California's "statute of limitations" law imposes a deadline -- usually six years or less -- for prosecuting any but the most heinous crimes. The time limit on civil lawsuits is even stricter, ordinarily one year from the date of the alleged injury.

But in California politics, there appears to be no statute of limitations on using instances of youthful behavior as campaign ammunition.

Earlier this year, Republican Congressman Darrell Issa was bombarded with allegations about his supposed brushes with the law as a young man after he personally committed upwards of $2 million to the campaign to recall Gov. Gray Davis. Some Democratic operatives openly referred to him as a "car thief," despite his long and successful business career.

The vilification campaign against Issa worked, contributing greatly to his tearful decision to drop out of the race to succeed Davis, should the governor be recalled on Oct. 7.

Now, the two leading candidates to succeed Davis, Republican movie star Arnold Schwarzenegger and Democratic Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, are facing suggestions that in the 1970s, they engaged in personal or political behavior that somehow renders them unfit to become governor in 2003.

Schwarzenegger has been fielding -- somewhat clumsily -- reporters' questions about a 1977 Oui magazine interview in which he, then a world-famous bodybuilder, boasted of his sexual exploits, including group sex. And Bustamante has been explaining -- with more success -- his involvement as a college student 30 years ago with a Latino student group that some contend has a racist and separatist tinge.

Enough already.

Aside from a few absolutist zealots, it's doubtful whether many Californians care what Schwarzenegger or Bustamante did three decades ago -- if for no other reason than any real human being has done youthful things that he or she would just as soon not have dredged up in middle age. That's what human maturation is all about; as you age, you learn and evolve.

An office seeker's proper response to some opposition researcher's revelation of youthful indiscretion should be something like this: "When I was young and foolish, I was young and foolish. I've learned from my mistakes and as a mature adult I'm now seeking office. End of story."

As they contemplate whether to recall Davis and install someone else in the governorship of the nation's most populous state, Californians should reject all of the sludge that's being dredged up from the past about those seeking the office. They should demand that the campaigns and the media deal with the candidates and issues as they exist now -- and heaven knows there's plenty of material.

Whether Schwarzenegger was being truthful or boastful about his sexual exploits in Oui is immaterial, although his multiple explanations this week may say something about his current credibility. The important question about him is whether, as a political novice, he is capable of governing California should Davis be ousted, because the state sorely needs a governor who engages its many problems. And to date, Schwarzenegger has not been reassuring on that front.

Whether Bustamante subscribed to some nationalistic pipe dreams as a college student is equally pointless. The real question about Bustamante is whether he would be an effective governor and not in bondage to monied interests -- especially since Davis' governorship has been tainted by such influence. We should focus on such matters as Bustamante's acceptance of millions of dollars from Indian tribes with gambling casinos that also retain Bustamante's political guru, Richie Ross, as their lobbyist, thus violating the spirit -- and perhaps the letter -- of state campaign laws.

Despite the hoopla that has surrounded the campaign -- especially with Schwarzenegger in the fray -- this fundamentally is, or should be, serious business. We should toss out an incumbent governor only if we are convinced that he is beyond redemption and that we can't tolerate three more years of wheel-spinning. We should elect someone to succeed him only if we are convinced that it will improve the quality of governance. It would be foolish, even destructive, to go through this and wind up with another dysfunctional governorship.