WASHINGTON, DC-- Today's full slate of meetings and events here in the nation's capital essentially boil down to one question: how much of California's budget problem can be solved by asking the feds for more cash?

Governor Schwarzenegger is here, along with the four leaders of the Legislature, to discuss that very issue with the entire California congressional delegation (though we think it will only be the 53 members of the House of Representatives, with separate meetings later with Senators Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer).

But in recent days, it's seemed as though the trip originally billed as "How To Get More Federal Money" has turned into something more like "The California Wish List." The meetings scheduled today are likely to not just focus on the budget, but also tack on other discussions, like how the state can avoid having more military bases on this year's list of closings.

Perhaps part of this trip's refocusing may be due to the cold, hard reality of the facts: California's ever-smaller portion of the federal budget is largely due to formulas that are used year after year.

A thoughtful analysis by the non-partisan California Institute For Federal Policy Research concludes that there are two big problems. First, California's population is younger than that of many states-- which means less Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid money. Second, the federal government's formulas for other social programs place a lot of emphasis on per capita income. California's is high... but so, too, is the state's poverty level. The federal formulas assume the two factors are opposites (in other wordds when one goes down, the other goes up). As a result, California gets short-changed.

But changing those formulas would be complicated. And it would take major political heavy lifting by both the governor and the California GOP members in charge of the big fiscal committees. All of that may make the hype of the "Collectinator" tough to back up.

I hope to have an update on the day's events later... and will have a full wrap-up Friday morning on The California Report.