Early voter turnout in California is heavy.

... a record number of voters for a gubernatorial race — 15,380,526 — were registered for Tuesday's vote. At late morning, his office said polling places around the state were reporting long lines and a shortage of parking places but that otherwise things were going well. People began strolling into a Hollywood polling place as soon as the doors were opened. Within a few minutes there were about 30 people waiting in line.

It was the heaviest early turnout Patti Negri said she had seen in 12 years as a polling supervisor. "I've never been so busy, ever," she said. "We had to do a lot of paperwork but people seem excited and ready to vote."

Update: Estimates are that 10 million voters will turn out in person, 2 million absentees.

The polls close at 8 pm. Our prediction today is the same as last night: Davis loses big, Arnold wins handily.

It's official. Bob Graham has dropped out of the race for the Democratic Presidential nomination. Good move. Now he can throw whatever support he had to one of the other candidates. We think it will be Wesley Clark, but stay tuned.

Who's it gonna be? Tomorrow's the day. Arnie's in good spirits and Maria is standing by her man. Gray Davis is hoping for a miracle. Whatever happened to Bustamante? We haven't heard a peep out of him for days.

Our view: Vote no on recall. Vote no on Prop. 54. We take no position on who should win if the recall succeeds.

Here are the most likely choices - let the voters decide.

Update: Arnold is pulling out the big guns. He's got Eunice Shriver in California making the round of tv interviews. Smart move.

Our prediction: Davis will lose big, Arnold will win handily.

Voter registration for the recall election is at an all time high:

Wesley Clark is sticking to his guns with respect to his criticism of the death penalty. We continue to be very impressed with him. He'll be in Iowa tomorrow, and we will continue to follow his remarks and report here.

Democratic presidential candidate Wesley Clark said Sunday he has serious concerns about the way the death penalty is applied and would support a mandatory review of all death penalty sentences.... I’ll tell you, I’m uneasy about the death penalty,” Clark said answering a question ...

“A government like the United States has the right to, in extraordinary cases, take the life of a criminal, but I I don’t like the way the death penalty has been applied in America,” Clark said. “ I think its been applied in an unfair and discriminatory fashion and I think we need to go back and use modern technology and unpack all those cases on death row.”

Clark spoke his mind on other issues as well. He will study legalizing marijuana for medical use, although he opposes decriminalizing marijuana for all purposes.

When asked about marijuana laws, he said he opposes the use of the illegal drug. However, he added that he has talked with people who use it to ease their chronic pain. “They said smoking marijuana helps,” he said. “We need to look at that and make some allowances one way or another.”

On Bush and the War in Iraq:

There are so many comments and emails coming in on Arnold and the new allegations of his mistreatment of women, that we can't keep up with answering them. So the podium is your's. Have your say.

Just a few guidelines: Put your urls in html format, don't reprint overly long quotes from articles, and no profanity (so we don't get hit by censor-blocking software).

Arnold got some good and bad coverage today. On the positive side, his former boxing trainer described how as a teenager, Arnold helped break up neo-Nazi gatherings.

Trainer Kurt Marnul told The Associated Press in an exclusive interview that Schwarzenegger was "filled with rage against the Nazi regime" and took part at least twice in organized disruptions of neo-Nazi gatherings in the southern Austrian city of Graz during the 1960s.

....On Friday, the Austrian magazine NU, which caters to the alpine nation's Jewish community, quoted former politician Alfred Gerstl as describing how Schwarzenegger once "hunted down" neo-Nazis who had gathered outside a teaching institute run by an avowed anti-fascist.

On the negative side, Arnold lost the endorsement of the Oakland Tribune. And three more women have come forward with reports of past groping on movie sets. Two of the complaints pertain to the filming of the movie Twins. Arnold denies the charges, and several involved in the film, including the director, Ivan Reitman, back him up.

"I was on the set all the time and it was one of the friendliest shoots I've ever been on," said Reitman, who has known Schwarzenegger for 15 years and recently held a campaign fund-raiser for him. "No raunchy stuff. People's families were there. "Nothing even approximating what you're saying happened. I would have heard something," he said.

If enough people votes no on the recall, there will be no Arnold issue. We still refuse to endorse a replacement candidate. Vote no on the recall, and no on Prop. 54.

Update: The Times of London has this amusingly written editorial about Arnold.

Law Professor and Political Analyst Susan Estrich writes in her LA Times column today that the groping allegations against Arnold are (1) no big deal (2) come too late to make a difference (3) amount to a dirty tricks campaign and (4) should not have been published by the LA Times.

As a professor of sex discrimination law for two decades and an expert on sexual harassment, I certainly don't condone the unwanted touching of women that was apparently involved here. But these acts do not appear to constitute any crime, such as rape or sodomy or even assault or battery. As for civil law, sexual harassment requires more than a single case of unwelcome touching; there must be either a threat or promise of sex in exchange for a job benefit or demotion, or the hostile environment must be severe and pervasive.

But none of these women, as The Times emphasizes, ever came forward to complain. The newspaper went looking for them, and then waited until five days before the election to tell the fragments of the story. What this story accomplishes is less an attack on Schwarzenegger than a smear on the press. It reaffirms everything that's wrong with the political process. Anonymous charges from years ago made in the closing days of a campaign undermine fair politics.

...Is this the worst they could come up with? Ho-hum.

We agree with her on the first three. We have no problem though with the Times reporting it - let the people decide. For the other side, go over and read one of our favorite writers, Jeanne D'Arc at Body and Soul.

Democratic presidential contender Bob Graham may drop out of the race. We think he should. He's never gained traction and he would serve the cause better by throwing whatever support he has to one of the top contenders. [thanks to Atrios for the heads up.]

Update: Graham's Communications Manager quit today.

Gray Davis provides the media with a very classy response to Arnold's apology today about his past treatment of women:

I would just rather leave this matter to the voters of this state. They will digest it. They will decide what importance to attach to it. And they will decide what impact it has on the choices before them next Tuesday.

"I've been saying (that) one thing has become clear over the last several days ... we no longer have 135 choices to make. It's really one choice that's likely to emerge from (ballot) question number 2: Arnold Schwarzenegger.

"And that leaves the voters with a clear choice. They can retain Gray Davis as governor or they can elect Arnold Schwarzenegger and his crew from (former Gov.) Pete Wilson to run the governor's office. "That's the choice they'll have to make. I'm sure they'll make it fairly, to determine who's best qualified to lead this state."

California Political Review reports that Bustamante is expected to withdraw from the recall race.

Dems are finally understanding that the issue is defeat the recall, not who should replace Gray Davis.

Political Wire, which links to the withdrawal report, says the report may be incorrect.

We think Bustamante will drop out to salvage his career. He's not going to beat Arnold. If Arnold wins, Bustamante's future doesn't look too bright within the Democratic Party. At least if he does the right thing by Gray Davis now, even though like Arianna, it will be too little too late, he may maintain some respectablility within the Democratic Party.

Arnold today acknowledged improperly touching women in the past, said he has reformed and promised to be a champion of women's rights, if elected.

Gubernatorial front-runner Arnold Schwarzenegger acknowledged that he has "behaved badly" to women and offered an apology Thursday...."When I am governor I want to prove to the women that I will be a champion for the women, a champion of the women," Schwarzenegger said at a rally in San Diego. "Now let's go from the dirty politics to the future of California."

The crowd of Schwarzenegger supporters interrupted him with cheers.

Schwarzenegger said: "Yes, it is true that I was on rowdy movie sets and I have done things that were not right which I thought then was playful but now I recognize that I offended people." "Those people that I have offended, I want to say to them I am deeply sorry about that and I apologize because that's not what I'm trying to do," he said.

We don't think the issue will matter one whit in the election. It's more dirty tricks politics and coming so close to the election, we suspect California voters will shrug it off as such. We think his advisors picked the right response. Since they knew it was coming, we wouldn't be surprised if they did focus groups with women and ran several different possible responses by them, so they could determine which would elicit the most favorable reaction.

We'd say: Advantage Arnold on the dirty tricks.

Once again, vote no on recall, no on Proposition 54. The latest poll has Arnold and Gray Davis in a dead heat.

Josh Marshall of Talking Points interviews Gen. Wesley Clark, [link via Media Horse]