I beg to differ, I do think that the election of Schwarzenegger did imply a marriage of both.
The "TV tabloid" entertainment news programs dedicated much more time to this than any other news programs.
Not that I was keeping tabs, but is just a general impression.
Of course that also happens whenever there's a political scandal (e.g. Gary Condit), and given how Ahnold has always been covered by such programs maybe is not a surprise.

Anyway, I think that an election shouldn't be a popularity and charisma contest, but a matter of electing the person with the best qualifications.
But that never happens today... not since TV came into politics and political debates came into TV. There's a famous, and often repeated, example of the Kennedy/Nixon debate, the very first televised one. Kennedy was the more charismatic and better presented, while Nixon didn't want to have any makeup nor any other "improvements" to his appearance, he also looked less comfortable on camera. The people that saw the debate thought that Kennedy won the debate, the people that only heard it on radio thought that Nixon had won the debate, according to polls.

Image and appearances count for getting votes...

Many critics of the current Mexican president, Vicente Fox, do like to mention that.
"Oh, I want life, I want it now and forever, I want to rise up out of this chamber and clamber into the sky"