October 12, 2003 - It was 1972 and I was in the middle of a congressional campaign. After weeks of not seeing our families on weekends the candidate declared a Saturday off.  My wife and I went to the movies. It was a Robert Redford vehicle, The Candidate.  It was the story of an unlikely political new-comer taking on an incumbent Senator and pulls it off.  At the end of the movie the Redford character, the new Senator-elect, turns to his campaign manager played by Peter Boyle and with a look of mixed puzzlement and apprehension asks, “Now what do we do?”  That is the question that Governor-Elect Arnold has to be asking this morning.

Well, I have some suggestions. There is little that you can do, Governor, to address the California deficit. You are hemmed in by the aptly named Proposition 13 on the revenue side and your new constituents are not going to tolerate reductions on the expenditure side. You have to rely on the same factors that plunged your state into the fiscal toilet to pull you out of it – the national economy. You can’t control it, you can’t direct it, so level with the people of California and ask them to join you in prayer. It can’t hurt.

Next, you need to address the real problem in governing California and that is that it can’t be done with every political nutcase with more money than sense ready to finance a legislative initiative to tie your hands and a recall to unseat you when you can’t untie them.  Remember that your predecessor served just 8 weeks of his term before the movement that made you governor started.  California needs something more than the Italianesque instability of government by recall and referendum.  Lead a movement to amend the State’s Constitution to get rid of those destructive elements.

I know that you are used to life in the public eye, but Sacramento is not Hollywood and outrageous behavior is not expected.  Well, perhaps it is expected but rather than being part of a marketing persona it will be exploited by your opponents at every turn.  Get your testosterone under control. I suppose we liberal nutcases should thank you for taking Bill Clinton’s sexual misbehavior off the table – or at least giving us a fair and balanced stock response.

Good luck, Arnold, you are going to need it. It is your ballgame and now talk isn’t enough. You have to deliver.