Arnie's Running.

So, Arnold announced he’s running for Governer.

Comments?

All I can say is, this election season is going to be a hoot.

Er, Governor.

The debates would be interesting if he just kept shooting his opponents and then uttering one-liners

You sure? Just heard the news a little while ago say he says he’s not running.

The mean partisan in me rejoices. Let them! Let the Tighty Righties have this mess, with our blessings! Jesus Horatio Christ could not straighten out the mess California is in, so, fuck 'em, let them grasp the nettle, and more power to them.

Of course, the humanitarian in me cringes in revulsion.

Not a big surprise: you don’t stump like he was, certainly not schedule an appearance on Leno, if you aren’t seriously planning on a big announcement. It would be funny to see him follow in Reagan’s footsteps: that natural born citizen crap is bull anyway. We shouldn’t give people anything but all-the-way citizenship.

Arnold’s no tighty-righty. He’s a very moderate Republican.

Exactly! I live in a state with a Republican Governor and Mayor and in most of the rest of the country, they’d be considered screaming liberals. I don’t doubt that there’s some right-wing elements involved in the recall–hell, Orange County is out there–but to think that Repubs all think monolithically is really unfair.

Dammit, I never watch the tonight show but now…

BTW, it’s the siren news at Drudge. I think Leno just finished taping and of course, there be spies there who opened their laptops as soon as they reached the parking lot.

What crazy radio station were you listening to elu? It sure wasn’t CNN… FM

http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/08/06/candidates.announce/index.html

Well, Al Gore hosted Saturday Night Live right before he announced he wouldn’t run for president in 2004. Besides that, all the reports in the past few days have been that Arnold wasn’t going to run.

That’s right. I’ll be very interested in seeing what ideas/plans he has for cleaning up this mess. So far, all I know about him is that he has done some excellent work for children/afterschool programs.

I suppose this means Riordan is out. I have a feeling he had the best chance of winning, as many felt had he been the original candidate he would be governor now. (Hell, even some Dems I know said they’d have voted for him.)

Personally, I don’t think anyone will be able to clean up this mess in two years. It simply has to run its course.

But if Arnie’s got some good ideas, he might get my vote.

I don’t know what a “tighty righty” is, but coming from 'luci I assume it’s a conservative on social as well as economic issues. Arnie is probably as close to a libertarian as we’ll ever see run for major office.

I’m guessing he’ll pull a Jesse Ventura-- get the “I’m sick of politician” vote and slide into the governor’s office easily. Talk about name recognition. Jesus! He’s got a good business sense and I actually think he will be a good non-politician. Whether or not he’ll have the same problem working with the legislature as Ventura had, I don’t know. Of course, Jesse was a true Independent, and Arnold is a Pub. The Dem legislatures may find themselves “recalled” in the next election if they are seen as getting in the way of Arnold fixing the mess that CA is in.

I need to see his platform, but I’m pretty sure I’ll be voting for him.

His major problem is that California is nuts.

They have energy problems, but don’t want new energy plants.

They have money shortages, but won’t accept tax increases.

They have out of control spending, but won’t tolerate spending cuts.

It seems to me that California is headed for bankruptcy and a major smack in the head. I’d hate to be the governor that has to preside over that.

My guess is that if Arnold wins, he’ll either wind up just carrying out business as usual the way Davis is, or he’ll try to make some fundamental changes, and the howls of protest will make the current discontent pale in comparison.

But hey, on the bright side, maybe there will be another recall in a year. Just keep throwing the bums out of office until you find someone who can give you everything you want, increase spending, and cut taxes, while balancing the budget.

Oh, and he has to make electricity fly out of his fingertips.

This is just step 1 in Arnold for President. Hating the republican party as I do is irrelevant, this is 1 man that has deserved a shot at the big title. Republican or not. I will vote for him when he reaches the oval office and I’m sure he will win.

the only way he’ll win is if we change the rules. He wasn’t born in the USA, so he can’t be president.

OK, he’s running.

Give me odds on whether he’ll win.

Assume the recall goes through. Do you think Arnold has a decent shot at winning?

High name recognition, major party backing, he’s supposedly a moderate Republican, so he could appeal to the moderates out there. He may bring in a lot of people who wouldn’t (don’t) vote normally, but will cast a vote for the Terminator. And it’s not like he needs a majority, with the number of people in the race, the winner might only get a small percentage of votes (just more than the rest of the candidates).

On the other side, there is a credibility problem.

Yeah, I think he’s got a shot.

I think it is possible. I mean he is popular, of polititan caliper in intelligence, and he acts good. That is what it takes to be a polititian right? Acting?

Arnold won’t make that mistake. He’ll remember what happened to Dynamo when Maria Conchita Alonso got on his case.*

*obscure The Running Man reference.

Since Arnold has (or will) announced his candidacy on The Tonight Show, will FCC equal time rules require Jay to allow all the other candidates on his show? This happened back in '68 when Pat Paulsen announced his candidacy for President (when Johnny Carson had the show), but with all the deregulation since then, it’s possible this rule has been changed or removed.

And in case everybody hasn’t heard, Gary Coleman (Different Strokes) has also announced his candidacy. Is this thing going to get even loonier?

Sam:

The CA energy crisis is so last year! You need to get with it. We don’t have an issue with power generation these days. There have been enough new power plants brought on line.

I don’t envy anyone trying to fix the physcal mess we’re in. But Arnold has a lot going for him:

  1. He’s rich, and doesn’t need any money from special interest groups. It’s going to be a real short campaign, so it won’t be that expensive anyway.

  2. He can’t be President, and probably has no political aspirations beyond the governorship. If it works out, great. He won’t worry about alienating the teacher’s union or any other special interest groups.

  3. He’s a businessman and has seen his share of failures. He won’t be afraid to try something new, and if it doesn’t work move on to something else.

  4. Peopla really like the guy. He’ll be able to rally support like no one else.

With no viable Dem candidate, and with Riordon not running, I think Arnold has it locked up. Peole just hate Davis. The guy is toast.