Will Schwarzenegger veto the state budget?

Speculation that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is gearing up to veto the budget this afternoon is rampant in Sacramento. Staff at the governor's office have been busily calling news directors at local television stations to ask that they make room on their evening programs for a live statement from Arnold.

Last night, the governor said he wouldn't sign a budget unless lawmakers strengthened future controls on spending, a demand state legislators refused to meet. Seems unlikely the governor would make such a big show of mentioning a veto if he didn't really mean it. Meanwhile, Schwarzenegger's communication shop won't comment other than to say Schwarzenegger plans to address the budget sometime today.

-- Evan Halper

Photo credit: Robert Durell / Los Angeles Times

Comments

[MB]

State workers unions shake down us simple folk every year. The permanent democrat majority feed them $$ in return for permanency.

it's a mob style racket.

[Agnostic Free Thinker]

We're going to face the same "budget crisis" every year unless there is a plan in place to control spending. After all, it is OUR money that these idiots in the legislature are spending. Sacramento politicians make me sick.

[MT]

He should veto the budget. It's a highly irresponsible budget that takes future anticipated money to pay today's bill, which does nothing put push the problem into the future. In addition, it hits all Californians hard by accelerating state withholding taxes (that have to be paid back to the taxpayer, interest free (when's the last time YOU got an interest free loan?), which also hits us all hard in tough times, and finally, it temporarily halts deductions for business losses - what incentive is there to start or to continue a business if you're going to be essentially "taxed" on the loss? Most businesses have a loss for at least the first year, if not the first few. Most importantly: this budget does NOTHING to stop the overspending in Sacramento. It's not a revenue problem; it's a spending problem. We simply cannot afford to give everybody everything they want; things must be cut. End of story.

[Solve not pass]

VETO it! those so called law-makers joking us around, put our money in tolit year after year. They pass the budget simple becase they fear about the comming election. We need solve the problem once and for all!

[Jeronimo Banuelos]

We should all be blaming ourselves for this budget delay. A couple of years ago there was a ballot measure that would have held legislatures and the governor accountable and would have not allow them to take any vacation or time off and would have withheld their pay until the budget was passed, but voters rejected it.