cheer. Because while the media have presented Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), the wealthy car-alarm magnate, as the man who drove the recall, he's actually been little more than a useful idiot for a stealthy group of GOP operatives who laid the groundwork. Months before the recall was even a blip on the media radar, this consultant cabal began manipulating California's idiosyncratic electoral system, creating a muscular funding mechanism and exploiting it for its members' own ends.
The cabal includes Kaloogian, who was a right-wing backbencher in the state Assembly, Sal Russo, who handled banker Bill Simon's hapless 2002 gubernatorial campaign, and David Gilliard, a veteran GOP strategist with a career steeped in scandal. They're joined by former Enron pollster and Republican tactician Frank Luntz, who devised a strategy for the recall campaign centering around negative character attacks and avoidance of policy discussion. With the surprise announcement of actor Arnold Schwarzenegger -- who boasted on The Tonight Show Aug. 6, "I have plenty of money. Nobody can buy me off." -- the movie star's high-priced uber-consultants George Gorton and Don Sipple have grabbed the baton in the recall race, eager to take it the last mile to the state capitol. Thanks to this handful of men and the millionaires who bankrolled them, what started with a petition and a few phone calls has become an election that may unseat a twice-elected governor and dramatically affect the lives of one in seven Americans.
The recall saga began in February when Ted Costa, a self-styled "anti-tax activist," started gathering the requisite 100 signatures to file a recall petition. (It took an additional 899,900 signatures to turn that petition into a ballot initiative.) Kaloogian and Russo urged Costa to hold off. They wanted time to get their own recall committee off the ground to solicit donations. But Costa went ahead on his own and filed the petition, forcing them to improvise. With little public interest in a recall despite Davis' low approval rating and the state's fiscal crisis, Russo and Kaloogian realized that a movement would have to be manufactured from the top down.
In order to find a funding source to jump-start the movement, Kaloogian enlisted Ray Haynes, a Republican leader in the state Assembly's far-right caucus. To his chagrin, Haynes was rebuffed by Simon, Schwarzenegger and Gerald Parsky, George W. Bush's chief California fund-raiser. Parsky initially distanced himself from the recall out of concern that it might backfire or divert funds away from Bush's 2004 re-election drive. Only after these rejections did Haynes call on fellow right-winger Issa, who was planning to run for governor in 2006. Issa enthusiastically stepped forward to form his own recall committee, Rescue California, with $1.7 million from his personal fortune. Suddenly, droves of clipboard-waving petitioners were descending upon the nucleus of California civic life -- shopping-mall parking lots -- and were paid $1 per signature.
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