Rival candidate porn movie actor Mary Carey: Arnie doesn’t mind the view so long as it’s good

Struggling to define Arnold Schwarzenegger’s politics, the news media have usually described him as a fiscal conservative who leans to the moderate side of Republican social policy, supporting abortion rights, some form of gun control and gay rights.

But in Schwarzenegger’s own words, his political philosophy is sometimes as elusive as his movie nemesis, the predator, whose mirage-like movements could only be sensed by the flutter of leaves.

The Austrian-born movie action hero has been criticised by Democrats and Republicans for not offering specific policies on major issues facing the state since he announced his candidacy last week. On morning TV news shows on Friday, Schwarzenegger at times appeared to dodge questions.

A review of interviews with Schwarzenegger over the last decade shows that he has staked clear positions on some issues but also managed to avoid taking a stand on others.

His ability to deflect tough questions shone when Talk magazine interviewer Max Vadukul asked him in 1999 if he and his wife, Maria Shriver, scion of the Democratic Kennedy dynasty, talk politics at home.

“Not since I’ve been sleeping in the garage,” he quipped, nipping the interviewer’s attempt to shift gears.

Schwarzenegger has been quoted numerous times as saying he favours sensible gun control, but he has never defined what he means by sensible. His most expansive comment comes from a frequently cited interview on a Berkeley-based youth radio station last year.

“I don’t run around every day with a gun in my hand,” he reportedly said. “So I want kids to understand the difference; one is make-believe like we do in the movies. But in reality I’m for gun control. I’m a peace-loving guy.”

Though on-the-record comments are sparse, the perception of his support for gun control goes back to the early 1990s and was so well established that even Senator Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., thought of him as a possible ally when actor Charlton Heston testified against her bill to ban assault weapons in 1994.

Schwarzenegger has been much more talkative about violence in the media, which he says has gone overboard. A little restraint is in order, he told the Los Angeles Times in a 2000 interview, just before his action film The 6th Day premiered.

“We could say to all those marketing people, ‘Look, we know that if you sell an R-rated movie to 12-year-olds, they will want to go and see it. But is it really good in the end for our country to let them in?’” he said. “Or should we come up with a system where we really don’t let any kids in whether they’re with a parent or not? Because to me, that’s bogus...”

In interviews, Schwarzenegger has revealed more about his own drug use than what he thinks about the debate over decriminalising pot or the high percentage of drug cases bogging down the courts.

The subject that made presidential candidate Bill Clinton squirm is already out of the way for Schwarzenegger.

“What it is is what it is,” he told Talk magazine in a 1999 interview. “I inhaled, exhaled, everything.”

He has also admitted to taking steroids as part of his bodybuilding regime, though he has not said how often he used the drug.

“You’d do it for three months once a year before contests,” he said. “If you take 15 milligrams of let’s say, anabolic steroids for three months, it’s one thing. But if you take 200 milligrams a day for a whole year, that’s something else.”

Schwarzenegger said his drug use ended in the early 1970s, when information became available about the harmful effects of steroids, but he still enjoys a cigar. His criticism of New York City’s ban on smoking in public places illustrates what one commentator has called Schwarzenegger’s pragmatic libertarian tendencies.

“I would have some restaurants that are smoking restaurants and some nonsmoking so there is a choice,” he told the New York Post.

“Now there is no choice, so I think it’s a little overboard.”

Appearing on Fox TV’s The ’Reilly Factor in May 2001, Schwarzenegger made a strong defence of abortion rights.

“I disagree with George Bush about that,” he said. “I’m for choice. The women should have the choice. The women should decide what they want to do with their bodies. I’m all for that.”

He’s also been outspoken on gay rights.

“I have no sexual standards in my head that say ‘this is good’ or ‘this is bad’,” he told Cosmopolitan in a frequently quoted interview. “Homosexual — that only means to me that he enjoys sex with a man and I enjoy sex with a woman. It’s all legitimate to me.”

Schwarzenegger has acknowledged that his views on social mores diverge from mainstream Republican values. He said he hopes to lead his party in a more tolerant direction.

“You’re going to lose until you become a party of inclusion, that you love the foreigner that comes in with no money as much as a gay person, as a lesbian person, as anyone else — someone that is uneducated, someone who’s from the inner city,” he told Talk magazine.