The battle over California's gaping budget hole is probably going to get more intense before it ends... as just about everyone thinks someone else is to blame.
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My interview yesterday with Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger included a new assertion from the chief executive: that his willingness to break his anti-tax stance earlier this year was a one-time deal to which Democratic legislative leaders agreed.
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There hasn't been much of a post-mortem among politicos about the May 19 election -- partially because the state's fiscal crisis hasn't allowed time for pondering, but also because it's seemed pretty darn clear: the voters thought the budget deficit measures stunk.

Nonetheless, a couple of interesting points have come up in the past 24 hours... today from the state's preeminent pollsters and yesterday in my interview with Governor Schwarzenegger.
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It seems Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s position at this juncture of the budget deficit debate can be summed up thusly: he's resolute on the size of the needed solution, but flexible on how to get there. In every way but one, that is.

That was the thrust of the governor’s message in a 22 minute one-on-one interview this afternoon in his state Capitol conference room. You can hear my reporting on the conversation tomorrow morning on The California Report, and the full interview will be able to be heard online on our website.
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Arnold Schwarzenegger the optimist was back on display this morning in his brief, and serious, speech to a joint session of the Legislature.

But the governor, who's fond of saying that "he alone cannot lift" the fiscal weights of California, now must find a way to get Democrats and Republicans lifting the same weight. At the same time.
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Welcome to the final month of the 2008-2009 fiscal year for state government, and buckle your seatbelts for what promises to be one of the most unusual -- and difficult -- summers in state Capitol history.
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[note update on state worker pay at bottom of this posting --JM]

Add another unusual event to an already unusual year: Governor Schwarzenegger said today that he will deliver a speech to a joint session of the Legislature on the state's $22 billion budget deficit.
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Governor Schwarzenegger proposed a new list of deep reductions in state spending today, including more prisoners to be released early, a scrapping of a stalled state worker labor agreement, and new cuts in medical care for the poor.

And that won't be all; aides to the governor say he'll propose an additional $3 billion in spending reductions later this week.

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Party over, oops, out of time! So tonight we're gonna party like it's 1999. -- Prince

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger suggested dusting off the script of a movie he wasn't in today, Back To The Future, in telling reporters that the state budget should match its anemic revenues -- now about where they were a decade ago.
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And now, the least surprising news of the political year: the special election called by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Legislature to help solve the state's budget dilemma was a bust.

The voters have spoken. And their very loud answer on the five budget-related ballot measures with real impact: no.

There's a risk in playing crime scene investigator before the smoke has fully cleared. Still, it's hard to deny some of the more obvious reasons for Tuesday's train wreck, things that most everyone in California politics has been talking about for weeks...
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