After reading this week that he'd bought a cig I knew there was no way he'd resist a Cuban LOL That luxury hotel's downtown near the Parliament buidings, along the beginning of a mainly uninterrupted scenic 25 minute drive along the canal to the airport.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger fired up a Cuban during his trip to Canada this week, but did he break U.S. law to do it? California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's unexplained public sojourn into criminality on a quick stopoff taken on the way to the airport while leaving Canada's capital.
According to the CanWest News Service, Schwarzenegger unexpectedly ordered his limo driver to stop at Ottawa's Westin Hotel, and sent an aide into the International News Plus shop off the lobby, apparently to purchase the 'Governator' a cigar.
Store clerk, Rahmat Assad explained his stunned surprise at being confronted by an officer of the Governor's Canadian security detail and told to prepare for a visit from a "special guest."
"I was very surprised. I couldn't believe my eyes. I've seen his movies."
Describing the Governor as dressed casually in a blue shirt, Assad said he stayed only long enough to have his aide purchase a sixteen dollar (cdn.) Partagas cigar.
"They paid for it," said the star-struck Rahmat, adding; "he put it in his mouth, and he left."
Schwarzenegger is one of the world's more famous cigar smokers, appearing with regularity in the pages, and on the cover of Cigar Aficionado, an upscale life-style magazine glorifying the weed.
As President Clinton before him, Arnold may find this cigar a bit of a public relations problem, because Partagas is a Cuban cigar; that is to say: It is a crime for an American citizen, whether in the U.S. or abroad, to purchase Cuban goods.
But did he inhale?
The cagey Arnold may have some defense here, as it was his aide who purchased the offensive stogey. And, the fact he was not witnessed actually lighting it, he may contend the Partagas was an official research project, spontaneously launched by the Governor for some as yet classifed reason.
Or, he may have to take the fall for breaking the decades-old embargo against Castro's tiny island, a perennial thorn in America's side?
Arnold can afford the fine, but how would a criminal record effect his long-rumoured ambitions for the presidency?
True, only American-born citizens are currently allowed the privilege of standing for the presidency, though there has been concerted efforts in recent years to overturn the centuries-old law.