The word from the tent: Governor says he’s a multi-tasker

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger wants you to know that he is completely capable of performing two or four or even more tasks simultaneously.

He can, to be precise, negotiate a bill that relieves dangerous prison overcrowding while he works to create a coalition behind universal healthcare and plays in the national political arena. That still leaves plenty of time for bragging about past deeds.

The governor especially wanted me to know this. So I was invited -- sort of summoned -- to his cigar tent in the Capitol’s atrium late one afternoon last week.

That day, I had written about a new poll -- showing voters favored some of his healthcare ideas, but objected to taxing doctors and hospitals -- and concluded that Schwarzenegger needed “to hard-sell the whole complicated, costly concept of universal healthcare.”

I advised: “Lose all the rhetoric about last year’s global warming bill and ‘post partisanship’ -- a grating word -- and stop trying to play in presidential politics.”

That earned me a ticket to the cigar tent -- that and my column three days earlier. In it, I pointed out that although the governor had lectured reporters in a speech about the importance of forcing presidential candidates to be specific on issues, he himself had been deliberately vague when he ran for reelection last year.

How could I ever get the warped notion, Schwarzenegger began -- calmly, but eyes piercing -- that he was taking valuable time away from California’s healthcare and prison problems by occasionally playing on the national stage?

At least, that’s how I remember it. The governor wouldn’t allow me to turn on my recorder. He merely wanted to talk. So I didn’t take notes either. Ultimately, I persuaded him that any good points he was trying to make would be lost to readers unless his words were recorded.

Schwarzenegger had proof of some multi-tasking dexterity.

The governor said he and legislative leaders had all but agreed on a compromise prison bill. They’ve been prodded by a federal judge’s threat to begin releasing prisoners in June if inmate overcrowding isn’t eased. There currently are 173,000 inmates stashed in prisons built for 100,000.

The governor and lawmakers plan to disclose their solution next week after Easter recess. But Schwarzenegger told me the tentative agreement is to build 48,000 new bunks -- a third in state prisons, a third in county jails and a third in community reentry facilities. Plus, there’d be 7,500 more medical beds and major upgrades in rehabilitation.

All this would be paid for by “lease revenue” bonds that wouldn’t need voter approval. The governor originally proposed $10.9 billion in bonds, but that has been reduced to less than $10 billion.

“I’m very happy with it,” Schwarzenegger said, “because I’m happy when you don’t have to release inmates just for the sake of running out of space.... People should be released because we have reshaped them, we have changed their heart.”

OK, score points for the governor and Legislature on prisons.

What about healthcare? In the view of many in Sacramento, this is the toughest challenge Schwarzenegger has taken on yet -- because of the economic stakes, the billions in government costs and its potential impact on every Californian.

So shouldn’t he be more focused on trying to promote universal healthcare to the public and negotiating a deal with legislators? Prioritize his many messages? Mute the bragging about last year’s accomplishments? Stop lecturing about presidential candidate specificity?

Schwarzenegger wouldn’t hear of it.

For one thing, his staffers are negotiating with health interests -- medical providers, insurers -- trying to develop a consensus. Until they’re on board, he said, “we’re not going to put bills out there [for interests] to beat up.”

Moreover, the governor continued, the public is capable of digesting more than one thought at a time from him. On healthcare, he said, “people get it.”

He vowed, “we’re going to get it done this year.” All sides are searching, he added, for the compromise “sweet spot.”

At one point, Schwarzenegger observed that the Legislature was capable of tackling only one major issue at a time -- a thesis that lawmakers in both Sacramento and Washington generally would accept. This year, there has been prisons. Then there’ll be the red-ink budget -- and in August healthcare and water.

So what makes Schwarzenegger believe that he, uniquely, is such a multi-tasker? “You have to understand that I work long days and think about it day and night,” he said, referring to all his projects.

He must understand, I mentioned, why reporters were a bit incredulous listening to him recently sermonize on the need to hold presidential candidates’ feet to the fire after he’d been so vague while seeking reelection.

Schwarzenegger grinned slightly and said something like: Just because one person gets away with it doesn’t mean they all should.... I was offering my vision. But this was during the recorder blackout, so I can’t be exactly sure.

He did make the point later that ideas shouldn’t be dismissed just because of their source. For example, Schwarzenegger observed, people say of him: “ ‘He shouldn’t talk about the environment. He drives a Hummer.’ That does not mean I can’t do great, great things for the environment worldwide.”

The governor also said he has a “responsibility” to brag across America about his accomplishments because they’re California’s accomplishments too -- global warming legislation, stem cell research, so-called post-partisanship....

And banging on the presidential candidates to be specific -- especially about California issues -- is part of his effort to increase the state’s influence. “Let’s not think about only what is going on here. Think about the impact we’re having nationwide and worldwide,” he said.

“What I want to convince you of,” he told me, after I’d nearly emptied his bowl of seasoned almonds, “is don’t forget the big picture. I’m a big-picture guy. I love to solve the problems here. But let us also sell California worldwide. If we have something to brag about, let’s brag.”

The last time Schwarzenegger told me to “think big” he was running off to stumble over a cliff in a special election. He won’t do that again. He’s much wiser.

But we really won’t know until late summer how skilled he is at multi-tasking when one task is creating universal healthcare. That’s a very big-picture project.

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Reach the columnist at george.skelton@latimes.com.