Schwarzenegger has denied the allegations, but he has done so in a way that is something less than politic. In a profile in the Weekly Standard last year, Schwarzenegger was quoted as saying that the allegations against him were so outrageous that he didn't even have to explain them away -- to his wife or anyone else. "When someone said [they] walked into my trailer, and I was eating a chick in the living room, [Maria] knows I'm not that stupid, number one. Number two, I have two guards standing out at all times in front of my trailer so no one could walk in ... . That already makes the story not credible."

Credible or not, the personal attacks may be all that Davis has. He ran negative campaigns to get elected in the first place, and now it appears that he will have no choice but to do so again. With approval ratings in the 20 percent range and a state budget deficit of $38 billion, Davis can't run on his record. And with Schwarzenegger in the race, he can't run based on fear of the right wing. And even if Schwarzenegger were to stay out of the race, it's not clear that such tactics would carry the day anyway.

While the recall campaign was started by ideologues on the right, California voters are dissatisfied with their government -- and their governor -- in ways that are not particularly ideological. The state is in a budget crisis; like the country as a whole, California has gone from record surpluses to a huge deficit virtually overnight. But while George W. Bush seems to get a free ride for the nation's fiscal woes, Davis is buried with the blame for California's crisis. Voters see Davis as an incompetent manager, a pay-for-play politician with no agenda beyond securing the next campaign contribution.

"We're in a non-ideological recall, and it's a mistake for Davis to think that he can run on ideology," said Tony Quinn, editor of the California Target Book, a publication that analyzes California political races and districts. "Davis has been pitching this as if it's left vs. right. But the public is mad about management. They don't want their taxes raised, they don't want their services cut. They want someone who can manage these things."

Schwarzenegger will have to prove that he can do that -- that he's not just a successful movie star but a successful businessman as well. He'll also have to hold his breath. While Schwarzenegger leads the polls in most possible matchups, the race tightens considerably if Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein decides to come to the Democrats' rescue.

So far, Democrats have vowed that none of their own will enter the race. There's plenty of speculation that the dam will break soon. By setting the election at the last of three possible dates, Democratic Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante also effectively pushed back -- until August 10 -- the deadline for candidates to enter the race. That will give Democrats the most time possible under the law to track the polling on Davis and see if they should join the race to replace him.

For now, the polls provide little solace for the Davis camp. The latest Field Poll shows that, if the election were held today, 51 percent of likely voters would recall Davis. While Davis supporters are optimistic that those numbers will shrink as the vote draws nearer, Davis has little upside potential: Californians already know him and already don't like him. He can't hope to make major inroads by reintroducing himself now.

The news isn't much better for Democrats more generally. While California is a profoundly Democratic state -- statewide voter registration tilts 44-35 against the GOP -- it's not clear that the Democrats can field a candidate who can beat Schwarzenegger. It's unlikely that any of the in-state Democrats has the name recognition or celebrity status to outrun him. Dianne Feinstein might be able to do it, especially if she can position herself as a "favorite daughter" outsider who is coming home to fix the mess in Sacramento. But all indications so far are that she won't make the run.

Although there is no love lost between Feinstein and Davis, Feinstein has criticized the recall effort and reportedly rebuffed efforts to draft her into the race. That could change, however, if the Republicans come together behind Schwarzenegger and it appears inevitable that Davis is going to lose. "All the Democratic powers behind the throne are polling now: Can Davis survive, yes or no?" said Whalen. "If they figure out that the answer is no, they've got to hotfoot it to Dianne Feinstein. Nobody else stands out among the Democrats in California, and she can say she's going to come in and rescue the California people -- sort of a white knight of California politics."

If her backers have their way, Huffington could play that role, too. While Huffington certainly has experience with the rigors of a high-profile campaign -- her ex-husband served in the House of Representatives before spending $30 million in an unsuccessful effort to unseat Dianne Feinstein in 1994 -- it appears that no one in either party is taking the draft-Arianna movement too seriously.

Huffington underwent a political transformation over the last decade, shifting from a darling of the Newt Gingrich Republicans to a populist who rails against the abuses and fraud of corporate leaders and the wastefulness of SUVs. In an essay she wrote for the Los Angeles Times in 2000, Huffington explained that she had been "seduced, fooled, blinded, bamboozled" by Gingrich's purported interest in helping the poor and middle-class. That didn't send her into the arms of the Democrats, however. She wrote that her disillusionment with the Gingrich Republicans left her searching for a path "that would take us beyond the standard left-right paradigm and provide new solutions to the greatest crisis America is facing today: the fact that we have become two nations, one basking in unprecedented prosperity, the other left to choke on the dust of Wall Street's galloping bulls."

While those bulls aren't galloping anymore, questions about Huffington's true allegiances linger -- at least among those eager to dismiss her fledgling candidacy. Mulholland asked mockingly whether Huffington is registered as a Democrat or a Republican now, and -- in a rare moment of bipartisan agreement -- a California Republican strategist raised exactly the same question. "What letter would Huffington put after her name -- P for populist or W for Westside?" he asked. "We've talked about Huffington more as a joke than anything else. With Arnold and Arianna, nobody would understand what either of them is saying."

Of course, it may be that only the big-party operatives don't understand. Voters are frustrated with everything that's coming out of Sacramento right now, and the recall effort -- although launched by right-wing Davis-haters -- may be tapping into a vein of reform-minded populism that has always run deep in California voters. That populist streak led to the adoption of the state's recall laws in 1911, and it could lead to any number of unexpected and unpredictable outcomes now -- pranksters even had people believing this week that Ozzy Osbourne is about to enter the race.

While His Ozzness might not have a shot, things are moving quickly enough that just about anyone else might. If Davis goes down, it will take only a plurality vote to choose his successor. If enough candidates run, that means that someone who draws, say, 20 percent of the vote might wind up being governor. While conventional wisdom says the winner will be a big-name uniter like Schwarzenegger, it's still possible that a small-time candidate with a devoted core following could take the race, too.

For political operators used to a more predictable, money- and incumbency-driven status quo, the recall drive is a little like those photos of Uday and Qusay -- they're horrifying, but you can't help wanting to look. "We all like this race because a lot of politics in this country is very predictable," says Whalen. "This isn't like that at all."

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