It's California versus wackos

<div class="section1"><div class="Normal"><script language="javascript" src="Config?Configid=43376741"></script><br />WASHINGTON: An Austrian immigrant who turned body building into superstardom, a smut king who cherishes the first amendment, a glamorous Greek political columnist whose millionaire ex-husband supports a rival, a porn star who wants to tax breast implants, a midget comedian whose career has collapsed, and a 100-year old woman who is sponsored by a chain of discount stores.<br /></div> <div align="center" style="position:relative; left: 0"><table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" align="center" border="0" width="67.1%"> <colgroup> <col width="100.0%" /> </colgroup> <tr valign="top"> <td width="100.0%" colspan="1" rowspan="1" style="" valign:="" top="" background-color:="" f3f3f3=""> <div class="Normal"><img src="/photo/128262.cms" alt="/photo/128262.cms" border="0" /></div> </td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td width="100.0%" colspan="1" rowspan="1" style="" valign:="" top="" background-color:="" f3f3f3=""> <div class="Normal"><span style="" font-size:="" font-weight:="" bold="">Matter of the flesh:</span><span style="" font-size:=""> (From left) Actor Arnold Schwarzenegger, porn actress Mary Carey and Hustler publisher Larry Flynt.</span></div> </td> </tr> </table></div> <div class="Normal"><br />These are just some of the 150-odd contestants vying to be the governor of California in an American election like no other.Americans are discovering just how messy and turbulent a real democracy is something India, with its boiling multi-party system, has always known. <br /><br />The October 7 election is being held under an arcane rule that allows voters to recall a sitting fixed-term governor (in this case Democrat Gray Davis) if a million voters sign a petition (they did).<br /><br />If more than 50 per cent of the voters opt for an ouster, the second part of the poll allows election of a successor, a possibility that has attracted a menagerie of wacky hopefuls that is threatening to turn La La land into Laloo land. <br /><br />Among the proposals aired by the aspirants in their bid for office are tax-deductible lap dances, a state-backed system of conflict resolution based on The Jerry Springer Show, and an ashtray-exchange program for smokers. <br /><br />Although opinion polls show that a majority of voters want to turf out Governor Davis, blaming him for turning the Golden State (and the world’s sixth largest economy) into disaster zone, its the second part of the election that has people worried. <br /><br />In the first past the post system, a contestant who gathers the maximum number of votes can become the governor. That could be as low as 10 to 15 per cent even in a field reduced to a dozen serious contenders.<br /> <br />Plus, the election will cost around $ 70 million, something the money-strapped state with a $ 38 billion deficit can hardly afford. <br />While voters wrestle with this dilemma, the media is having a field day featuring the wackos, among them a billboard queen named Angelyne who is campaigning for better roads for her pink sports car and porn actress Mary Carey, who wants to swap guns for sex films to reduce violence. <br /><br />Leading the pack of flesh-pressers is <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">Hustler </span>magazine publisher Larry Flynt. And of course, there’s Arnold Schwarzenegger, whose winding last name has led some Indians to call him Arnold Shivajinagar. Their face-off has already been dubbed “the Terminator versus Larry Flynt.�<br /><br />A CNN/Time poll showed that voters would remove Davis from office and replace him with Schwarzenegger by a 19 percentage-point margin if the election were held now. Other contenders at the top of the field are Democratic lieutenant governor Cruz Bustamante and fellow Democrat Bob Simon, followed by publisher Larry Flynt and columnist Ariana Huffington.<br /> <br />But its the tail end of the field that is providing the fireworks for now. </div> </div>