Wilson’s Message Previewed in Plea to ‘Pull Together’ : Governor: Outmatched by Assembly Democrats, he distributes a videotape calling for a spirit of cooperation to turn the state’s economy around.

Opening a public relations offensive that is expected to last a month or more, Gov. Pete Wilson on Tuesday distributed a videotaped message urging Californians to “pull together” to turn around the state’s economy one job at a time.

Wilson, after a year in which he sought but failed to wrest control of the state Assembly from the Democrats, called for an end to “partisan finger-pointing” and “politics as usual.”

“We can no longer afford to be a collection of disparate, rival interest groups,” Wilson said. “We must work together to rebuild California job by job by job.”

The 3-minute, 28-second video, sent to 73 television stations around the state, was billed by Wilson’s aides as a preview of the State of the State message the Republican chief executive is scheduled to deliver to a joint session of the Legislature at 5 p.m. today.

Although the video message included some of the same language that was in drafts of the 25-minute speech Wilson is to deliver, the governor’s top spokesman said Tuesday’s shorter version was aimed “directly at the people” rather than at the Legislature.

“He wanted to make sure the people around California understand they’re the most important audience,” said Dan Schnur, Wilson’s director of communications.

Schnur said the video was the beginning of a series of events, many of them breaking from gubernatorial tradition, aimed at building support for proposals Wilson says will improve the California business climate.

“We’re going to work more aggressively to communicate the governor’s message,” Schnur said. “There are a lot of ways to transmit that message and we intend to work harder to take advantage of those other means.”

The video will be followed by today’s speech, which is the usual forum for the governor to set out his goals for the year, and a longer, more detailed message that Wilson will transmit in writing to legislators after his address.

Wilson will attend a press conference Thursday at which he will elaborate on the jobs theme. The governor also plans a series of speeches around the state in the next several weeks and forums at which he will discuss his ideas with handpicked audiences.

All of this is intended to portray Wilson in the best possible light even as he is proposing a new budget--due out Friday--that he already has hinted will include harsh new reductions for higher education, health and social services.

Wilson’s last State of the State address one year ago went awry after the governor’s press office first admitted, then denied, that Wilson had fabricated the stories of three Californians he said had shown him firsthand the suffering caused by the lingering recession.