FROM SACRAMENTO — California's Capitol has been shrouded in fog -- literally and figuratively. The literal fog is seasonal and can smother the Central Valley for days on end this time of year. The figurative fog is year-round.
Both types are a curse. They depress moods, hamper vision and are characterized by denseness.
The literal fog is called tule fog, and it is created on the ground. The figurative fog develops in the mind and results in zombie-like repetitive rhetoric and actions -- sort of like in the movie "Groundhog Day."
You remember how the Bill Murray character, the TV weatherman jerk, keeps repeating the same day over and over until he finally reexamines his life and priorities and transforms himself.
Our legislators -- mainly Republicans, but Democrats too -- keep replaying the same budget battle, sounding the same bugle calls and going nowhere. In fact, the going keeps getting tougher.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger announced Wednesday that the projected deficit for the current fiscal year has risen to $14.8 billion, based on a $103-billion general fund budget. That's up from $11.2 billion in early November.
The governor accused the Legislature of "playing chicken" to see "who blinks first" -- Republicans on tax increases or Democrats on spending cuts and GOP "reform" demands. But Democrats already have given substantially on cuts, whacking the aged, blind and disabled, for starters.
Schwarzenegger implored legislators at a news conference " to be leaders . . . to compromise . . . to come to a conclusion here and solve this financial problem once for all."
But the lawmakers are not even close to uniting behind a strategy to rescue state government from free-falling off a cliff.
To be fair, this is not the total fault of a dysfunctional Legislature. It's because California is one of the few states that foolishly require a two-thirds legislative vote for passage of a budget or tax increase. That leads to minority tyranny and gridlock.
Last time I checked, Schwarzenegger still swore allegiance to the two-thirds hurdle that is the principal cause of the legislative inaction, a standoff that he said Wednesday is heading the state toward "a financial Armageddon." With a majority vote, the governor still could veto anything the Legislature sent him.
