Last night, protesters turned out for a candlelight vigil in San Diego near the Hotel del Coronado, where President and Mrs. Bush were staying. The demonstrators held signs that read, “Send your daughters,” “Mission accomplished?” and “Impeach Bush.”

But one significant no-show in the schedule for the Republican president’s two-day visit to California is the state’s Republican governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger.

According to Chuck Todd of The Hotline, reporting on C-SPAN’s Wasthington Journal, a spokesperson for the president said that Mr. Bush’s schedule in California was very tight and that the White House team was sure the governor was also very busy.

Right. It has nothing to do with the fact that both these pols are polling in the 30’s here in California.

San Diego is a longtime Republican bastion that is reeling from a series of scandals for which a GOP mayor was booted out in mid-term, two GOP city councilmembers are in jail and a GOP US Congressman is facing federal indictments. The president is in the city for a commemoration today of the 60th anniversary of the Japanese surrender at the end of World War II.