President Mike Curb

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POD: Mike Curb https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Curb wins the rather closely contested California GOP gubernatorial primary of 1982 https://www.ourcampaigns.com/RaceDetail.html?RaceID=389359 and goes on to defeat Tom Bradley in both 1982 and 1986.

Governor Curb is a candidate for the GOP presidential nomination in 1988, claiming to be the true successor to Reagan. ("They say I'm lightweight, they say I'm from showbiz--isn't that what they said about the Gipper, too?") What are his prospects? If he is nominated, he will probably win in November. Even if he doesn't win the nomination, maybe Bush names him as his running mate--and he later seeks the presidency in 1996 or even 2000?

Of course, we must first ask how Curb gets to win the 1982 GOP gubernatorial primary. Apparently a quarrel with a Los Angeles Herald Examiner reporter (whom he threatend to "get") played a role in his 1982 defeat. https://www.upi.com/Archives/1981/10/07/Campaign-kickoff-becomes-ruckus/7698371275200/ (I would think that if anything a quarrel with the press would help Curb in a Republicn primary, but I guess times were different then.)

One other--rather bizarre--possible contributing factor to Curb's defeat:

In 1965-7 Robert Carl Cohen (noted for such documentaries as Inside Red China, Inside East Germany etc.) made a movie called Mondo Hollywood, which he described as a "flippy, trippy psychedelic guide to Hollywood."
http://radfilms.com/mondo_hollywood_variety_revu.htm The Variety review continues:

"Flip approach settles on as wacky (some not so wacky) a group of characters as screen has seen, each claimed to be the real article - who acts, speaks, cavorts - some a genuine part of Hollywood with their accomplishments. To this footage, Cohen adds flashes of many screen names, such as celebs attending first-nights, etc. Some off-color language might well be deleted, and film would benefit by wholesale cutting to speed action and give it better continuity. Not all the characters are odd-ball. Topic of LSD is given attention through shots of Dr. Richard Alpert, dismissed from Harvard for his experiment with drug; sculptress Valerie Porter is limned as she practices her art; and Rudi Gernreich, who invented the topless fad, is shown at a parade of his attire for moppets. There are others, too, but Cohen focusses primarily on what he sees as the Hollywood the public does not know. For what is perhaps one of the first times on the screen Cohen takes his cameras into a topless joint where waitresses are serving bare to the waist. Productionwise, film is virtually a one-man project. Cohen handles quadruple chores of producer-director-photographer-editor, and also does the music editing. Most of the technical aspects are expertly executed. Interesting freefall photography of a parachute sequence is done by Doyle F. Fields and Mike Curb does a good job with musical direction."

Curb's role as musical director of the movie came back to haunt him in 1978, when he was running for Lieutenant Governor of California against the Democratic incumbent Mervyn Dymally. Dymally, while admitting he had never seen the movie, accused Curb of having done the music for a "pornographic" film (though the film could at most be described as mildly racy in parts) and of having "sung in falsetto in a bath tub scene with two lesbians." http://radfilms.com/mondo_hollywood_accusation.htm (all quotes in this and the next two paragraphs are from this site). Now, I originally thought that while this accusation evidently did Curb no harm in the 1978 *general* election, it might have hurt him enough to cost him the 1982 GOP primary, where the voters are presumably more socially conservative. This might indeed be true, if Curb "was defeated by less than 1% in the 1982 California Republican Party Primary" as the web site claims. But in fact this is false. True, Deukmejian got only 51.1% of the vote; but Curb got only 44.8%, minor candidates apparently getting the rest. This is probably too big a margin to be fully bridgeable by a POD where Curb is not involved with Mondo Hollywood.

However, it is conceivable that Mondo Hollywood--or rather Curb's attempt to rewrite the history of his involvement with the film--did hurt him in 1986, when he once again won the Republican nomination for lieutenant governor--but lost the general election. In 1978, after at first denying that he sang in the film, he acknowledged it and added that "he's actually quite proud of the film's music, particularly since he did it 12 years ago as a 21-year old fledging in the recording industry..." In 1986, however, Curb changed his mind yet again--and said that he did not sing in the movie:

"Curb denied that his voice had ever been used in Mondo Hollywood. Interviewed by NBC-TV, Robert Carl Cohen reaffirmed that Curb's electronically 'falsettoed' voice had, indeed, been used. Asked why he now denied it, Cohen's response that Curb, like many other politicians, 'Will say or do whatever he thinks will get him elected,' may have contributed to Curb's defeat."

So what if Curb had never been involved in Mondo Hollywood--or conversely, had been consistent in acknowledging that his electronically falsettoed voice had been used in the film? As I said, by itself, this probably wouldn't have been enough for him to win the 1982 GOP gubernatorial primary. But maybe he would have been elected Lieutenant Governor in 1986 (again it was not the film as such that hurt him but the "lying" issue) instead of Democrat Leo McCarthy. (Although the size of McCarthy's margin--over eleven points--makes me doubt this was decisive by itself. https://www.ourcampaigns.com/RaceDetail.html?RaceID=304456) And that in turn might have had national political effects: Governor Deukmejian claimed that he had ruled himself out as a possible running mate of Bush in 1988 because he had a Democratic lieutenant governor. (My guess is that Bush wanted someone younger and more appealing to "movement" conservatives than Deukmejian in any event, but you can't totally rule out a governor of the nation's most populous state...)

Two footnotes on Mondo Hollywood: (1) The cast included one Manson Family member and one victim, as well as Jayne Mansfield and Frank Zappa; (2) "Although FBI & CIA files later acquired under the Freedom of Information Act describe MONDO HOLLYWOOD (along with Cohen's other films & books) as 'pro-communist,' when shown at the Brno, Czechoslovakia Film Forum, while engaging in shoving matches to get into six separate screenings, all Communist area film buyers reject it as: 'Glamorizing capitalism - too many cars & swimming pools'" http://radfilms.com/cohen_filmography.html
 
Curb would face one key hurdle to being nominated: he was very publicly pro-gay rights. While this wouldn’t be too big of an issue in more recent times (he could even make a serious play for the nomination earlier in the 2000’s), he would most likely be stonewalled in 1988 and probably for much of the 1990’s as well.
 
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