One Republican gubernatorial contender, Bret D. Schundler, even suggested that Democrats had put Mr. McGreevey's lover up to the blackmail scheme to ditch the embattled governor while keeping the governor's office in Democratic hands.

They made quite a pair, the embattled governor of this weary state and the rotund basketball star whose very name suggests rebirth.

Keep Davis off the tube until the end, when you buy statewide time to telecast a movie-star-studded rally, followed by a short, penitent, promissory pitch from the embattled governor to rescind his $150 car tax.

The state will be led by an embattled governor mired in personal and legal problems for three months.

The voter revolt in California sent a jolt through national political circles on Tuesday night, raising the possibility that other embattled governors could face similar insurrections in an atmosphere of rising animosity toward incumbents and increasingly anger-driven campaigns.

IN 1991, Garry South arrived here with no job, few contacts and $16,000 from cashing out his pension after three years as communications director for the embattled Democratic governor of Ohio, Richard F. Celeste.

Gray Davis, the embattled governor of California, is getting an unwanted lesson in speech pathology.

Within the territory there were four petitions circulated expressing support for the embattled governor, one by Mormon residents, one in the northern counties, and two by anti-Ring groups.

Later that year, Eastwood offered to film a commercial in support of the embattled governor, and in 2001, the star visited Davis' office to support an alternative energy bill written by another Democrat, California State assemblyman Fred Keeley.