Beatty Versus Shwarzenegger?

Above: "I can out grope as well as out govern you, Arnold"!

Could a Warren Beatty-Arnold Shwarzenegger Gubernatorial matchup be in the offing? Beatty has obviously lost his old simmering rivalry with Robert Redford (how can one compete against Sundance?), could he be looking towards a political legacy? Imagine the one liners that would fly at such a debate:

Shwarzenegger: Warren, you ahr an economic girlie man. (flexes) You're so vain, I bet you thing this race is about you ... dont you ... don't you.

Beatty: (coy, pseudoshy) "Don't" is not a word I have encountered often. But you seem to have passing familiarity with its use. Arnold, my good man, the starlets I've groped over the years -- and numbers are multitudinous -- were willing participants.

And so on. According to the San Francisco Gate (link via Drudge):

"Warren Beatty, an actor who has dabbled in politics across four decades, has some words of advice for fellow film star and now Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

"Schwarzenegger should raise taxes on the California rich and 'terminate' his fund-raising and dinners with 'the brokers of Wall Street' and the 'lobbyists of K Street,' Beatty said.

"'Arnold. Be the action hero I know you can be. Be strong. Stand up and confront the wealthiest 1 percent of Californians who have benefited $12 billion a year from the Bush tax cuts.'

"Beatty said he wants to root for a fellow actor in the governor's office, but said he's disappointed that Schwarzenegger is yielding 'to a reactionary right-wing agenda in order to get a political party to become a president. That's not so fine with me. It makes me sad for Arnold.'

"Beatty said Schwarzenegger should lead the rich toward helping California.

"'It's called the haves giving a little more to the have nots,' he said. 'Nobody likes taxes, but everybody likes a peaceful, compassionate, law-abiding, productive, protective society.'

"Schwarzenegger spokeswoman Vince Sollitto replied Saturday: 'Tax and spend rhetoric aside, California needs budget reform because it's not a revenue problem, but a spending problem.'"

To be continued ...