August 7, 2003 - As none of the pundits predicted noted actor and Kennedy in-law Arnold Swartzenegger joined the cast of the California farce – Recall 2003. Other cast members include diminutive unemployed actor Gary Coleman, columnist and talk show personality Arianna Huffington, and “honest” pornographer Larry Flint. The only thing missing from this expensive extravaganza is Zero Mostel and Phil Silvers cavorting in their togas.

We just had an election – that one in November 2002 – not quite a year ago. It was an election in which the Democrats swept up the Republicans’ candidate for governor. Everybody thought that was it for the next four years and the re-elected Governor could have that time to set about correcting the devastation wrought by the trifecta of the Bush economy, the fallout from the Bush tax cut and the Enron raid on California’s energy pocketbook. It wasn’t to be because in yet another ploy to avoid the consequences of the peoples’ choice the Republican establishment, spearheaded by Rep Issa, reached deep into their pockets to make sure that the election could be overturned,

It isn’t the first time the Republicans have tried to void an election. We are growing used to that. Who imagined that a President could be impeached over a sexual peccadillo? When the Republicans used the imagined perjury – it wasn’t – in a manufactured frivolous lawsuit to attempt to bring down a President the casualties ended up being the Republican Speaker of the House and then his designated successor. They set the standard and then fell by it. A funny thing happened to Newt on the way to the Whitehouse.

Then there was Florida and the 5-4 decision tossing the Federal system of dual sovereignty in the trash bin. You remember the scene where the troops invaded from Washington to delay the counting of the ballots until a ruling could be obtained that it was too late to count anymore. Now we have Delay again, trying to redistrict the redistricting in Texas. Write a screenplay like this and you would be run out of town. It would not even play as the second feature at the Drive-In.

It is a comedic farce and it is fitting that the biggest star in the cast announced his candidacy on The Tonight Show. The only better venue for the announcement would have been Saturday Night Live. But while it might be comedy tonight you can be sure that it will be followed by tragedy tomorrow. The present Governor of California was given six months to cope with what Ken Lay and Karl Rove imposed on the state be for Issa started his recall campaign. You can be sure that there is a Democrat with an unlimited pocketbook just ready to recall the Terminator in half that time. And that will be a tragedy for our political system if it does provide comic relief to the rest of the world.