Governor Schwarzenegger commutes daily from Sacramento to L.A.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who once joked that Sacramento was "death," apparently doesn't want to spend many nights in the graveyard.

As the Los Angeles Times reported last week, the governor has been spending nearly every night in his Brentwood mansion, shuttling between Sacramento and Southern California in his private jet.

The governor uses his own money to pay for his Gulfstream flights, which price out at about $10,000 an hour, the Times reports.

And what about the cost to the environment? The governor's staff says he purchases "carbon credits." Such credits are aimed at offsetting the greenhouse gases generated by his flights but do nothing about the particulates and smog-forming compounds they spew into the air.

Obviously, this green-leaning governor (pictured last year on the cover of Newsweek with a globe on his finger) is sensitive about the apparent hypocrisy of his daily jet-setting.

Yet he said in an interview that he needs to spend more time with his family, and thus is spending fewer nights at a penthouse at the Hyatt.

"I just don't have a home in Sacramento," Schwarzenegger said to the Times.

"The question is how can I be with my family, because that is extremely important, to be with my kids. They are all growing up. They are in their teens. They need their father around. … I felt it took a toll on my family not being at home every day. So what I am trying to do is find that balance between the family and running the state."

There's an easy solution to this homeless tragedy. It was pointed out by former Gov. George Deukmejian, one of many Southern California state leaders who managed to survive an extended occupancy in Sacramento.

Deukmejian suggests that Schwarzenegger buy a big house here, move his family into it, and then donate it to the state as a governor's mansion once his term is over.

It's a fine idea. There are, we hear, a few houses on the market around Sacramento these days.

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