I’m mildly obligated to point to this, and you can follow the various links there to further explosions of excitement.  It popped up in my “incoming links inbox”, which I think means Jimmy was wavering on linking to something on this blog before deciding I had nothing to link.  After all, the last time I mentioned Doc Hastings, I was posting about Gordon Allen Pross, which is a clear demonstration of my misguided priorities.  But maybe he was looking for this:

1994: JAY INSLEE, ousted. 51%, 48%.
1996: Rick Locke lost 52% to 48%.
1998: Gordon Allen Pross: 25%
2000: Jim Davis, 37%
2002: Craig Mason, 33%.
2004: Sandy Matheson 37%.
2006:  Richard Wright:  40%

So, the would be Speaker-of-the-House (heh heh heh), Richard Doc Hastings, is up by a jarringly small margin over George Fearing in an internal poll.  I recall in 2004, and maybe even last time in 2006, the Democratic candidate releasing an internal poll really early on suggesting something of a race, but the poll was laughable and incredibly leading in its questioning — too much mischief designed to get some donations.  This doesn’t have that motivation, and is at least on the surface pretty straight forward — even if the margin of error suggests anything between Fearing winning by one and Doc Hastings winning by eleven.

So, here in 2008.  Who will win?  Doc Hastings.  What — am I crazy?  You saw the past election results.  The only caveat is that in a “wave election” someone will win a seat nobody expected in their right mind could be won — as with 2006 and her, her, and him.  Somewhere on the map in this nation — a nation where Barack Obama is tossing some late dollars in the states of North Dakota, Arizona, and Georgia–, that seat exists.  And George Fearing wants you to believe it could be this seat.  Do what you can, true believers.

Washington has its Primary Elections today.  Maybe I am just too danged wedded to the Two Party System — theoretically with third parties scattered about now demolished — and its orderliness of decisions, but I don’t really like the idea of the “Top Two Primary”, generally seeing it as a place where some mischief can be borne out, and where some flukes can be passed through.  I guess my fear is, I don’t know… Gordon Allen Pross, by dent of having built in the back of people’s minds by being on the ballot every primary since 1998 and with a segment of the population bemusing themselves in lieu of their vote for the surely transferred to general election Republican incumbent Hastings, will come in second to the unknown Democratic candidate George Fearing.  Or thus is a theoretical example.  Which, I suppose in the twiliht zone where that happens, will make me prophetic, and in the real world where it does not happen would demand of me a cleaner example — though the dynamics would still be at play.  (Then again, these things happen in our conventional system.  Gray Davis staved off his political death by a year by dumping money into the Republican primary on behalf of the ultimately winning candidate.  And the 2008 Montana Republican Primaries and the 1986 Illinois Lt Governor Primary testify to flukes.  So maybe one takes the ingredients of public back-psyches and accept these oddities.  Even if the state has given itselef one more volitile stray electoral ingredient.)

Well.  Warshingtonians.  Vote today.  You have… four hours?  Then you vote again in November.  See how that works?

Evergreen candidate Gordon Allen Pross apparently has something of a permanent campaign website up, via google, complete with a historical review of his voter’s pamphlet statements dating back to 1998.  I do not know what to note from this.  It does appear he has crafted his platform down to his tithing system — described with a description of Lincoln copperhead pennies, further making a historical connection to the political legacy of Abraham Lincoln.  I suspect Pross thinks of himself in the manner of Huey Long, who proclaimed himself of the party of BOTH Jefferson AND Lincoln — beyond party, having travelled a trail from Democrat to Republic to “GOP” — initials he grants two different meanings.

Axe your tax, and oh boy!  Watch out Doc!  Gordon Allen Pross has returned to his old stomping grounds, after flirting with his Senate bids, and is taking YOU ON!

I don’t know what Mccranium refers to here regarding media coverage.  Even a fringe figure of the stature of Pross warrants a trickle of media coverage, and unless I am missing out on 15 minute stories on the KNDO and KNDU Local news at 5 coverage, a trickle is what Pross has here.  And Pross and Ron Paul aren’t really comprable either, as I can point to and flush out real live Ron Paul supporters — Hell!  Forget that some supporters flew a blimp.  Some have decided to form a Ron Paul Commune! — It’s definitely a niche following, but it’s enough to — for instance, disrupt a Republican website’s call for platform policies.  Pross gets you nothing.  Not even a bumper sticker to be found.  Good lord, a google search for “Gordon Allen Pross” pops up my page at #1 — last I checked.

I’m not entirely sure what Gordon Allen Pross thinks he is doing.  It’s hard for me to imagine he thinks he is on the cusp of any type of victory.  To ascertain whether or not that is the case takes a more careful reading of his words than I am compelled to try. 

This is as opposed to the case of Montana’s Bob Kelleher, the perenial candidate whose frequent campaigns garnered him enough name recognition to bolt him to the Republican Senate nomination, who has more or less stated he never expected to win a danged thing.  Kelleher’s campaign hobby can be thought of as something of a Tribune to a Lost Cause, or a host of lost causes.  Pross?  I gots nothing.

Hm.  You know the Republican Party “brand” is in trouble when your perenial oddity candidate does this:

There is the issue of Republicans playing games with the “party preference” on their filing forms.

Some of the Republican candidates decided to file as “Prefers G.O.P. Party” — such as Dino Rossi for Governor, and Jim Wiest for Lieutentant Governor. Gordon Allan Pross filed as “Prefers Grand Old Party” for 4th district U.S. House.

Go figure.  But, as he said in his 2002 bid, “I am so your candidate!“, which is a sentiment that I suppose transcends party.

Imagine 100 people representing 100 percent of the American population to include 100 red headed Lincoln pennies representing all the money in America. Clearly, Congress legislated 59 Lincoln cents to 01 person, then 31 Lincoln cents to 4 people. Therefore 90 percent of the wealth is legislated to 5 percent namely “We the People.”
    While 10 Lincoln pennies are legislated to 95 Americans, or 10 percent of the wealth legislated to 95 percent of the enslaved Americans. This is a 90 percent to 10 percent ratio. It was a snap for Congress to fix these numbers.
    As your United States Senator, together it will be liberating turning this formula upside down so an American citizen will find equality in earning 10 red Lincoln cents through tithing 01 red Lincoln penny to govern. This one red headed Lincoln cent being the absolute one & only tax paid by an American citizen. Together we’ve found Your money for healthcare, education, career track and paid vacations.

Our nation’s fiscal troubles are really just that simple.

Exciting news!  Infused with hopeful signs of political revolution coming out of Montana, Gordon Allen Pross is running again for office, returning to take on Richard “Doc” Hastings in the Fourth Congressional District of Washington State.  I look forward to the debate which I’m sure is a’coming, which will surely be decisive in determining the Republican nominee for this seat.  I do not believe he was forced to answer his thoughts on … um… that.

But neither were any of Gordon Allen Pross’s opponents in that Senate race in 2006.  Besides which, there is the distinct possibility Gordon Allen Pross has written up a new platform, perhaps an anti-war program regarding when the United States might leave Iraq based on figuring out the precise time two trains heading toward each other from different directions at different speeds.

For the past 3 elections in Washington’s 4th Congressional District, Democrats have been gaining ground on Doc Hastings. From the dismal 34% of Craig Mason (no offense Craig) in 2002, the semi-well funded Sandy Matheson in 2004 with 37%, to the wildly underfunded 2006 Richard Wright campaign with 41% there is a serious trend in play and something to watch in 2008.  With record Central Washington turnout in the 2008 Democratic Caucus, and the dismal performance of the WA GOP caucus, 2008 could very well be the year the 4th CD trends back to it’s Democratic roots.     

Hm.

Actually you can chart it back to 1998 when the glorious Gordon Allen Pross garnered 24 percent of the vote.  But to get the unequivocal line upward, you would have to leave out Jim Davis in 2000, who bested Craig Mason by a few percentage points.

That was meant to be snarky.  It is impossible not to be skeptical, and I think we can account for the shifts in percentages to external factors moreso than local voting trend-lines.  Craig Mason under-performed by a few percentage points because he was perceived as a big L liberal egghead college professor type.  Richard Wright over-performed by a few percentage points because the year 2006 saw a Democratic wave, the effect on the Fourth Congressional district were those few points.  Thus the typical result would have to be Jim Davis’s 2000 and Sandy Matheson’s 2004 result of… 37 percent.

I suspect some things offset — presidential election means entrenched partisan voting down-ballot, with a general Democratic year.  Um… better finance (He is the dream candidate in that regard, right?  Self-Financer?)  will bring us…

The trend line back to 1998, skipping over 2000 for convenience, continues!  3 more points still!

But the dawning of a new Partisan order suggests some districts you don’t expect to vote Democratic will indeed do so.  But from the point of view of someone in Seattle or DC, manning purse-strings, it makes complete sense that they would scour about and skip past this and deem, say the fifth district as a better candidate for that.  Then again, that district was a disappointment in 2006 — somewhere in the last wave of suspected possibilities for the political party, and the candidate did not perform much better than Richard Wright’s shoe-string campaign.

I thought Doc was supposed to retire.  Or is he still holding out for the Republican takeover of Congress when he gets to get his dream position of chair of the Rules Committee.  (Maybe he can give up that dream, say, after the 2012 election — which is the next time I can possibly see the Republicans take back the House?)

Hm.  General Betray Us, eh?

While we’re at it, let’s call everybody in the political sphere a name, taking off a rhyme of their real name.  For instance, Oregon has a Senator Gordon Smith that is up for re-election in 2008.  It is something like pick-up opportunity number 5 or 7 for the Democrats.  Here’s his remarks:

Sen. Gordon Smith, one of the few Republican senators who supports legislation ordering troop withdrawals, told reporters Thursday he thought Petraeus’ testimony and the MoveOn.org ad were the two biggest factors in keeping Republicans from breaking ranks with the president: Petraeus’ testimony because it was persuasive and the MoveOn add because it went too far by attacking a popular uniformed officer.

So.  Um.  Senator … Lard And Filth?  That… kind of rhymes?

Yeah, there you go.  Like you have anything better!

New Hampshire has incumbent Endangered Republican Senator #1.  Senator.  Sununu.  Hm.  Senator… Your Mumu.  But that doesn’t strike me as an insult.  Damnedit!

George Bush.  Um.  I think I’ll mock him by calling him… George Bush.  Dick Cheney I’ll mock by referring to as… yes, Dick Cheney.

No, I should really stick to Northwest politicians.  You know, it’s been a while since I mentioned the Congressional critter of my old home — Doc Hastings.  He popped up in the CREW list of “Most corrupt members of congress” — admittedly a bit of a partisan affair that CREW, but a bit of a surprise nonetheless because the strange conventional beltway wisdom had it that the man was an honorable man what with his great handling of an ethics subcommittee that dealt with the James Traficant.  But never mind.  The listing fits well enough Representative Wastings.

Gawd I’m stupid.  I should really think of something that rhymes with “Doc”.

………………………………….

Explanation for the Conventional Beltway actions and reactions in the Senate toward that moveon.org advertisement.  Understand something: I have no real opinion on the ad itself, but am insulted by the existence of this reaction.  The propaganda is being laid on thickly — thou shall not insult this man.  The storyline that follows in the Conventional Beltway does not translate into the real world, and I’m thinking there is work still to be done by that nebulous entity called the “netroots” and the non-netroots grassroots to get to that point where this type of sideshow does not overwhelm our stuffed beltway critters.

The point that Kevin Drum makes in that post, about it being a sign of desperation on the part of the Republican Party — and the Usual Suspects visa vie Fox News,  would make sense, except this is a type of technique used over and over again.  It’s being used when the Republican Party is down, as it is now, just as it was when the Republican Party was up — Desperation has nothing to do with the matter.  Frankly, I think that this show we have been inandated with is as good a vindication for moveon.org’s stupid ad as anything else.

I watched as somebody– I presume mother, even though she seemed a little too young for the three she was toting along — though not inconceivable, also could have been the eldest sister and the oldish woman in the seat adjacent somebody else in the family dynamic, who knows? — hand out some peanut butter sandwich, made out of sourdough English Muffins and peanut butter.  There was this moment when one of the lads, the toddler in the carriage, half handed it toward someone, half didn’t.  The statement was made that the kid wanted to share yet keep the whole thing for himself at the same time.

The site of these three kids  eating the peanut butter sandwiches brought to mind this story:

Trying to remove radioactive sludge that is thick as peanut butter clogged a pump and led to a spill at the Hanford nuclear reservation, officials said Tuesday.

Now workers are trying to determine how to clean the worst spill that Hanford’s tank farm area has had in years.

“The release to the environment of this waste material is not acceptable,” Delmar Noyes, of the U.S. Department of Energy at Hanford, told reporters during a conference call.

No workers were contaminated by the radioactivity and the spill was contained within a tiny area near the waste tanks, so it posed no threat to the public, Noyes said. […]

The waste from the bottom of the tank is so lethal “that a cup full of waste would kill everyone in a room in a short period of time,” Pollet added.
Well, if the United States had the same lax standards for food safety as China, the kids might wel be eating Nuclear Sludge Peanut Butter sandwiches — a cheaper way to the same sensation, I suppose.

Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) today released a list of the most egregious pork barrel projects spilling over in the Fiscal 2008 House Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies (THUD) Act. One section of the bill alone – – Economic Development Initiative (EDI) grants — has $78.2 million in pork spread throughout 480 projects. The purported purpose of EDI is to increase economic development and revitalization, but it is too often used as a pork depository.

Pork is one of those things that is a little hard to dissect.  Any number of congress critters rail against it, and then slice up all they can for their districts — thus having it both ways.  The pork meisters, in the Senate, are Alaska Senator Ted Stevens and West Virginia Senator Robert Byrd — who have wisely staked out their Seniority chairmanships to best enable them to take their jabs at the Federal Budget.  But there is a situation that arises where one dismisses Stevens’s infamous “Bridge to Nowhere” as a farce, and then thinks for Stevens’s somewhat non-descript highway appropriations that it is difficult to see how West Virginia couldn’t use those highways.

CAGW could use a better acronym.  How do you pronounce “cagw” — specifically the dangling ‘w’ at the end?

— $250,000 for construction of the Walter Clore Wine and Culinary Cente in Prosser, WA, in the district of Rep. Doc Hastings (R-Wash.);

— $200,000 for sidewalks, street furniture and facade improvements in Tamuning, Guam, in the district of Del. Madeleine Bordallo (D-Guam)

Maybe the Walter Clore Wine and Culinary Cente will bring in industry and tourism beyond its quarter of a million fund — and usually when I think of any Congress critter and the federal funds he brings in, I stall at the amount that Hanford requires.  But it is maybe a little startling to see that the Representative of Guam — who doesn’t have a vote — is in on the action.  One doesn’t think much of the power that Guam’s representative delegate brings to the picture.  A fifth of a million dollars for sidewalks, street furniture, and facade improvements?  What the heck is street furniture, and how much of the $200,000 is going toward it?
And could Doc Hastings get some funds for rodent removal — Prosser, of course, having had that nationally noted Humongous Marmot problem a year or two ago?

Doc Hastings’s ‘q’-rating is up! Sam Sedar of Air America Radio referenced him the other day, and seemed to — as well as anyone — put the right posit on who the nation knows Doc Hastings as. I paraphrase but I have the gist down, “that Doc Hastings guy.”

Other ways of putting it that I have heard have been “that Doc Hastings guy, from Washington State.”

Which is that Doc Hastings is referenced just often enough with just enough uncertainty as to who the heck he is that you have to qualify his name with “that guy”. Or perhaps people are embarrassed at referring to a self-given nickname “Doc” for a Congressman?

This all is just as well. He might have been the Speaker of the House under extraordinary circumstances. Dennis Hastert had him tapped in case of emergency in the last Congress. Fortunately, I imagine that if things had come to that point, we all in America would have greater things to worry about than who is running the Lower Chamber of the Legislative Branch — better to just go ahead and dissolve the government than put Doc Hastings in charge.
South Central Washington must be proud. The only way my Congress citter can make the news is by making bad Star Trek references on the House floor. And there he’s referred to as “David Who?” Hastings is a vaguely known commodity… who is popping up in the news.