By Arnold's Bedside

Gov. Arnold Schwarznegger's staff, eager to show the governor hasn't been incapacitated by his surgery to repair a femur fractured on the slopes, has issued a statement from the governor and a few "action" photos of him working from his hospital bed.

Today I woke up feeling great and I am back at work. From the hospital I am preparing for my State of the State address, meeting with members of my staff and working on the state budget. I am also looking forward to my inauguration to a second term as your Governor - even if it means I have to walk into my swearing-in ceremony on crutches. Over the past few days I have received so many phone calls and notes wishing me a speedy recovery. Thank you for your thoughts and prayers.

-- Jordan Rau

A Pole in One

Turns out Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's skiing mishap, in which he fractured his right femur, wasn't so glamorous. Schwarzenegger's press operation isn't releasing any details, but the Times' Peter Nicholas tracked down an eyewitness:

Adi Erber, a ski instructor who was with the governor at the time of the accident, said that Schwarzenegger was standing still, preparing for the final 200 yards of the run on Bald Mountain in Sun Valley, Idaho. The governor's ski pole got caught in one of his skis, causing him to trip and fall.

Erber described it as a "freak accident.''

He said the governor was in pain, and that a rescue team took him down the hill on a toboggan. Schwarzenegger was then taken to the hospital for X-rays.

The two men, accompanied by security guards, had been skiing for about two hours prior to the accident, Erber said.

"It was the last run down,'' Erber said. "He was trying to take off again and he tripped.''

Erber, a fellow Austrian, said that skiing is one of Schwarzenegger's favorite sports, and predicted that once the governor's leg heals he would be back at it.

"I've skied with him for 18 years,'' he said. "He's an expert skier.''

He added that the governor "will be back in shape in no time. And I'm sure he will ski again.''

-- Jordan Rau

Schwarzenegger surgery is successful, his office says

The governor's doctor says Schwarzenegger is awake and alert after the 90-minute surgery this morning to mend his broken leg. He'll remain in the hospital for three days.

Here's the statement from Dr. Kevin Ehrhart:

At 9:45 this morning our surgical team, consisting of myself, two assistant surgeons, an anesthesiologist and two nurses, completed a successful open reduction internal fixation on the upper part of Governor Schwarzenegger's thigh bone. The surgery involved using cables and screws to wire the two main fragments of the Governor's broken femur bone back together. It lasted approximately an hour an a half, was without complication, and the post-operation x-rays look great.

Following the surgery, the Governor was awake, alert and talking in the recovery room. He is now fully coherent and I have cleared him to resume his duties as Governor. The Governor will remain in the hospital for three days, as is standard for this type of operation. Recovery will take approximately eight weeks and I expect the Governor to fully recover. The Governor is not in a cast and will use crutches to walk while his leg heals.

Here's the written comment from First Lady Maria Shriver:

When we checked Arnold into the hospital on Christmas night he was looking forward to his surgery. He has been in good spirits. He asked when he could get back to work and he's looking forward to his inauguration next week. Our children and I are grateful for everyone's support and prayers.

-- Jordan Rau

Arnold Goes Under the Knife while Cruz Takes the Helm (Ever So Briefly)

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is to undergo surgery Tuesday to repair his right femur, which he fractured while skiing Saturday.

This is the statement issued by orthopedic surgeon Dr. Kevin Ehrhart on Monday:

First thing tomorrow morning, our team will repair the Governor's fractured right femur by performing an open reduction internal fixation on the upper part of the thigh bone.  This relatively common surgery involves using orthopedic cables and screws to help the bone heal. 

Governor Schwarzenegger will be put under general anesthesia for no longer than two hours and the surgery should last less than two hours.  As is standard for this type of surgery, the Governor will be kept for observation for three days.  The Governor will use crutches following the surgery and recovery will take approximately eight weeks.

I have spoken to the Governor several times since the skiing accident occurred and he is very comfortable. The Governor has already been admitted to the hospital for standard pre-operation procedures and I am confident he will have a speedy recovery from this routine surgery."

While Schwarzenegger is under general anesthesia, Lt. Governor Cruz Bustamante will serve as acting Governor.

-- Jordan Rau

Arnold's Early Christmas Present: A Fractured Femur

Schwarzenegger broke his leg while skiing Saturday. Here's the 411 about the 911 from Adam Mendelsohn, the governor's spokesman:

This morning while skiing with his family in Sun Valley, Idaho, Governor Schwarzenegger suffered a fracture to his right femur. After the accident the Governor was taken to a local hospital for X-rays and was soon discharged. He is currently at his home in Sun Valley, Idaho, with his family. When the Governor returns to Los Angeles from his scheduled Christmas trip, he will have surgery to repair his femur.  No one else was involved in the skiing accident.

The Times story Saturday night fills in the background:

The femur, the long leg bone between the pelvis and the knee, is considered one of the strongest bones in the human body.

Schwarzenegger is well known in Sun Valley, and has led a traditional Christmas Eve torchlight parade on the local mountains. A mogul-filled ski run there is named Arnold's Run in his honor.

Schwarzenegger has often ducked out to the ski haven in the Sawtooth Mountains, which has become a de facto hideaway for politicians and silver-screen stars. John F. Kerry snowboarded there during his presidential run and locals have spotted Demi Moore, Bruce Willis, Clint Eastwood and Jamie Lee Curtis in town or on the slopes.

-- Jordan Rau

A firm connection in global warming

When the Schwarzenegger administration this week announced the 14 members of the Market Advisory Committee, a new panel created to help the California Air Resources Board enact this year's Global Warming Solutions Act, there were a slew of details about the chairman:

Winston Hickox is former Secretary of the California Environmental Protection Agency. As Secretary of Cal/EPA, Hickox was instrumental in the enactment of legislation requiring new greenhouse gas emission standards for cars. He also established the Environmental Protection Indicators for California, and led the implementation of Environmental Justice legislation in California. Since July of 2004, Hickox has been employed by CalPERS, the California Public Employees’ Retirement System, as a Senior Portfolio Manager. He has assisted with the design and implementation of a series of Environmental Investment Initiatives, including investments in clean technology, and other investment initiatives focused on the impacts of climate change. Hickox currently serves on the Sacramento County Employees’ Retirement System Board, as well as the Boards of the following NGOs: the California League of Conservation Voters, Audubon California, and the Sustainable Conservation Boards. Hickox has a BS in Business Administration from Cal State University Sacramento, and an MBA from Golden Gate University.

One pertinent biographical detail, however, was left out: Hickox is a partner at California Strategies, the uber-influential government consulting, PR and lobbying firm founded by Bob White, the former chief of staff to Pete Wilson.

BreAnda Northcutt, a spokeswoman for Cal EPA, said Hickox's current employment "certainly wasn't omitted with maliciousness," but that the lengthly bios of all the members had to be edited down so that only the most directly relevant experiences were included. Hickox said he was "not at all hesitant" to have California Strategies mentioned. He says he will be working on the firm's "existing book of business" and otherwise will concentrate on helping institutional investors learn from and replicate what California's public pension funds have done in terms of using their capital to address climate change issues.

Interestingly, California Strategies is in merger talks with another player in a major government endeavor: Smith, Watts & Co., whose partners D.J. Smith and Mark Watts are two of the biggest consultants and lobbyists on transportation issues in Sacramento. (The firm's former partner, Will Kempton, is director of Caltrans.) They helped design and get approved by voters this year's $20 billion transportation bond package. Now that it has passed, the state is going to have a huge influx of new money to be divvied up for roads, bridges, public transit systems and ports.

So with these two moves, California Strategies soon will include people with great connections and expertise concerning two of the biggest ventures the state of California is undertaking. We can already hear the clients queuing up at the door.

-- Jordan Rau

Schwarzenegger hires a new press secretary

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has a new press secretary. He is Aaron McLear, a 29-year-old spokesman who was the Republican National Committee responsible for the northeast section of the country.

McLear replaces Margita Thompson, who left to go to work for HealthNet. Though the job is a pressure cooker, it should be pleasant compared to some of McLear's recent gigs. It couldn't have been very fun, after all, to watch the Republican Party lose some of its few remaining moderates in the Northeast, like U.S. Rep. Sue Kelly of New York and Sen. Lincoln Chaffee of Rhode Island. (You know a Republican campaign season sucks when your biggest victory is the re-election of moderate Democrat Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut.)

Before the RNC, McLear was communications director for President Bush's Ohio campaign. He came there from the press shop of Ohio GOP Gov. Bob Taft, a.k.a. the first governor in that state to be convicted on criminal charges. McLear told Kate Folmar at the Mercury News that he is excited to work for a ""new kind of leader, who is very inspiring, with a sense of bipartisanship that is very unusual.''

Steve Maviglio, the Democratic Assembly's communications director and a quick-witted blogger at the California Majority Report, welcomes McLear with this tidbit from the past: while in college McLear was the "Brutus" mascot for the Ohio State Buckeyes.

“When the crowd rushed the field they put me on their shoulders and passed me around,” McLear told the student newspaper, the Lantern, in 1999. 

Funny, that's just the way the Capitol press corps treats press secretaries!

-- Jordan Rau

Lawmakers' Excellent Adventure with Chevron and GM

Global warming has some upsides apparently, at least for state lawmakers who participated in an "International Study Travel Project to South America" hosted by the California Foundation on the Environment and the Economy, a nonprofit group whose members include utility, labor and business leaders.

The November trip drew criticism because it gave a number of corporate executives -- including ones working for Pacific Gas & Electric, Southern California Edison, Sempra Energy, Comcast and Chevron (all members of the foundation) -- lots of quality time with some of the Capitol's biggest players: Schwarzenegger's chief of staff Susan Kennedy, Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez and Stephen Larson, executive director of the California Public Utilities Commission.

The Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights obtained via the state's public records law the itinerary for the trip, and it turns out it wasn't all schoolbooks and lectures. The foundation reported that:

According to the records, the tour ... included only two full working days and four days in which meetings were over by noon.. Much of the time was set aside for city tours and free time at high-end resorts in Brazil, Argentina and Chile, for which the politicians and lobbyists on the trip were recommended to pack “a swimsuit and comfortable hiking/walking shoes as it is heading into summer in South America…”

The itinerary is on pages 5 through 11 of the records. But in fairness to the participants, it wasn't all fun and play. There was the lunch hosted by Chevron Brazil, followed by two hours of briefings by Chevron employees; the briefing/dinner hosted by General Motors at the Copacabana Palace (reception in the Pool Room and dinner at Pergula restaurant); and what must have been the most malodorous part of the trip: the "Briefing/Tour Swine Farm" in Rio de Janeiro.

-- Jordan Rau

The Holiday Spirit, Kaufman style

Not everyone in the Capitol has abandoned their hard feelings about Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's 2005 "year of reform" effort to strip unions and lawmakers of much of their power. Gale Kaufman, the Democratic consultant who masterminded the campaign that tanked Schwarzenegger's special election, has put out a little negative ad of her own in the form of her office holiday card this year:

That's Kaufman's son playing the Alex Trebek role and her two stepsons, Michael and Sean Murakami, playing the contestants who know the "right" answer. We're not sure who the other kid is but he has pretty lighthearted parents to allow Gale to set up their child as the dunce by giving the wrong answer.

As politicians like to say, children are the future: the future of negative advertising.

-- Jordan Rau

About Schmidt

His work done in California, Schwarzenegger reelection campaign manager Steve Schmidt is onto another loose cannon. The Washington Post reports that Schmidt will be working as a senior adviser to the presidential campaign of U.S. Sen. John McCain. Er, make that McCain's exploratory committee. The maverick Republican senator hasn't yet announced his candidacy.

Schmidt, who helped send W. back to the White House in 2004, had the job of keeping our sometimes overly candid governor on message and above the fray throughout the campaign. Rarely did the governor utter a nasty word about opponent Phil Angelides. He left it to Schmidt's team to put the venom in electronic missives with such titles as "Typical Phil."

And for this Schmidt was paid handsomely. Some $333,750 in less than a year. Of course, he was just one of many Arnold confidants to rake in large amounts of campaign bucks. Others include "Terminator 3" stunt double Dieter Rauter, paid $62,000 to use a hand-held video camera to film Schwarzenegger starring in his role as governor. No word yet on whether any presidential contenders are courting Rauter.

-- Evan Halper