A film about an action movie hero who becomes governor of California? Well, it may have sounded like a B-movie a few months ago, but with the election set for Tuesday and Arnold Schwarzenegger holding a lead in the polls even as controversy swirls about him in California's gubernatorial recall race, that hokey premise is looking like it could become political reality.

Of course, in the real life campaign there have been a few Total Recall-style plot twists -- like charges that Schwarzenegger is no gentleman but an inveterate groper of women who as a youth found kind words to say about Hitler...