As promised, he was back. Arnold Schwarzenegger swept into California governorship as a replacement for the much maligned Gray Davis, who mismanaged the state’s economy so bad that a special recall election was organized just to get him out of office. Californians always had a thing for actor-politicians — this was the state that elected Ronald Reagan, star of “General Electric Theater” in the 50s and 60s, to governorship, after all. Schwarzenegger was able to tap into that, along with a general disgust for politicians. He was not like them – he was the Terminator.

On this day, November 17, in 2003, in a special election to replace the seat vacated by Gray Davis, Californians chose Arnold Schwarzenegger.

The “Governator” went right to work, enacting his promised measures to clean up gridlock, repeal car registration fee increases, and taking harder measures on illegal immigration. In discussions with the state Democrats, he borrowed a line from a Saturday Night Live parody of him, calling the Democrats “girlie men” — and when asked to apologize in the interests of political correctness, he doubled down on his epithet. This was the Governator’s law.