Steve Lopez - A Car Dealer's Kind of Governor

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-lopez21nov21,1,4352962.column?coll=la-headlines-california

A Car Dealer's Kind of Governor
Steve Lopez

November 21, 2003

We knew he was a man of many talents, but Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was a knockout Thursday in a new role:

San Fernando Valley car salesman.

"Go out there. Buy cars," Schwarzenegger implored a few hundred disciples at Galpin Ford on Roscoe Boulevard in North Hills.

New car, used car, any car. Just buy a car, said the governor, and enjoy the benefit of the vehicle tax reduction he enacted Monday, his first day in office.

Galpin owner H.F. Boeckmann and his wife, Jane, pumped $42,400 into Schwarzenegger's gubernatorial campaign, and Mr. Boeckmann kicked in an additional $10,000 for his inaugural.

"I think you've got an odd way of looking at it," Boeckmann said when I asked how this was any different from the pay-to-play politics of ousted Gov. Gray Davis.

But Court had bigger concerns than that. Auto dealers statewide funneled roughly half a million dollars to Schwarzenegger. Then, on his first day in office, Schwarzenegger dumped DMV chief Steve Gourley, who had a reputation for cracking down hard on auto financing scams.

"I got a call at about 3:10 in the afternoon" from a Schwarzenegger staffer, said Gourley, who was asked to clear out his office by the end of the day. Gourley, who was having throat surgery the next day, said he didn't know if he could get his things together on such short notice.

"Stay late," he was told. Then make yourself history.

Californians simply don't know what they are facing, now that the gropenator has dispensed with the car tax. That $4 billion has now been added to an already bloated budget deficit there and the groper has no plan in place on how to replace it. This is what Jim Gilmore got elected on here in VA and it absolutely ruined this state financially. And there was no way anyone was going to put it back in place - political suicide. But someone should ask the groper where Gilmore is now??? Just another horses ass on the road to nowhere.

Enjoy those new cars now, folks - because down that road, you are all in for a very rude awakening.

People may not be paying more in a car fee
but will in other ways.

the sky in North Hills was lit up so brightly last night?
(I live near Galpin)

If I had known, I would have gone over and heckled ....