Schwarzenegger Comes Out Kind Of Against Electoral College Dirty Trick

The AP has a story up about Governor Schwarzenegger's reaction to the right-wing dirty tricks proposal to steal the Presidency in 2008.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger gave a chilly reception Thursday to a GOP-backed plan to change the way California awards electoral votes in presidential elections - a proposal critics say could tilt the outcome in favor of Republicans.

"In principle, I don't like to change the rules in the middle of the game," the Republican governor told reporters.

OK, starts good, not as hard-hitting as you would want but...

Schwarzenegger added he wasn't versed in details of the ballot proposal and stressed he wasn't taking a definitive position.

Ah, the last bastion of a political scoundrel. "I haven't read it."

But his uneasy response is likely to make it harder for supporters to build momentum and could chill fundraising.

I doubt that, considering that far-right Republicans don't even much like the Governor anymore.

The proposed ballot initiative is being pushed by Thomas Hiltachk, a lawyer in a Sacramento firm that represents the state Republican Party.

Um, you couldn't have mentioned that he was Schwarzengger's personal lawyer? Would that have killed you?

The other big election story is that the governorappeared with Pete Wilson and Gray Davis to announce their intention to push for a change in redistricting laws.

Governor Schwarzenegger joined with two former governors today in Los Angeles to call for a new way to carve up political district boundaries.

Schwarzenegger appeared at a news conference with former Republican Governor Wilson and former Democratic Governor Davis.

Schwarzenegger said the current system does little to encourage competition. The governor said in the past three election cycles, only 4 of the 459 congressional and legislative seats changed party hands in California.

Schwarzenegger seeks a ballot proposal that would have an independent commission do the reapportionment, rather than the legislature. The proposal is similar to one that was unsuccessful on the 2005 ballot.

He wants the proposal on the February 2008 ballot. If this would take effect immediately, I don't know how anyone could support changing the way districts are drawn with 8 year-old Census data. But "I haven't read it"!

This is part of a new strategy of aggressiveness coming out of the Governor's office, to show the Legislature who's boss, I guess. Obviously the Governor is holding out endorsement of the term limits measure as a chip to get redistrcting done. And he's vowing not to sign any health care proposal that doesn't have his thumbprints all over it.

What remains to be seen is whether or not post-partisanship has any coalition-building left in it. The Governor came out of the budget fight relatively unscathed, and has really only taken a popularity hit this year when the public noticed his lack of a true commitment to fighting global warming. What he ends up blue-penciling out of the budget might cause a reaction as well. And the reaction to his middling response on the dirty tricks issue may hurt him. A lot of questions leading into crunch time for the legislative process.