It isn’t just the state budget mess. It isn’t merely because Gray Davis is the least popular political figure in California, with a positive rating barely above 20 percent in recent polls. Nor did the recall drive against Davis catch fire only because a blatantly opportunistic Republican congressman dumped big bucks into a campaign that was waiting to ignite.

All these things, plus an openly stated Republican wish to reverse last year’s election results, moved the recall forward. But the reasons for the brush fire-like quality of the campaign to oust Davis go deeper than that. It reflects a widespread public revulsion not just against Davis, but against politics as usual in this state.

It’s not enough, for instance, to note that public poll ratings of Davis are near record lows. The same polls show state legislators are held in even lower regard. This indicates that Davis has become a lightning rod for the tainted system he symbolizes. Were he not such an active manipulator of that system, some might call him a scapegoat.

This campaign is fueled, then, by much more than the $1 million or so that San Diego County Rep. Darrell Issa donated, money that is paying petition carriers $1 for every valid voter signature they turn in.

It’s fueled also by recent events: One was the manner in which a state Senate committee failed to pass the most elementary sort of consumer privacy bill, SB 1, which would have forced banks, insurance companies, credit card firms and others to get permission from customers before circulating financial information about them. That bill seemed certain of passage before the companies it sought to restrict waged a heavy-duty lobbying campaign.

The impression persists that corporate and labor union cash buys policy and contracts in California. This sense was furthered when Democratic Assembly Speaker Herb Wesson, state Senate Republican leader Jim Brulte, Assembly Republican leader Dave Cox and others junketed on Maui in December — while already deadlocked on the state budget — on the tab of the state prison guards union, Pacific Gas & Electric Co., the Pfizer pharmaceutical company and more.

How, voters were left to wonder, could PG&E spend $8,200 on a golf outing for lawmakers near Wailea, Hawaii, when it is bankrupt and pushing a bailout plan that would cost consumers many billions of dollars? Why, voters could wonder, would these top legislators go for that?

Decades of these kinds of scenes lead inevitably to voter dismay and disgruntlement, as evidenced by the turnout (or turnoff) in last fall’s election, when almost one-quarter of the folks who voted in the previous run for governor didn’t bother going to the polls.

So even if they don’t always articulate it this way, it’s not just Davis that people want to get rid of. It’s a system where corporations call many of the shots, basing public policy on their profits rather than the public good. It’s not only Democrats who anger them. When The Associated Press reports that Republican Rep. Doug Ose of the Sacramento area has used his chairmanship of a House Government Reform subcommittee to help developers and businesses who supported his campaigns, that further disgusts voters.

Essentially, many voters signing recall petitions are saying there’s no reason why California’s campaign finance laws can’t be brought in line with far more restrictive laws that limit contributions to federal races for the House and Senate. They are saying it’s probably high time to take congressional and legislative redistricting away from politicians who benefit directly from the results, which now guarantee there will be very few close contests for the next eight years.

They are saying they want change — and not merely a change of the face occupying the governor’s office.

Yes, the unpopularity of Gray Davis helps this movement a lot. So does his inability to lead the Legislature through the budget morass. But dissatisfaction with government in California has been building for years, as voters see more and more of at least the appearance of corruption and influence peddling.

Like the 1978 Proposition 13, this recall is the product of public anger. Not just at Davis, but at the entire system he’s exploited through his almost 30 years in public life.