Honeymoon over for Arnie

Most politicians would regard a 17-month honeymoon as an unimaginable gift from the heavens.

But in the case of Arnold Schwarzenegger, whose aura of invincibility has been part of his formidable public image since he first ran for Governor of California, the end of the honeymoon is not only proving a letdown, it is rapidly transforming him from public hero to public enemy and raising urgent questions about whether he has a political future at all.

Having campaigned two years ago as "the people's Governor", Schwarzenegger now faces a barrage of opposition from large numbers of those very same people who voted for him so enthusiastically - nurses, firefighters, teachers, parents, recent immigrants - almost all of whom he has managed to alienate through ill-chosen words or over-provocative policy prescriptions.

On Tuesday, the Governor's staff were furiously back-tracking from a speech Schwarzenegger gave to a newspaper association convention in San Francisco, in which he urged the federal Government to "close the borders" with Mexico to put an end to illegal immigration.

This statement put him considerably to the right of President George W. Bush, who has proved quite progressive when it comes to managing and protecting the immigrant labour force.

But the remark was also widely interpreted as pandering to an extreme, quasi-racist position entirely out of step with the Californian mainstream. The fact that Schwarzenegger himself is an immigrant did not help matters.

This was only the latest gaffe or gratuitously insulting remark Schwarzenegger has made in public recently. The state's nurses are still fuming at his vow to "kick their butts" because they want to increase nurse-to-patient ratios.

The state's Democrats, who run most things outside of the Governor's office, have broken off their once cosy relationship with him, not least because he accused them last year of being "girlie men".

Worse, in his efforts to rein in California's runaway budget deficits, Schwarzenegger has proposed cuts that not only damage the interests of his Democratic Party rivals - principally, public sector unions - but also eat into his own support base.

Parents who remember him pledging to protect education at all costs are appalled at a proposal to gut one of the main planks of the state's school spending infrastructure - effectively slashing resources for schools at a time when California is already near the bottom of the national heap in educational services.

Schwarzenegger's approach on spending has been to propose draconian measures and then challenge the Democrat-controlled legislature to pass them, with the threat that if they don't he will go straight to the people and use his personal charisma to win the argument in a public referendum.

But that strategy is now backfiring. Schwarzenegger has talked about calling a special election at the end of this year to try to ram through a series of anti-union measures - privatising the state pension system, stripping teachers of some of their tenure privileges, and so on.

Not only have these proposed measures appalled public opinion - Schwarzenegger's once sky-high approval rating has dipped below 50 per cent - but the whole idea has come under fire because the special election would cost the state US$70 million at a time when every belt is being tightened.

California's Democrats are starting to smell blood, and revelled in anti-Arnold rhetoric at a state convention last weekend. Both Schwarzenegger and his wife, Maria Shriver, have dropped hints that he might not seek re-election next year.

"He's attacking firefighters, nurses, teachers and cops," read a banner draped over the convention floor. "Are you next?"

Schwarzenegger is, however, a consummate political player and it would be a mistake to write him off too quickly. The great unmentioned issue looming over his budget fights is taxation.

As a classically Republican fiscal conservative, he is refusing to be the first person to propose raising taxes - historically the way that even Republican Governors have resolved California's cashflow problems.

The Democrats in the state legislature, meanwhile, are reluctant to propose tax increases, first because they risk being unpopular, and second because they are having way too much fun watching Governor Schwarzenegger squirm.

By the end of the northern summer, however, someone in this game of chicken is going to have to back down.

At which point the political calculus will change all over again, and Governor Schwarzenegger - perhaps chastened, perhaps robbed of some of his previous aura - could well rise again.

- INDEPENDENT