With his poll numbers sagging, California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said on September 16 that he will seek reelection next year.

With his poll numbers sagging, California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said on September 16 that he will seek reelection next year. His announcement was timed to boost a package of budget, school, and election-reform proposals that so far haven't generated much enthusiasm but will appear on a statewide ballot in November. Although these measures are not nearly as aggressive as they might have been, they have antagonized California's powerful public-employee unions, which already have spent millions to defeat them, and now they will be viewed as a referendum on Schwarzenegger's tenure. The same may also be said of Proposition 75, a "paycheck protection" initiative that would require unions to receive permission from workers before spending their dues on politics. Schwarzenegger isn't the driving force behind it--as he is behind the other proposals but he did endorse it. Separately, the governor got an unexpected boost from Sacramento lawmakers when they approved a bill recognizing gay marriage, despite the wishes of an electorate that overwhelmingly voted to ban gay marriage five years ago. California's Democrat-dominated state legislature is now the first in the nation to embrace marriage as something other than a union between a man and a woman. (Massachusetts enacted gay marriage through judicial decree; its legislators merely have declined to object). Schwarzenegger has promised a veto, and because of this it's possible for him to say that the only thing preventing gay marriage from becoming a reality in California is a Republican governor. As he prepares for his political comeback, that's not a bad message.