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Gov. Schwarzenegger: Middle is path to the White House for RepublicansDate: 03.03.2007
Posted by: Anabolic Info Team United Kingdom
And the best place for his fitness expo is in Columbus
The three leading Republican candidates for president should resist being pushed too far right to win the party's nomination, because most Americans are in the political center, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Saturday.
Sen. John McCain of Arizona, former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, all viewed skeptically by some conservative leaders, will have a better chance of winning the 2008 general election if they remain moderates, Schwarzenegger said in an interview with The Dispatch.
“I'm very proud that the Republican Party has three candidates that some conservatives feel like they are not conservative enough, because that feels like they have a good chance of winning the overall election,” the governor said. “The people in America are in the center, they're not extremists.”
Some conservative GOP leaders have criticized the three front-runners for various reasons, including their sincerity on issues dear to the party's base such as abortion and gay-marriage.
But Schwarzenegger, a moderate Republican who was reelected in 2006 with nearly 60 percent of the vote, including 93 percent of the GOP vote, said the middle is the path to the White House.
“If you have three candidates who are in the center, I don't think anyone has much to worry about, as long as they stay there.”
Walking with a cane after breaking his leg skiing in December, Schwarzenegger, 59, still appeared chiseled -- “I train every day” -- as he paused from overseeing the Arnold Fitness Expo.
Mostly discussing politics, Schwarzenegger couldn't resist professing anew his love for Columbus -- “my second home” -- and pledging that he has no intent ever to move the annual fitness classic from the city, despite lucrative offers from other countries.
“We've said no. This is where it is. This is it, no matter what you offer in South Africa or in Australia or in Japan or in China, it makes no difference. This is the Arnold Classic and this is where it's going to stay. We have here the volunteers that we would never find anywhere else, nowhere.”
While Schwarzenegger won't deprive Ohio his coveted classic, he is about to inadvertently lessen any clout Ohio might have in the 2008 presidential primary season. Poised to move its primary election to Feb. 5 -- potentially joining Florida, Illinois, Pennsylvania and New Jersey -- California automatically would become the 800-pound gorilla in the nominating process, likely rendering it a done deal by the time Ohioans vote March 4.
“We are the most important state in the union,” Schwarzenegger said. “We are the most powerful, we generate the most money, we have great population, we have the most diversified economy and we would be the sixth or seventh largest economy in the world if we would be a country. So, I say why are we not in the mix, why are we not part of the decision-making when it comes to the primaries and choosing our Democratic candidate and Republican candidate?”
Beyond using California as an ATM for their campaigns, presidential candidates traditionally have spent little time campaigning there because the state usually is reliably Democratic. But Schwarzenegger said that in the last month, GOP candidates, and even a Democratic candidate, have called his office requesting that he appear with them.
“If we hadn't been talking about moving (the primary) up, I don't know if I would have gotten these phone calls.”
The Austrian-born Schwarzenegger answered with a joke when asked if he would like to see the U.S. Constitution amended to permit foreign-born Americans to run for president: “It's part of comprehensive immigration reform.”
Term-limits will require him to leave the governor's office in 2010 and Schwarzenegger said he hasn't contemplated what he wants to do then, but he is “not inspired by going back” to movie acting.
“I don't think four years ahead,” he said. “I don't feel that's my style. I like to not know on a personal level what happens to me, to my career, what I'm going to do. That's the fun thing.”
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