It's a way to keep taxes down and a way to make sure there won't be new taxes. If it passes, what it would really do is make the legislature second banana in the budget process.
It fits in with the values of his core constituency. It offers an opportunity for those people who had been with him in the past to be with him now.
It resurrects his relationship with his base - that's the first critical step toward rehabilitation. It puts him in a good position. ... And it advances us to the midterm elections.
If it fails to get on the ballot, it's hard to see where he's got any clout. He's at odds with his own party and he certainly doesn't have any with the Democrats. That makes him the political version of the Maytag repairman -- the loneliest guy in town.
Given that the governor has a very small base and that this base would be very offended by signing this legislation, he politically has no choice but to veto.
This tells me that in the long term Schwarzenegger is in trouble. There seems to be a strengthening of resolve against these three initiatives.
like a three-dimensional chess game. . . . The key is that the messages not be too far apart.
Arnold set the bar for very high expectations, coupled with strong demands. But the expectations weren't met, the demands weren't honored, and that has voters very skittish. Most voters are showing malaise, even downright disgust.
For me, it was 90 minutes of wasted time. They got nowhere beyond their elevator statements. I'm not sure that's going to help people make sense of things, because these propositions are so complicated.
