The also-rans

Editor's note: Michael Ackley's columns contain satire and parody based on current events, and thus mix fact with fiction. He assumes informed readers will be able to tell which is which.

Sure, Arnold Schwarzenegger won big in the California recall, but whither Arianna? Ms. Huffington, a candidate the media treated as a major player before the election, didn't rise to the level of a footnote after the ballots were counted. However, she will be able to tell her followers that 42,603 Californians can't be wrong. (Yes, that was her vote total – 0.6 percent of the ballots cast.)

Other significant vote-getters: Bruce Margolin, a "marijuana legalization attorney," got more than a token 7,981 votes. Diminutive actor-security guard Gary Coleman reached 12,690. Golf pro Paul "Chip" Mailander scored only 608, perhaps the voters hold the same prejudice as I, that you have to wonder about any adult who goes by Chip, Skip or Buzz.

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Porn queen Mary Cook tallied 10,114, slightly less than George Schwartzman, who netted 10,949 votes – largely attributed to voter confusion between his name and Arnold's. This still leaves California with proportionally fewer stupid people than Florida.

An old friend, Leonard Padilla, who used to run down bail jumpers but now heads a law school, once ran a valiant, losing campaign for mayor of the state capital while he was jailed in Los Angeles. In this election, he tallied 1,155 votes for governor. Much was made of the length of Schwarzenegger's name, but the longest name on the ballot belonged to David Laughing Horse Robinson, tribal chairman, who got 5,759 votes.

A tip of the hat is due Mike P. McCarthy. He could have hidden his profession (as some did) behind the catchall title "businessman." Instead, he struck a blow for the dignity of used car dealers everywhere and racked up 1,198 votes. This will go a long way toward curing the wound inflicted when unfeeling individuals put up billboards with Richard Nixon's picture, asking, "Would you buy a used car from this man?"

Custom denture maker Ivan Alexander Hall III never really got his teeth into the issues, but still garnered 2,045 votes. Multicultural appeal was insufficient for Kurt E. "Tachikaze" Rightmeyer. The "middleweight sumo wrestler" (apparently there is such a thing) gathered only 734 votes. The hopes of cigarette retailer Ned Roscoe went up in smoke, but finishing dead last was "businessman" Todd Richard Lewis. Lewis got a barely discernible 172 votes. Still, that was more than you would expect for the man who exploited skid-row denizens in the film "Bum Hunter."

The long list of candidates, such as those listed above gave the effete East plenty of opportunities to feel superior. The New York Times was particularly – and consistently – snide, both on its editorial page and in its news columns. Some of the work was so good, however, it could have been written by Jayson Blair.

Tears have been flowing for the vast number of Gray Davis administrators – more than 2,000 – whose jobs are expected to end when Schwarzenegger is sworn in. We guarantee you: Some of these are worthy toilers for the public interest, but many are patronage appointees. In fact, the new governor could save the state some millions by ferreting out and terminating the political appointees from both parties who function mainly as space fillers and oxygen consumers in various state offices between the Oregon border and Mexico.

And by the way: Davis' political obituaries have been referring to his decades of "public service." When politics became a career path – somewhere around the time of the Lincoln-Douglas debates – the identity between elective office and service began to fade. Let us reserve the term "public service" for those who sacrifice real jobs to work in the interest of the people. Come to think of it, that definition might apply to Arnold Schwarzenegger.