"Girlie Men" in Sactown

A colleague brought the recent story about the Governator calling the California legislature "girlie men" to my attention today. I've seen the clip, and some of the uproar at the comments being supposedly "sexist" or "homophobic." Of course, Arnold was quoting the old SNL "Hans and Franz" skit with Dana Carvey and Kevin Nealon--a skit which made fun of him! While people can get upset about this, I think they are upset for the wrong reason.

Why should people be upset? Because, despite being a fairly moderate Republican, Governor Schwarzenegger has bought into the California GOP's maddeningly one-track policy of "no new taxes." His remarks poke fun at the legislature for wanting to "represent those special interests...those unions and trial lawyers," while ignoring the equally strong special interests who fund Republican campaigns. Now, I'm not saying that I want to raise taxes up the wazoo, but taking any non-negative tax changes completely off the table seems needlessly ideological, particularly given the state's overwhelming budget problems. Surely money can be saved by eliminating redundancies, laying off state employees, etc. but at the end of the day, the "goes ins" have to equal the "goes outs," and it's wise to at least consider additional forms of revenue. I don't care if our governor wants to poke fun at the legislature through an old comedy skit--I do care that his party holds that legislature hostage to a comedic tax policy.

Posted 19:38 PST