Is Arnold better off without the GOP?

SHOULD GOV. Arnold Schwarzenegger run for reelection as an independent?

Schwarzenegger is a centrist -- conservative on taxes, crime and illegal immigration, and moderate on cultural and environmental issues. That balance is what attracted the support of swing voters when he was elected two years ago. But it has also kept him from forming a stronger relationship with the most ideologically committed members of his Republican Party.

When Schwarzenegger announced his candidacy during the recall campaign against Gray Davis, it was a combination of star power and animosity toward Davis that allowed many conservative voters to overlook the actor-turned-politician’s support for abortion rights. His campaign promises to repeal the “car tax,” balance the budget and block driver’s licenses for illegal immigrants effectively secured the backing of more than three-quarters of GOP voters.

Since his election, Schwarzenegger has fought Democratic attempts to raise taxes and has reduced the size of the state’s deficit. He has vetoed legislation that would grant driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants and praised the work of volunteers who patrol the U.S.-Mexico border. Most recently, he invested almost his entire store of political capital in a special-election reform effort supported almost solely by conservative voters.

But the areas of disagreement have never been far from the surface.

Schwarzenegger’s entry into state politics came in 2002, when he sponsored a ballot initiative to fund after-school programs for California children that many fiscal conservatives privately dismissed as a big-government spending program. Social conservatives were irate when he told Jay Leno last year that he would not oppose the preferences of state voters on the question of same-sex marriage. In 2004, even while campaigning for President Bush’s reelection, he endorsed a ballot measure funding stem cell research that almost two-thirds of Republicans opposed.

So, when the governor announced last week that he was hiring a longtime Democratic operative and abortion-rights activist as his new chief of staff, conservative Republicans erupted in anger. Already unhappy over his proposal for a multibillion-dollar bond measure and uneasy with his decision to hold a clemency hearing before deciding the fate of Stanley Tookie Williams, GOP activists were furious when Schwarzenegger tapped former Davis advisor Susan Kennedy as his top government aide.

THE UNIQUE dynamics of the recall election had allowed Schwarzenegger to run from the center, helping him avoid a GOP primary in which his moderate social and environmental positions could have caused him problems with a right-leaning electorate. Running for reelection as an independent would allow him the same opportunity. State law would have to be changed to allow him to alter his party registration so close to an election. But leaders of both major parties would have a vested interest in persuading their supporters to approve such a change.

For California’s conservative movement, an independent Schwarzenegger candidacy would present its members the opportunity to support a more ideologically acceptable candidate. Could that candidate take 35% to 40% of the vote against Schwarzenegger and the Democratic nominee? It’s certainly more attainable than the 50% required in a traditional two-party race. Although Democrats would have to be wary of a centrist Schwarzenegger repeating his recall performance and attracting enough independent and moderate Democratic support to win reelection, organized labor and other party mainstays could support another candidate, one more strongly committed to their most important policy goals.

Schwarzenegger would be gambling that enough Californians are suspicious of both down-the-line liberal and conservative agendas that they would opt for the centrist solution instead. His supporters from the state’s business community would be able to put their resources behind a candidate who didn’t have to balance their interests against either social conservatives or economic liberals, as would the growing percentage of Californians aligned with neither of the two major parties.

So there’s less reason than ever for Schwarzenegger to jam himself into a political identity with which he is not comfortable. If Schwarzenegger is truly an independent, who supports Republican positions on some issues and Democratic positions on others, maybe his reelection campaign would be a good time to come out and say it.