Cooperation?
A chastened Arnold Schwarzenegger took complete blame Thursday for the thrashing he endured at the polls and pledged to be a more collaborative governor in the coming year, offering Democrats an extraordinary role in crafting his agenda.
In his first public comments since election night, Schwarzenegger said he would rely far less on campaigns and ballot fights as a governing strategy in the coming year, pushing various goals instead through slow, painstaking negotiations with his legislative adversaries if that's what it takes.
So determined is he to adopt a more centrist and inclusive approach, Schwarzenegger said, that he will ask Democrats to help him craft his State of the State speech -- the blueprint for his 2006 policy goals.
It was that speech 10 months ago that set the course for Tuesday's debacle, in which voters rejected all four initiatives that Schwarzenegger had cast as crucial to California's future. Not one of the eight measures on the ballot passed.
In a reference to his famous movie role, he said at a news conference: "If I were to do another Terminator movie, I would have the Terminator travel back in time to tell Arnold not to have a special election."
Arnold made a big show of being an asshole the first two years of his governorship, running a Bush-style divisive operation. Now, with his ass handed to him in a hideously expensive and wholly unecessary special election, he expects Democrats to help bail him out?
While Democrats will talk nice, saying they will work with him for the news cameras, they won't. They smell blood in the water. Expect Arnold to get a giftwrapped anvil for Christmas.