Schwarzenegger's Budget Choices: Will He Lead or Wimp Out?

[courtesy of The California Majority Report]

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's chickens are coming home to roost on Wednesday, when he'll announce a budget deficit somewhere in the neighborhood of $20 billion caused by his tax-cutting actions of the last few years. Rumors are swirling in the Capitol about what action he'll take. But the bottom line will be whether he chooses to lead or wimp out.

Here are some of his options:

• Raise Taxes -- Schwarzenegger has hinted that he's willing to "get creative" and propose some type of revenue raiser, though his office goes bananas anytime suggests it will be raising taxes along the lines of what legislative Democrats want. Yet Schwarzenegger could defy conventional wisdom and propose some modest tax increases in an attempt to win favor from Democratic legislators who will ultimately be responsible for getting the state budget bill to his desk. The political downsides are minimal. Sure, he'll have broken the only promise he made during the 2003 campaign that he's kept (the Bush-like "no new taxes). But it sure didn't harm Governor Huckabee any on the grand scale after he did the same thing in Arkansas. With the exception of the right-wingers at the Orange County Register and San Diego Union Tribune, it would win editorial praise. Sure, Republicans will groan. But they already loathe him, so there's not much to lose there. Having Schwarzenegger on the balanced approach bandwagon would put added pressure on the legislative GOP in an election year.

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