Background: "Total Recall"

The California gubernatorial recall election of 2003 represented one of the most remarkable political victories of right-wing corporatism masquerading as populism in U.S. political history. 

Helped along by ally George W. Bush, who allowed Bill Clinton's price controls to expire soon after taking control of the presidency, Enron shorted California residents of electricity, leading to blackouts and exorbitant rates. Having few options, Democratic governor Gray Davis signed expensive long-term contracts, which were essentially ransom payments, rather than ride the storm out.

Seeing an opportunity in the disaster Enron had created with Bush's help, Republicans expertly prayed on public ignorance, blaming Davis for the electricity shortage. Implicit in the scapegoating of Davis was the falsehood that one of California's most experienced public servants, who was racking up an impressive legislative record as governor, was incompetent.

To run against Davis, Republicans recruited Arnold Schwarzenegger, a man with no political experience and next to no knowledge of public policy who hadn't even bothered to vote in half of the elections in his adult lifetime. Multi-millionaire Arnold was presented as a man of the people, an immigrant who had made it (who, ironically, was campaigning on getting rid of occupational driver's licenses for undocumented immigrants). 

Thanks to a stalling national and state economy, the blandness of Gray Davis, the effectiveness of the GOP's false narratives, and a staggering level of ignorance and misdirected rage, Schwarzenegger became governor, setting the template for the presidential campaign of Donald Trump thirteen years later.