Hoffmania!

Whoa Now

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's plane made an emergency landing Friday evening because of smoke in the cockpit.

The jet was about 10 minutes away from landing at the Santa Monica Airport when the pilot reported smoke coming from an instrument panel, Schwarzenegger spokesman Aaron McLear said in a statement.

The pilot made a "quick, steep, but safe landing" at 6:23 p.m. at Van Nuys Airport in the San Fernando Valley, McLear said.

City fire crews met the jet on the runway. There were no flames and no one was injured.

Schwarzenegger tweeted about the incident, calling it "a little adventure," and posting a link to a photo of the jet parked on the runway on his Twitter feed.

He'll Be On Leno This Fall to Announce He's Quitting

My big question: So what's Darrell Issa going to do NOW? Another recall to oust Schwarzenegger? Doubtful.

The economic cornerstone of Arnold's campaign in the Issa-launched recall election was taxing the Indian casinos. After that, he got a little lost.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger wanted to permanently fix California's "broken budget system." But three times now he has tried and failed to smooth out the state's roller coaster revenues.

Voters on Tuesday resoundingly rejected his latest effort, a package of budget-balancing measures that he promised would provide a short-term patch for the current financial crisis and prevent further catastrophe in the future.

Instead, he now faces a $21.3 billion budget deficit and a budget system that has not changed a bit since he took office nearly six years ago.

"I think he's discovered that this job is a lot harder than he anticipated in a state of economic downturn," Treasurer Bill Lockyer said Tuesday of the governor who came into office in 2003 promising to "end the crazy deficit spending."