Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is taking on just about every major interest group in California in his audacious effort to bring universal health care to the nation's biggest state: unions, small business, doctors, hospitals, insurance companies, conservatives.

Whether the former Hollywood action hero can prevail and get it passed — or get it passed in still-recognizable form — is far from clear.

"I think it's very difficult in its present form," said Bill Carrick, a Democratic strategist. "He's got universal Republican opposition to it and the stakeholders are all going to get hit with a tax — doctors, hospitals and employers — so they're clearly going to be opposed to that."