"The Arnold takes them all" by George Will

The Arnold takes them all by George Will:

"Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican populist, practices what Leon Trotsky preached � permanent revolution. He is in perpetual campaign mode, wielding his celebrity and theatricality to keep the Legislature nervous about being bypassed by lawmaking-by-referendum, a constitutional weapon that is a Hiram Johnson legacy.

If Schwarzenegger successfully employs the plebiscitary mechanism this year, he will approach re-election next year ranked among the state's most transformative governors. And ripples raised by the boulders he is throwing into this nation-state's political pool will roll eastward across the country.

If all four measures go to the ballot — ‘‘the train,'' Schwarzenegger says, ‘‘has already left the station"; the process ‘‘is on automatic pilot'' — he expects opponents to spend a combined $200 million. He plans to raise $50 million and believes that if he is outspent by only four to one, he will win. His confidence approaches mysticism. Extending an arm, his palm toward his face and his fingers curved as though holding an invisible orb, he says ingenuously, ‘‘If I can see it" — any goal — ‘‘I can achieve it. And I have the ability to see it."

He sees California's political system reopened, like concrete cracked by a jackhammer, and sees the state's social system reinvigorated by an economy liberated. ‘‘The world,'' says this man who is used to being looked at, ‘‘is looking at us.'' Come November, the nation certainly will be."