Dan Walters: Governor's latest political stunt is a dud

Arnold Schwarzenegger, it would appear, just can't help himself. The man who achieved success as a bodybuilder and action movie star with over-the-top, attention-getting stunts keeps trying to make them work in politics – and keeps failing.

The governor's latest political stunt is a grandiose order that thousands of part-time and temporary state employees – including student interns – would be laid off and everyone else on the state payroll have their salaries slashed to the federal minimum wage of $6.55 per hour because the state lacks a budget.

The lack of a budget, he said last Thursday, "leaves me with no easy choices, only choices with consequences" as he blamed the Legislature for failing to produce a budget. "I have a responsibility to ensure that our state has enough money to pay its bills," he said.

Other than creating much angst among innocent state workers, however, Schwarzenegger's stunt appears to be having little impact. It has not altered the conflict over whether taxes should be raised or spending cut to close a deficit. The administration is undercutting itself by exempting thousands of workers from its provisions and issuing conflicting decrees on its effects. And state Controller John Chiang says he can't do it.

Chiang has been in office for less than two years, is probably the least known statewide official and evinces no overt ambitions for higher office. But he has become the governor's chief obstacle, simply by declaring that there's no way to physically implement the pay reduction in less than six months, even if he agreed with it.

Besides, Chiang says, the state's cash situation isn't nearly as dire as Schwarzenegger claims, with enough money to meet its payroll and other obligations through September. It would still have $4.2 billion remaining then, he says, and could borrow through issuance of "revenue anticipation warrants" if there's no budget in place.

Schwarzenegger's action is based on "faulty legal and factual premises … and is just wrong," Chiang told a legislative hearing Monday.

So what happens now if Schwarzenegger were to continue this bit of political theater? A big state worker union has already gone to court to block the order, but Chiang's declared intention to keep issuing payroll checks means that the order won't take effect anyway unless Schwarzenegger were to go to court himself.

"He would sue us and we would respond," Chiang says with characteristic diffidence.

While Schwarzenegger's stunt has received much media attention, it has not propelled the Legislature into quickly resolving its ideological conflicts over spending and taxes, nor should it. Any hurry-up budget would be another get-out-of-town budget that relies on gimmicks and borrowed money and doesn't truly close the deficit.

We do need a new budget, but more important, we need a budget that fairly balances income and outgo, not one that continues the state's years-long fiscal charade.

About the writer:

• Call The Bee's Dan Walters, (916) 321-1195. Back columns, www.sacbee.com/walters.