Posted on 07/24/2006 10:11:36 PM PDT by Aussie Dasher
It seems Arnold Schwarzenegger can’t get enough of the liberals.
From expanded health-care programs at grade school levels to lowering health-care costs and reducing the number of uninsured Californians, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is wooing liberal voters. He has also heaped praise on Al Gore's global warming movie, which should serve the Republican governor well in this otherwise eco-centric, deep blue state.
Facing state Treasurer Phil Angelides, his ultra-liberal opponent in the November election, Schwarzenegger is casting his net in a leftward direction.
The Los Angeles Times reports that Schwarzenegger aides say the governor is seeking to respond to critics who charge him with failing to come up with substantial remedies for his state's health-care problems by such moves as proposing new medical clinics in as many as 500 elementary schools.
The move would add to the 140 campus facilities that are already in place helping uninsured children. His critics are calling his proposal an election-year stunt.
"We have too many uninsured people in California," Schwarzenegger stated at a news conference last Friday. "There are still a lot of children uninsured."
The new clinics would be built on school grounds and offer basic services such as immunizations. Some could also provide mental health or dental services. Bigger clinics could include labs and pharmacies and offer treatment for adults as well as children.
Aides said Schwarzenegger would introduce the idea at a health-care conference that his office organized in Los Angeles.
On Sunday, Angelides told the Times he "welcomed the debate" with Schwarzenegger on health care. But he said the governor has been absent on the issue and "should be charged with political malpractice."
The Times notes that Schwarzenegger's plan could put him at odds with some fellow Republicans, pointing out that religious conservatives, in particular, have opposed school clinics as a potential source of birth control for teenagers.
Lowering health-care costs and reducing the number of uninsured Californians will be top priorities for Schwarzenegger in 2007, if he's re-elected according, to the San Jose Mercury News, which reported that he convened an invitation-only summit today to pick the brains of labor leaders, business executives, and elected officials.
The governor's staff said the gathering at the University of California-Los Angeles won't end with a comprehensive solution for the nearly 7 million Californians who lack health care.
The Mercury News said that critics have dismissed the summit as an election-year stunt from a man they charge has killed a raft of Democrat-sponsored health proposals since taking office in 2003, an allegation his aides dispute, claiming that the governor "cares passionately" about covering more people and lowering health-care costs.
"The intent here is to begin a dialogue," his health secretary, Kim Belshé told the Mercury News. "The summit is not intended to solve a very complicated problem in one day," she added.
On Saturday, Belshé announced that the Schwarzenegger administration now supports a drug-discount plan for 5 million Californians who earn up to three times the federal poverty level, $60,000 for a family of four.
The newspaper said that drug companies that did not volunteer discounts of 40 percent on brand name medicines and 60 percent on generics within five years would risk being shut out of the state's multibillion-dollar Medi-Cal program for the poor.
In the past, the governor has supported only voluntary drug discount plans, as opposed to ones with sanctions. The governor's proposal is similar to a plan liberal legislative Democrats are pushing, except the Democrats would cover more people and slap sanctions on recalcitrant drug companies two years sooner, according to the Mercury News.
In an obvious bow to liberal environmentalists, Schwarzenegger wooed a San Francisco audience last week when he said he "loved" former Vice President Al Gore's controversial movie on global warming, "An Inconvenient Truth," according to the Sacramento Bee.
He told the Commonwealth Club of California that Gore is right in issuing warnings about global warming, and added that he liked Gore's presentation of facts and figures, adding that he usually falls asleep during movies he watches late at night.
This one apparently kept him awake.
I can't wait for McCain to hit the road as well with the Gubby.
Angelides versus Schwarzenegger... battle of the Kalifornia liberals. LMAO
I may have to sit this one out.
Don't forget to vote for McClintock for Lt. Gov.
next step before running for governor in 2010.
It says a lot about Arnold that he wants to "woo" liberals and therefore jam a knife in the backs of normal, decent, taxpaying families. I couldn't care less what happens to Arnold's reelection chances at this point. What a huge disappointment he turned out to be.
I'm not disappointed - I wasn't expecting anything better.
well if everyone who said they were gonna vote for McClintock in 2003 had actually voted for him;
we wouldn't be in the mess we're in now!
The pragmatic answer seems pretty clear to me. I'm not saying it's the right answer, just the pragmatic one.
put yourself in his size 12's,imagine trying to survive as governor with a 99% liberal legislature and a 70% liberal voter block,all considered he is doing as well as any one could do in this socialist atocracy of California.
Vote for McClintock
AMEN,....and if the Wilson controlled backstabbing pork barel dipping California Republican Party would have done the right thing and stood behind McClintock.......
I know,I know, now comes the chorus of "but McClintock didn't have a chance" ......
yep, the same sky is falling chorus we're getting from the poll watchers over the Irey campaign against Murtha, "but Irey might lose,I don't want my $25 campaign contribution to go to waste"
ROFL! I think that would be the Pom-Pom list and it probably applies only to flattering propaganda put out by the campaign team. This definitely wouldn't apply.
How the heck are we going to reel this guy in?
Toomey-Specter... same script. :-)
He's worse than I expected, and I didn't expect much to begin with.
I have written several times that Arnolds politics are neither conservative nor liberal; they are Austrian. He would be slightly right of center in his country of birth, but would fit in perfectly. He is a free-market environmentalist with a nasty penchant for programs that benefit the common good.
Oddly this makes him perfect for California. A lot of true conservatives in California seem to want a genuine conservative who cannot get elected. That I find strange.
You find it strange that people want someone who stands on pricinpals? What good does it do to elect someone who is 180 degrees opposite of everything you believe in? If the conservative can't get elected we are no worse off with a dem then we are with a RINO(worse than RINO)like Arnold in office.
I will vote for real conservatices every time, even if I never see a candidate put into office because I refuse to compromise my beliefs, what's the use of having political views if you are going to say "what the hey, this guy can't get elected anyway!".
That is called surrendering and goes well in fRance but doesn't set well with most freedom loving peoples. A vote for what you believe in is never a wasted vote. To think otherwise means giving up and surrendering.
Actually you are 100% wrong. Your beliefs are essentially the same as a fanatic. You are totally unwilling to compromise and as a result will always lose.
A situation in which no compromise is necessary is not a democracy. Democracies move in baby steps. California is very far left, so the closest you will get to a conservative is a RINO. Realistically he is not as far to the left as his competition, thus make him, relatively speaking on the right.
Your attitude ensures your defeat, or at least your irrelevance which is just the same thing.
Moreover, if you fail to assist in striking a balance to pendulum may eventually swing to far and then they will come and get you. And that, my friend, will be your ultimate destruction.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.