Schwarzenegger

In a news conference, a frustrated and angry Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger blasted legislators of both parties for failing to reach a budget compromise ("shameful") and offered another budget proposal. This is unusual. California governors typically release two budget proposals -- one in January, and one in May. But the governor has put forward a compromise plan that includes a temporary sales tax increase -- violating his promise not to raise taxes -- in exchange for budget reforms. He said he was taking a risk: "I'm stepping over the line here," he said.

There was a take-it-or-leave-it feel to the session, which was cut short after four questions. He said it was time for budget "dialogue" to stop. "This is not part of the kabuki or anything like that," said the governor, all but demanding his proposal be passed.

Other highlights:

-Schwarzenegger admitted openly that his first attempt to fix the state's budget problem--the ballot measures Propositions 57 and 58, which were approved by voters in 2004--had been a failure. "This year is coming out clearly that our budget reform that we attempted in 2004 with Props 57 and 58 does not work," he said. 

California is stuck. More than two months have passed since the constitutional deadline to adopt a state budget for the '08-'09 fiscal year, and there's still no budget. What's worse, potential compromises all involve adding measures to this November's ballot. And the deadline for adding such measures already has passed -- it was Saturday. It's unlikely that legislative Republicans, who as the minority party are able to hold things up because California requires a two-thirds vote for budget passage, will relent on their demand for a rainy day fund and some sort of spending limit. Such changes are constitutional and require a vote of the people. Plus, Democrats are banking on money from borrowing against lottery revenues to pay for programs. Since the lottery was enacted by ballot initiative, these kinds of changes to the lottery require another vote of the people.

So what's the way out? Here's a fearless prediction: California's legislature will pass and the governor will sign a budget sometime in the next month. And that budget likely will include ballot measures on spending and the lottery as part of the compromise. But those measures can't appear on this November's ballot. Time has run out. Instead, they'll appear on the next scheduled statewide ballot -- in June 2010. In effect, the California's '08-'09 budget fight might not end until then. 

Writing at Huffington Post, my New America colleague Jim Pinkerton, who as a policy aide to the first President Bush helped Gov. Schwarzenegger in his work as the country's fitness czar, advances an idea for the governor's next act: as the country's "N N Czar." And in Pinkerton's scenario, he leaves California next year, before his term is up.

A gubernatorial spokesman predicts a "total meltdown" in the Capitol if there's not a deal for a new California budget  by Saturday, the deadline for adding measures that would be part of any compromise to the November ballot. At Blockbuster Democracy, we're adopting "Total Meltdown" as a way to distinguish California posts from news from other states.

In Total Meltdown news...

DON'T TAKE PERATA'S WORD: The Senate Democratic leader said a deal was close. It wasn't.

DIFI SMACKDOWN: Democratic U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a rumored candidate for governor in 2010, went to Sacramento yesterday and criticized legislators for failing to put a $9.3 billion water bond on the ballot. She's right, of course. The state badly needs the infrastructure, and the bond represents a compromise reached by her and Gov. Schwarzenegger. But folks on the left and right hate it, and the California legislature's mantra right now might as well be: "Let's make the perfect the enemy of the good."

WE DECIDE, YOU VOTE.  The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors reversed itself and voted to put a sales tax on the ballot to fund transit programs. But then the board voted to register its opposition to the package. Yes, it's confusing.

In February, Californians voted to ratify four of the state's compacts with indian tribes that operate casinos. The public vote was part of a referendum forced by union leaders who argued that the compacts did not have enough protection for workers. But supporters of the compacts, including tribal and legislative leaders and Gov. Schwarzenegger, told voters the compacts would produce big money that would help balance the budget. As the Press Enterprise shows in this story, that hasn't happened.

The Sacramento Bee columnist Dan Walters says so in this column that is being talked about this week. But Walters offers no actual evidence or examples of this tendency, other than a quote from Schwarzenegger about the virtues of changing one's mind and a comparison to Jerry Brown that's pretty meaningless.

Walters' analysis is conventional wisdom in Sacramento. The problem is it doesn't fit the facts--at least on matters of policy. In reporting a book on Schwarzenegger, a massive briefing binder with all of Schwarzenegger's intended policies from the 2003 recall campaign fell into my possession. To flip back through the book today is to be struck by how utterly consistent Schwarzenegger has been. He's still pursuing the policies he promised: an enlightened environmental centrism, regulation that favors business, infrastructure investment, protection of local government funds, redistricting that takes the legislature out of the process, and a spending limit and rainy day fund.

Schwarzenegger today clarified his earlier remarks and said he's sticking it out in California 'til the end of his governorship, according to the Sacramento Bee. That squares with what he's long said, and closes the door on a departure for an Obama administration, a door he seemed to open in an interview broadcast Sunday on ABC News.

Your blogger promises to take deeper breaths in the future.

That's what Aaron McLear tells the Sacramento Bee. Apparently, Schwarzenegger was discussing his options for early 2011, after he leaves office.

That sounds plausible, and matches hundreds of prevoius statements about Schwarzenegger's desire to serve out his term for taking any new challenge.

But if I were Garamendi, I'd still think about a transition team.

Gov. Schwarzenegger used an appearance on ABC's "This Week" Sunday morning to hint that he has interest in leaving his current job to serve in Barack Obama's cabinet as some sort of energy-environment czar. The McCain-endorsing governor also talked about an Obama presidency as a fait accompli--he referred to "when," not "if," the Illinois senator is president. I suspect you'll see an effort in the hours and days ahead by the governor and his aides to try to back away from what he told interviewer George Stephanopoulous and talk about his commitment to Californians. They'll note that he called the discussion "hypothetical" and was merely explaining his desire to serve American governments of either party. But I defy anyone to watch the show or read the transcript and tell me with any confidence that this governor intends to serve out the rest of his term, which runs through the end of 2010.

Here's the exchange. Stephanopoulous showed a clip of Obama praising the governor's environmental "leadership."

STEPH: "Newsweek" reported he might want you to be his energy czar. Would you be interested?

SCHWARZ:: I don't think about taking on a national role. There's so many challenges we have in California.

STEPH: If he were president and he called?

Here are details on the compromise, $9.3 billion bond that Gov. Schwarzenegger and Sen. Dianne Feinstein want the legislature to add to this November's California ballot. The bond would fund water storage and restoration of the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta. But the governor's efforts to secure such a bond in recent years have been frustrated by partisan and geographic rivalries.