The race for the right to represent the GOP in California’s upcoming gubernatorial election is another one of those head-scratchers that the oft-rumored Republican party here is known for producing. Meg Whitman, whose Republican credentials don’t extend much beyond her voter registration, has a comfortable over Steve Poizner in most polls at this point.

Here’s the thing, though: Poizner is consistently making a detailed, erudite case for why he should be governor while Whitman has been doing nothing more than barking “I ran eBay!” like an annoying toy dog.

True, when compared to career politician/hippie Jerry Brown, Whitman looks palatable. When he was governor back in the days of disco his biggest accomplishment was hooking up with Linda Ronstadt.

However, the differences between Whitman and Poizner are very sharp and don’t leave her with much of a serious narrative about why she should lead this great state. California does need a businessperson at the helm to pull it out of its economic doldrums, not a spend-until-China-buys-us-in-a-fire-sale Democrat. If we’re looking at business leader/entrepreneur street cred then Poizner wins that throw-down with Whitman easily.

Here are a couple of quick excerpts from a radio interview that Poizner did on Friday that help define the main differences between him and Whitman.

JOHN KOBYLT: You’re both Silicon Valley successful executives, you both got rich–

STEVE POIZNER: And that’s part of what’s driving the confusion in this race, we’re both from the same zip code approximately, both from high-tech companies. But you know, only one of us has actually started companies from scratch, that’s a difference. Only one of us has actually run statewide before and won. Only one of us has taken a large state agency, in my case it was the Department of Insurance, and I shrunk it by 15%. Even though all my employees are public employee union members, all lifetime civil servants. I got it done. I have a huge surplus now at the Department of Insurance. I passed that surplus back into the marketplace through tax cuts. I’ve practiced what I’ve preached. Only one of us has been in the classroom in a low income area teaching, you know, gang members for a year, 12th grade American Government. Only one of us, me, I just don’t want there to be any confusion here. Only one of us has been in the White House during the 9-11 Crisis working in the National Security Council putting together a new homeland security plan. So this background, the background differences, the track record, my views on tax cuts, these differences will come out in the course of this campaign, and the Republican primary voter is going to go with the conservative with the track record and that’s clearly Steve Poizner.

KEN CHIAMPOU: Are you implying that she’s not a conservative?

STEVE POIZNER: Well how do you explain of the 38 million in the state of California, why would you appoint an Obama supporter as your campaign manager? Why would you donate hundreds of thousands of dollars to left-wing environmental groups that helped write AB32 and that are suing farmers over the Delta Smelt?

KEN CHIAMPOU: But she’s called to suspend AB32.

STEVE POIZNER: Well you figure her out, because on one hand she tries to come across tough on the environment because she knows she’s on the spot now in the Republican primary, on the other hand, in 2007 and 2008 she gave $300,000 to the Environmental Defense Fund. Now Google the Environmental Defense Fund, they’re suing farmers over the Delta Smelt? You ask her, how can she do that? How can she actually endorse and campaign for Barbara Boxer in 2006? Now, how come she didn’t vote most of her life?