Posted on 11/03/2006 8:24:52 PM PST by freedom44
OAKLAND — Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger appreciates the Republican lieutenant governor nominee's opinion that the infrastructure bonds on next week's ballot are a mistake but believes he's "totally wrong." "If you went with his way of thinking, you would never rebuild California," the governor said Thursday of state Sen. Tom McClintock as he visited the Port of Oakland to stump for the $37 billion bond package.
With California's population continuing to swell, "we can't continue waiting; we have to build now," Schwarzenegger said, estimating the state's economy is only "70 percent living up to our potential" because it can't move goods and people fast enough.
Proposition 1B is a $20 billion transportation infrastructure bond which would provide money to relieve highway congestion, improve public transit and reduce air pollution, particularly at California's ports.
Harold Jones, the Port of Oakland's deputy executive director for external affairs, said while introducing the governor Thursday that the port is the nation's fourth-busiest container port and has spent millions on improving air quality, but to keep doing so needs federal, state and local support like that which Proposition 1B would provide.
Known as one of the Legislature's foremost fiscal conservatives, McClintock, R-Thousand Oaks, contends Proposition 1B; Proposition 1C, a $3 billion affordable housing bond; and Proposition 1D, a $10 billion school construction and renovation bond,
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-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- put too little money into projects that will last a generation, squandering too much on ongoing program costs and routine maintenance. He supports only Proposition 1E, the $4 billion levee and flood-control bond, and Proposition 1A, which would prevent existing gas-tax revenue from being diverted away from transportation projects.
The race between McClintock and Democratic lieutenant governor nominee John Garamendi, currently the state's insurance commissioner, is seen as one of California's tightest contests. Garamendi supports the whole infrastructure bond package.
Asked why voter support for these measures has been relatively soft despite their bipartisan backing and lack of organized opposition, Schwarzenegger replied Thursday that "no one has concentrated that much on it, there hasn't been that much information out there" until recent weeks.
The more voters learn about the package, the more likely they are to support it, he said, noting the bipartisan spirit behind the package is practically unknown right now in other states, or on the national political stage.
Earlier Thursday, Schwarzenegger touted the bond package in Prunedale, near Salinas, before being joined by U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., for a $1,000-a-plate fundraising luncheon at San Francisco's St. Regis Hotel.
Democratic gubernatorial nominee Phil Angelides' campaign issued a memo wondering whether McCain — who in the Senate has championed campaign-finance reform — is comfortable with Schwarzenegger's record-breaking fundraising, now at more than $113.4 million since 2003.
I'll be voting for Arnold but I still consider myself a McClintock supporter first.
No Arnie, you're wrong on bonds, but I'll hold my nose and vote for him. God help us in this state. The libs have trashed it.
No kidding.
Arnie should shut the heck up and go with the flow. Real conservatives know he is wrong on the bonds and wrong on his cooperation with the leftist loonies in the legislature. Despite that we are willing to give him the vote to keep Angelides from power. Arnie is short term stuff. Mc Clintock is our future.
Arnie needs to enjoy the fifteen minutes we so generously have given and are giving him.
Sorry, Arnie you didn't earn my vote but I will be voting for every other (R).
You are absolutely correct!
WOW!!!!! Thanks!
; ^ )
The phrase in the post "with california's population continuing to grow", prompts me to quote from a best-selling book which reveals CA's dirty little secret:
"The Golden Land is no more.An exodus comparable to that of the Dust Bowl in the 1930's has begun.For the first time since the Spanish came, native-born Californians have begun to depart. Fed up with rising crime rates and rising taxes to subsidize illegal aliens, they are leaving for Arizona, Nevada, Idaho...as the California they grew up in and loved morphs into Mexifornia.
Census 2000 revealed what many sensed: For the first time since statehood in 1849, European Americans had become a minority in the Golden State.
Sociologist William Frey documented the outmigration. In the 1990's, the state grew by 3 million, but its white population dropped by almost half a million. L.A. County alone lost 480,000 white folks."
The quote continues to outline the economic, social, and cultural disasters proceeding apace in CA.
Arnold and McClintock are arguing about the deck chairs and not seriously dealing with the iceberg that looms directly ahead!
"With California's population continuing to swell.." Take a wild guess...What is the real reason for California's growing population?
I know that Arnold will win, so I did not vote for governor as a protest. And I did not vote for the propositions either. McClintock is right, the bonds are bad law. Arnold will win, McClintock will win, and the bonds will lose. This will be painful for Arnold..but he deserves it.
ahhnold is plain wrong... $20 billion for transportation infrastructure is in theory a good thing (at least in my mind). but $20 billion in trains no one rides, air quality monitoring, increased security for ports already run by the chinese, and complex interchanges to mitigate bottlenecks (and create new ones half a mile down the freeway) is just plain dumb. We need more lanes, more runways and fewer demands on the budget for crap we don't need.
What a way to try and cut the legs out from under somebody.
A bit surprised that the Asia population has not more effect politically. It is they and the blacks who will prevent California from becoming bicultural, which is a very dangerous thing. The large percentages of Asians in the universities is interesting.
Mayb I ask why buslines have never received support? Makes more sense that car-pooling, or trains.
The knife has clearly been thrust in the back of McClintock.
A few more twists and Arnold can scuttle Tom's entire campaign, if this one wasn't enough.
Garamendi et al are using it to the maximum to paint Tom as extreme.
Too bad they won't acknowledge the truth--that Arnold is the one at odds with the Party platform, not Tom.
If this is the way Arnold treats his "running mate," I'm sure conservatives can expect to be dissed for the next four years.
Arnold is a rat.
Uh-huh, sure.
SCHWARZENEGGER: "Well, the most important thing is, and it's the first thing I will do when I get into office, is to open up the books, do the auditing, look at the budget line by line and look at where the waste really is."Arnold could make Clinton blush.
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