For her, XXX marks the spot

Ahoy, me hearties. In honor of International Talk Like a Pirate Day, all references to “the recall� in today’s column will be changed to “making Graybeard Davis walk the plank.� Also, Arnold Schwarzenegger will be referred to by his pirate name, “Arrrrrrr-nold.�

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The body politic

We hope you appreciate the tremendous sacrifices we make on your behalf. For example, on Wednesday, we found ourselves standing outside the Vine Theater in Hollywood to see the world premiere of porn star gubernatorial candidate Mary Carey’s latest triple-X flick. Unlike the other media vultures in attendance, our sole purpose was to investigate her positions on the critical issues facing California. The chance to view sexual acrobatics that would make Arrrrrrr-nold’s Oui

magazine interview look like a nursery rhyme had nothing to do with it.

So we’ll skip that part and cut to the press conference. As usual, the media posed a number of deep, philosophical questions, such as: “Do people ever confuse you with Mariah Carey?� (Answer: “No�), and “Which of the other gubernatorial candidates would you like to have sex with?� (“I think Arnold is hot; I wish I’d been in that group sex thing he talked about in Oui�).

All in all, it was a dignified exchange of ideas (and by “dignified,� we mean that Carey and her pals bared their chests to the press corps, which is exactly the kind of political discourse that Hiram Johnson envisioned when he introduced the recall process in 1910).

The candidate also revealed that Bill Clinton is her political role model (“He had sex in the Oval Office�) and that she hopes to run for president herself in 12 years, after she turns 35 and is legally eligible for the job.

For now, though, she’s worried about the court decision to postpone October’s walk-the-plank vote until March: “Delaying the recall means Gray[beard] Davis will have to keep campaigning instead of running the state, and California’s economic problems will get worse to the point where even I can’t fix them.�

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Quote of the day

From Gov. Davis, at a town hall meeting in Sacramento: “My vision is to make the most diverse state on Earth, and we have people from every planet on the Earth in this state. We have the sons and daughters of every, of people from every planet, of every country on Earth.�

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Debate watch

At a fund-raiser for Arianna Huffington, comedian Harry Shearer jabbed Schwarzenegger’s decision to appear only at a candidate debate where the questions are known in advance: “Negotiations have snagged over his demand that he be given the answers as well.�

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Late-night blotter

“Welcome to ‘Terminator 4: Rise of the Voting Machines.’ ... A federal appeals court postponed the Oct. 7 recall election. Or, as Gray Davis calls it, ‘a stay of execution.’ � (Jay Leno)

“When Arianna Huffington heard the election was postponed, she asked, ‘Does this mean I can skip paying my taxes again?’ � (Leno)

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First mates: Adam Tschorn, Jill Jones, www.talklikeapirate.com, San Francisco Chronicle, Washington Post. E-mail [email protected]. Past columns are arrrrrr-chived at www.latimes.com/recallmadness.