During the campaign, Arnold Schwarzenegger didn't want to tell us what he'd try to do to balance Kulli-fornia's budget. Now we know why:

Welfare-to-work grants, therapy for developmentally disabled people and projects to relieve traffic congestion would all take cuts under a proposal that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger plans to submit to the Legislature today.

...It would impose a 10 percent reduction on the rates paid to physicians and others who treat Medi-Cal patients, the state's version of Medicaid. That's on top of a 5 percent cut in this year's budget….

(The article goes on to note that “California already has the lowest [Medicaid] provider rates in the nation, which has made it difficult for some recipients to find doctors.”)

...Schwarzenegger also would cut state payments to long-term care facilities that increased the salaries and benefits of caregivers.

…In what's likely to be one of the more controversial proposals, the governor would put a cap on caseloads in various health and social service programs and establish waiting lists. Healthy Families, a fast-growing health care program for children in low-income families, drug assistance for AIDS patients, the regional centers and several other programs would be subject to the caseload limit....

Schwarzenegger proposes a 5 percent reduction in grants to people in CalWORKS, the state's welfare-to-work program….

The proposal cuts outreach programs at the state's university systems, as well as making unspecified cuts of $18.4 million to the University of California and $13.4 million to California State University, as well as bigger reductions in the 2004-05 fiscal year.

(As Atrios notes, this means Schwarzenegger's campaign promise not to make education cuts was a lie.)

…Schwarzenegger would call a halt to projects to relieve traffic congestion….

Assemblywoman Jenny Oropeza, the chair of the state assembly budget committee, said this:

"I don't see a lot of new stuff in here. It's ugly stuff. ... I sure don't see the waste, fraud and abuse they said they'd root out."

Yeah, this isn't fresh thinking from a political outsider -- it’s GOP business as usual. A Republican with a normal-size neck probably would have produced exactly the same laundry list.