Eloquence and Optimism

In an address televised virtually around the world Tuesday, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger sketched the state’s future in a broad and ultimately optimistic outline, avoiding the hard budget numbers that might detract from his big message: California’s in trouble and I’m here to fix it.

The occasion was Schwarzenegger’s masterful first State of the State address to a joint session of the Legislature in the ornate Assembly chamber. There’s never been anything like it -- not even when Ronald Reagan was governor. Satellite television trucks lined the streets along the north and west sides of the Capitol. A sprawling tent on the lawn served as a media center. The Capitol press room couldn’t hold the crowd.

The event itself was restrained by comparison. Schwarzenegger delivered a tough but upbeat speech, at times eloquent, at times blunt, brisk and spare. At the outset, he said he relished his job even in the midst of a fiscal crisis. “I love working for the people of California. It is better than being a movie star.” And though California is mired in a fiscal swamp, he said, “The state of our state will soon be strong.”

But he did not minimize the state’s problems and, slipping into campaign mode, made it clear that he blamed the Democrats sitting in front of him. He said that it would be painful to make enough budget cuts to wipe out a prospective $15-billion shortfall in the coming year’s budget, but that it must be done because “the alternative is economic chaos.”

Schwarzenegger held out the hand of bipartisan cooperation to the Democratic-controlled Legislature, but did not offer details of how he would balance the budget. Those will come Friday. And again he shunned higher taxes to help close the gap. In the end, new temporary revenue will almost certainly be necessary to avoid safety-net cuts so deep that voters recoil.

Schwarzenegger’s forceful pledge to sell the state as a place to do business ought to help in the long term, given his charisma and the dreadful lack of optimistic salesmanship in previous administrations. But for the immediate future, the governor most deserves support for his proposal to examine state government from top to bottom and to make it work better.

The move, he said, would include overdue reform of school finance so that local officials have more control over spending. A commission composed of legislators, public members and bureaucrats will propose real reorganization, he said, not just moving organizational boxes around. Such basic reform, including of the state’s tax system, is long overdue.

Schwarzenegger’s blend of sternness and hope may have displayed an actor’s craft, but he had the right lines and the right attitude. If he can, as he pledged, “stop the politicians from fighting,” California will be much the better for it.