Vetoes

This had been Sacramento's lost year, a stretch marked by a budget meltdown and hyper-partisan rancor, mass veto threats and mounting public distrust of state government as usual. But as the curtain dropped, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger performed as he has for half a dozen years in office: predictably unpredictable. After threatening a mass veto to spur a big water deal, the governor reversed course, revved up his ballpoint pen and signed a surprising slate of legislation. It included bills he had vetoed in the past and a flurry of measures that steered sharply away from the socially conservative Republican base the governor has rarely embraced.

So you wanted to keep up with the Legislature this year but got distracted? Don't worry. Anything important gets replayed or rescinded during the session's final week, which begins Tuesday. In the works are some good resolutions (domestic violence funding) and some bad ones (another bid at offshore oil drilling). In our last episode, the state Senate approved drilling off the Santa Barbara coast to help balance the shrinking budget, then adjourned. The Assembly rejected the drilling plan, expunged the record to shield members' votes from public scrutiny, passed a budget that didn't match the Senate version, sent it to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and left town.