Quick quiz…was the following said by A) Bill Moyers or B) Arnold Schwarzenegger:

“It is inherently suspect for politicians to be taking money from lobbyists while they are spending the people´s money.”

The answer is Arnold Schwarzenegger, during the recall of 2003, which is instructive because it shows where the people of California are.  They want an end to the corruption, fundraising, negative ads, lobbyists, cash-register politics, and all that.

In this context, today’s financial reports show how much damage the Arnold era is doing to our state.  Not only has he embarked on a quest for $120 million, but his financial arms race is forcing Steve Westly and Phil Angelides to raise more $$$ than Gray Davis ever dreamed of.

Mad yet?  Well, there’s hope.

The California Nurses Clean Money & Fair Elections initiative will appear on this November’s ballot.  Clean money elections, which allow qualified candidates to avoid fundraising by having their campaigns publicly financed, is already working well in Arizona, Maine, and Connecticut.  Voter participation is up, lobbyist influence is down, and corporate ‘special’ interests are suddenly feeling unloved.

Help bring it here to California.  In April we will be collecting signatures, and that’s when we need you!  Sign up to volunteer at www.CalNurses.org/CleanMoney . Thanks!

Shane Goldmacher at the Capitol Weekly has some interesting points about the bond deal:

As the Capitol recovers from its bond-financing hangover, the challenge of getting a bond on the November ballot is more complicated than the puzzle of a June deal. If there is going to be a deal for the fall, legislative leaders will have to negotiate amid the summer’s annual budget wrangling–just as the gubernatorial campaign picks up steam.

“People need to remember that getting it done [in June] was important,” said Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata, D-Oakland. Now, “you are going to see a lot of other forces entering this, including partisan politics with the November elections … It’s hard enough to do a deal on policy grounds. When you start dealing with politics, it is really tough.”

If there is a bond on the November ballot, Democrats may be in an awkward position of campaigning for Governor Schwarzenegger’s bond, but urging voters to vote against his re-election. But the campaigns of both state Treasurer Phil Angelides and state Controller Steve Westly said a bond would not be a boon to Schwarzenegger’s campaign.
(Capitol Weekley 3/23/06)

Basically, he’s making an uncontroversial statement: it will be harder to pass a bond deal while negotiating for the budget.  While the budget may be a little less rocky in the election year, it will still be a mess.  On the other side of the coin, the Dems could use the bond deal as a club to beat Schwarzenegger into some concessions on the budget.

On the other point, that it would put Schwarzenegger’s opponents in a difficult position. Well that’s probably true.  At this point it would be hard for Westly to campaign for the bond deal, seeing as his ties to the Governor are already seen as too strong.  And in the articele, it looks like the Westly camp is actually making some statements to play down the effect of the bond deal:

“He’s now developed a pretty distinct pattern of coming up with big grandiose plans, and watching them turn into a puddle on the floor,”  says Westly spokesman Garry South. “His performance review evaporated into the ether. Last year, he puts four crappy measures on the ballot, and they all get voted down. Now it’s this pie-in-the-sky infrastructure proposal.”

Angelides’ situation is a little more tenable here.  He has a little more flexibility given his past Arnold-baiting to take a stand on the bond deal on his views of the package.  But, no stand needs to be taken unless they can actually get something on the ballot.