I'm trying to reconcile these two stories in my mind--and I can't.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger isn't waiting to press the Obama administration on one of California's top priorities - regulating greenhouse gas emissions from automobiles.
The Republican governor sent a letter Wednesday to the new president asking him to give California and other states permission to implement tough tailpipe-emission standards.
"Your administration has a unique opportunity to both support the pioneering leadership of these states and move America toward global leadership on addressing climate change," Schwarzenegger said in his letter.
Story 2:
Ten days remain before California will begin defaulting on its obligations.
The state is spending so much money that Governor Schwarzenegger could fire every single California civil servant and still not come close to balancing the budget! Even if he also fired the other 149,000 legislative aides and people who work for the state’s courts or university systems (people not directly under the state’s control), he still couldn’t eliminate the deficit.
Environmental regulations increase costs. That may not be a bad thing, if the benefits of decreasing the environmental impact exceed those costs. But many of those benefits are nonmarketed benefits: that is, nonrevenue generating. Doesn't that undermine the more immediate goal of fiscal solvency for the state? Or am I missing something obvious? Maybe this is why I'm not in politics. That and my morbid fear of being judged by others.
