Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger attacked Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama on Friday in a last-minute Ohio campaign speech, comparing Obama's policies to European socialism and mocking Obama's physical appearance as "scrawny."
Schwarzenegger's address at a Columbus rally for Sen. John McCain was unusually caustic for a moderate Republican governor who last week called Obama a "great candidate" and rarely criticizes the Democrat in California.
The governor has business investments in Columbus and hosts a bodybuilding competition there each March. During his Friday speech at Nationwide Arena, the governor alluded to his annual bodybuilding festival in a dig at Obama's appearance.
"The Arnold's Classic is all about building up the bodies and pumping up," Schwarzenegger said on a televised broadcast. "And that's why at the Arnold's Classic, I want to invite Sen. Obama, because he needs to do something about those skinny legs. We're going to make him do some squats. And then we're going to go and give him some biceps curls to beef up those scrawny little arms."
The governor then said Obama needs to "put meat on his ideas." "Sen. McCain, on the other hand, is built like a rock."
Schwarzenegger, an Austrian native who came to the U.S. in 1968 to establish his bodybuilding career, said he left Europe "because socialism has killed opportunities there." He said in recent years Europe has recognized its mistakes and "rolled back Soviet spread-the-wealth policies."
"Now Sen. Obama says he wants to pursue the same spread-the-wealth ideas that Europe had decades ago," Schwarzenegger said.
During his speech, the governor recognized the awkward position of having to tailor his speech to McCain's anti-tax message while having proposed raising taxes this week in his own state to offset an estimated $10 billion revenue shortfall.
"Now just because you want to raise a tax certainly doesn't make you a socialist because in California I have proposed a temporary sales tax increase to address our massive deficit," he said. "But Sen. Obama wants to raise the taxes because of ideology. He wants to raise all kinds of taxes. He wants to raise the taxes on capital gains and dividends."
Schwarzenegger said he only plays an action hero in movies, while McCain is "a real action hero."
"John McCain has served this country longer in a POW camp than his opponent has served in the United States Senate," Schwarzenegger said.
Schwarzenegger has flown to the swing state on the eve of two previous presidential elections, in 2004 for President Bush and in 1988 for former President George H.W. Bush.
The governor's speech diverged from his recent descriptions of Obama. In an interview last week with CNN, Schwarzenegger described Obama as "a very strong, aggressive person that is a visionary."
"I think he sees himself as a leader, I think that he had long ago had those inspirations to climb that ladder, he's mapped that out very carefully, he's done a good job at that and he's a great communicator," Schwarzenegger said. "Those are all his assets and it's up to the people. I obviously believe that McCain is the better man, but believe me I think both of them are great candidates."
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