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ALAN AUTRY: In defense of the governor's record

It is a question that must be asked and answered. Five years ago, voters recalled Democratic Gov. Gray Davis. He spent California into oblivion, created an unworkable deficit and debt, drove California's economy into the ground with a burdensome workers compensation system and was unable to work with his fellow Democrats toward fixing the mess.

Now this: What tangible difference is there between Gray Davis in 2003 and Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2008? Davis had nonexistent public support, with an approval rating in the 15% to 18% range. Our current governor has a 60% approval rating, and he still can't or won't reform California's government.

The state could be facing a $20 billion deficit. The economy is teetering. We've done little to upgrade our infrastructure. Despite record funding increases, public education isn't meeting our expectations.

Schwarzenegger has supported and endorsed massive bonded indebtedness, mortgaging our future and compromising our credit ratings. Frankly, other than the workers compensation reforms he signed in 2004, the governor has made a disaster out of California's finances, with help from the Democrat majority, which wants to spend even more.

California's record tax revenues have been squandered. Any return on that investment? Minuscule at best -- and we face a bigger mess than we had under Gray Davis, with no truthful or realistic solutions on the way.

As recently as a few months ago, even with all indicators predicting a budget train wreck, the governor actually proposed a $14 billion health plan. On top of the deficits, on top of conclusive proof that his government can't fix anything, on top of overwhelming evidence that there are not enough doctors and nurses to treat the existing health-care demands now -- he wanted the state to have a larger role. I would characterize his proposal as well-intentioned, but nearly insane.

Two weeks ago, I was contacted by a fundraiser for a local event for Arnold's political committee. I politely declined, telling the astonished fundraiser that I did not vote for him in 2006, instead preferring to leave my ballot blank.

Why should I have voted for him? What great public policy was there to vote for? Casual observers of the economy could predict the current fiscal train wreck at least a year ago, but Arnold missed it. In 2004, we gave him a $15 billion bailout as part of "California's Recovery." He promised we would never have to do it again. Uh-huh.

His ridiculous "greenhouse gas" legislation, AB 32, celebrated by liberals everywhere, made him the darling of the environmental lobby, but is driving high-paying jobs out of California and preventing the development of new jobs -- providing fodder for other states to recruit new industries against us.

Republicans in the state Assembly and Senate are in no mood to work with Arnold. He's dissed the Republicans at every turn, left the state GOP millions in debt, refused to help down-ticket candidates in his re-election bid and rolled over on outrageous legislation passed by Democrats every year. The Republicans won't give him a tax increase, so he'll have to go to the ballot box -- something voters would have never put up with from Gray Davis.

As a conservative Republican, I supported the Davis recall with the promise that an outsider could, with the people's support, reform Sacramento. The historic recall of Davis provided some hope that indeed, Californians had a political "pain threshold" and that Davis had sent the pain meter into the red.

Schwarzenegger chastised the "girly men" for their refusal to embrace reform, but let me ask you this: Has he been anything but a political girly man since his reform package was defeated by the public employee unions and voters in November 2005? What was the lesson from that? Get your nose bloodied and then give up?

Now the governor wants to raise our taxes to fix his mess. But he can't. Not with $4 gas, rising food costs, plummeting home values and a populace trying to hang on for dear life as the economic cycle turns downward.

The economy isn't the only reason the governor can't raise taxes. There is a moral reason as well. He promised he wouldn't. We taxpayers have already provided him with abundant revenues -- the highest in history. He's going to have to contract state programs -- many of which have seen a 100% or more spending level increase in just 10 years.

He may leave office with a high approval rating, but his performance has been a terrible disappointment and left the state in great fiscal peril. Worse than Gray Davis? Yes.