Posted on 04/23/2004 1:17:43 AM PDT by JohnHuang2
Arnold Schwarzenegger continues to amaze those who thought Californians were turning their governorship over to a muscle-bound airhead when they elected him last October. The wealthy Austrian-born actor has spent the last six-and-a-half months demonstrating that the state's financial problems, though huge, were not impossible to solve; they just required a governor tough enough to insist on solving them.
Within days of being sworn in, Schwarzenegger had kept his campaign pledge to reverse $4 billion in car tax increases imposed by the spendthrift Democrat-controlled legislature. Just as quickly, he rescinded the drivers' licenses the Democrats had given to illegal immigrants in a cheap bid for Hispanic votes. And then, as a first step in reducing a state deficit bigger than those of all 49 other states combined, he put before the voters a proposal for a state bond issue totaling $15 billion, and another to limit state expenditures to the amount of revenues taken in.
At first, polls indicated that these two measures would be rejected by the voters – an outcome that would have delighted the Democratic legislators, since Schwarzenegger would then be forced to choose between major tax increases (which he had vowed, during the campaign, not to impose) and highly unpopular cuts in state expenditures.
But the Legislature had not reckoned on Schwarzenegger's popularity and resourcefulness. He campaigned tirelessly for both proposals, explaining in TV commercials why they were essential. And the voters rewarded him by passing both by husky margins.
Next, Schwarzenegger turned his attention to California's bloated workers' compensation system, which (as he warned during the campaign) was driving businesses out of the state in droves. As late as 1997, claims had totaled $6.5 billion. Last year, it is estimated, they amounted to $30 billion – the nation's costliest.
But reform required the cooperation of the Legislature, and the Democrats predictably dragged their feet. While negotiating with them, therefore, the governor began circulating a petition to put workers' compensation reform on the November ballot as an initiative for adoption by the voters – which would, of course, bypass the Legislature. At the last minute, with five hours to go before the deadline for legislative action, the Democrats crumpled and accepted Schwarzenegger's final compromise offer.
Note that it was a compromise. As in the case of the legislative spending caps, Schwarzenegger didn't get quite everything he wanted, but he got most of it. He knows, in other words, that politics isn't just a matter of having your way; it is often necessary to let your adversary win a point or two. Or, as the great Sun Tzu said in his 4th-century treatise on "The Art of War," always leave your enemy a line of retreat.
So the verdict on Schwarzenegger to date is, "So far, so good – and then some!" But there is, on the horizon, one dark cloud that is beginning to trouble conservative observers. For all the governor's efforts, the state budget is still some $4 billion out of balance. This must be made up either by cutting spending or by raising taxes. The Democrats don't greatly care which way Schwarzenegger jumps: He must either slash expenditures on highly popular programs, or break his solemn campaign promise not to raise taxes. Thus far, the rumors that he is leaning toward a tax increase are only that, but they are getting louder.
Schwarzenegger has a huge amount of political capital with the voters of California, and he could probably expend some of it on a tax increase that conservatives would detest and still remain fairly popular. But the history of politicians who break that particular promise – from George H. W. Bush ("Read my lips ...") and former New Jersey Democratic Gov. James Florio to the disgraceful renegade Republicans in today's Virginia Legislature – is hardly encouraging. So the jury is still out on Arnold Schwarzenegger. Is he something genuinely inspiring – a politician who makes tough promises and keeps them – or just another light that failed?
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