Governor Schwarzenegger got creamed the other night as he struggled to read through his commencement address at Santa Monica College.
He was hooted, hollered at, shouted down, jeered, heckled, spurned, booed and pooh-poohed from the first line of his fifteen minute sermon right down to his closing words.
Click here to read my full first-hand report on the Governator’s oratorical debacle.
Suffice it to say that when Schwarzenegger finished reading his script he had to be hustled away in a golf court lest his presence continue to further disrupt the graduation ceremony which still had another half hour to go.
Mostly, I had to wonder just how far out of touch with political reality has the Governor and his become?
His Santa Monica appearance came barely a day after he ordered a special election for November 8th which will feature several of his “reform” initiatives: a spending cap opposed by local and county governments; a delay in granting teacher tenure opposed, well, yes by teachers and students and parents; and a redistricting plan opposed by both Republicans and Democrats.
And then you wonder why Arnold’s popularity ratings have plummeted to about half his one-time high of 70%?
No surprise, then, that Arnold completely avoided touching on any of the political issues raised by the special balloting he will impose. I mean, how do you make the case – especially to an audience at an under funded community college—that the welfare of Kollyfornia somehow depends on making it harder for public school teachers to hang onto their jobs?
So it was a quarter-hour of fizzed-out bromides that the Governor discharged while the crowd jeered on. He closed out his soggy talk with this admonition on traveling the road to success: “Remember one thing --There’s only one obstacle: you and your mind.” That’s some good advice that the Governor himself ought to take some time to ponder as he blindly pushes the state toward an unwanted and unnecessary $100 million showdown. The world of trouble Arnold finds himself in today is purely of his own construction.