The Blue Voice

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

Schwarzenegger challenged on his rightwing Republican plans

Schwarzenegger let his "moderate" mask slip during his debate last Saturday with Phil Angelides when he talked about the failed rightwing initiative measures he sponsored during 2005. He said he still thought they were good ideas, he just should have been more bipartisan in his approach, that being his script as a "moderate" candidate until the votes are counted on Election Day.

But lots of people heard what he said about what good ideas they were: Unions blast governor: His remarks on special election targeted by Andy Furillo Sacramento Bee 10/10/06. Furillo reports:

Representatives of firefighter, police, nurse and teachers unions gathered outside a hotel where Schwarzenegger was about to give a speech to hold the governor to answer for his comments in Saturday night's debate, when he said "there were good ideas there" in the special election. Voters, however, rebuffed the Schwarzenegger-backed plans on spending control, "paycheck protection," teacher tenure and legislative redistricting.

"We are here to tell you that your ideas were not good," said Bobby Weist, president of the Davis Firefighters Local 3494. "Your attempts to silence the voices of working families and your attacks on the public safety officers, teachers and nurses who serve our communities were not a good idea."

If enough voters buy Schwarzenegger's phony "moderate" posturing this year to keep him in the governor's mansion, we'll be stuck with four years of the real rightwing Republican Schwarzenegger.

And he gives more background later in the article:

At a news conference after the debate, Schwarzenegger said he still thinks "it was a terrific idea" to overhaul the state's budget and redistricting systems, as generally laid out in Propositions 76 and 77, which he pushed. He did not mention the details of Proposition 75, the measure that would have required public employee unions to obtain the annual written consent of individual workers before spending their dues money on politics, or Proposition 74, which would have extended tenure terms on schoolteachers.

"Some of the other things were not perfectly worked out," Schwarzenegger said at the news conference. "And I think the message became very clear from the people. They sent the message, 'We didn't like the initiatives, you rushed it, go to the legislators and work it out with the legislators.' "

The Proposition 76 spending control initiative included a provision giving the governor authority to enact midyear budget cuts. Soderlund said Monday that while the governor still favors the idea of having the power to cut budgets in the middle of the year during fiscal emergencies, he would not use the authority to slice into the state's Proposition 98 education funding guarantees. ...

The union leaders expressed major anxiety over what they fear Schwarzenegger will do to their pensions if he beats Angelides.

Last year, the governor proposed an initiative that would have installed a 401(k)-type program for new public employees. He discarded it, however, after Attorney General Bill Lockyer adopted ballot language saying the Schwarzenegger plan would eliminate death benefits for the spouses of public safety workers killed in the line of duty.

posted at 9:45:00 PM by Bruce Miller

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