KANSAS CITY, KAN. ? The event was designed to raise money for breast cancer research, but Warren Buffett couldn’t help but get a plug in for his choice for the next governor of California.

Buffett, the second-richest man in the world, also is campaign financial adviser for candidate and actor Arnold Schwarzenegger. Buffett spoke Thursday night at a grand-opening event for Nebraska Furniture Mart, which he owns.

“Arnold is a very good man,” Buffett said. “He’s a very serious man. He’s willing to take on some serious problems in California.”

The gala, which drew more than 1,200 people, raised more than $200,000 for a mammography machine at KU Med, the hospital affiliated with Kansas University.

Though Buffett, a native of Omaha, Neb., and chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, said Schwarzenegger was a serious candidate, he opened his remarks Thursday night with some humor.

“I’m Warren Buffett,” he said. “I’m not Arnold Schwarzenegger. A lot of people have difficulty telling us apart. Our mothers kept on getting us mixed up.”

And he quoted Schwarzenegger’s character in the movie “Terminator” when talking about the promise of the 720,000-square-foot store near the Kansas Speedway.

“To our competitors, I’ll say, ‘Hasta la vista, baby,'” he said.

Tickets to the gala were $50, but about 150 people paid $500 each to meet the 72-year-old Buffett before the gala and have their photos taken with him.

Forbes magazine lists Buffett’s worth at $30.5 billion. The world’s richest man, Bill Gates, is worth $40.7 billion.

An auction Thursday night raised about $110,000 for KU Med. Del Dunmire, who owns Growth Industries, a Grandview, Mo., aircraft parts company, paid $90,000 to have lunch with Buffett in Omaha.

That may be a bargain. A similar lunch recently sold on eBay for $250,000.

Dunmire said if he and Buffett talked about business, he could earn more than $90,000 based on the conversation.

Dunmire said he wanted to talk about purchasing silver. Buffett purchased an estimated 15 percent of the world’s silver supply in 1998.

“He’s the biggest silver hoarder in the world,” Dunmire said. “If the next Great Depression hits, he’ll be worth 10 times as much as anybody else.”

Dunmire said he expected a lively lunch conversation with the multibillionaire.

“We’ll pass trivia,” he said. “He probably knows more trivia than I do.”

Nebraska Furniture Mart also presented the first-ever Rose Blumpkin Award for Excellence to Carol Fabian, a cancer researcher at the Medical Center. The award was named for the founder of the company.

Irene Cumming, president and CEO of KU Med, said she appreciated Buffett’s help in raising money and awareness for the hospital’s research.

“We just feel honored he took the time to offer his prestige and presence for the event,” Cumming said. “It really added to it.”