I grew up in a rough part of town. You had to look out for yourself. Early on my big brother taught me the rules of the neighborhood.

"Never hit a guy when he’s down," he said. "Kick him—it saves bending."

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has been beaten and bloodied in November’s election. All four of his anti-worker ballot propositions went down for the count. In fact, every measure on the ballot in his "special" election was defeated (see story page 5), emphasizing what a useless waste of money it was.

Still, Schwarzenegger had his reasons—he was going for the union movement’s jugular. There was no mercy or restraint in his program. But a funny thing happened on the way to the ballot box. The workers rose up, roped that dope and emerged more powerful than ever. If Hollywood were to make this movie, it could only be called "Pumping Irony."

The labor movement has flexed its muscle and pinned the Austrian body builder. Although he’s been taken down, he still needs to be taken out—like the garbage.

Schwarzenegger is reeling and George W. Bush would be too if he wasn’t too dizzy-brained to know the difference. What with the Iraq War disaster, the Katrina disaster, the CIA spy leak scandal, the House majority leader Tom DeLay scandal, and indictments happening all over Washington, D.C., Republicans are running scared in all directions, scattering like cockroaches when the kitchen light is turned on.

It all comes directly out of what is known in Greek tragedy as "hubris," the pride before the fall, the belief that you are so on top of your game that you’re invulnerable. You can do any outrageous thing without consequences because, dude, you rule!

You can terminate organized workers. You can bomb countries into submission. You can redraw the political map of a state or an entire region on the other side of the world. Or not.

Already Schwarzenegger has moved on to Plan B, moved to reinvent himself. Now he’s changed from confrontation to cooperation. Now he wants to work with Democrats in the legislature and with unions. He’s proposing a massive bond measure to fund long-needed transportation infrastructure and "goods movement" projects, an issue dear to the ILWU.

While the union will do its best to take advantage of the new emphasis on infrastructure, it won’t likely be seduced by the new, nice-guy Arnold. He’s just pulling the old "bait und svitch." But we’ve seen his true colors and we know we’ll see them again if he gets elected for another four years. We must never forgive or forget.

While Napoleon Bonaparte’s advice to never interrupt your enemy while he’s making mistakes has its kernels of truth, so does the 1960s slogan "If you don’t hit it, it won’t fall." We can’t just watch and hope the Republicans self-destruct. Sometimes a good push is in order. That’s why right now I tend toward my brother’s strategy—we gotta kick ’em while they’re down.

—Steve Stallone
               Editor