One of the bellwether contests this November in the battle for control of the state House is being fought in the 25th Legislative District, where Democratic incumbent Rep. Dawn Morrell garnered only 40% of the vote in a six-way race, compared to GOP runner-up Hans Zeiger’s impressive 36%. There hasn’t been much press coverage of this pivotal race, but what little we’ve seen all focuses on the the same thing: it’s gonna be close.
As a four-term incumbent, Rep. Morrell should be familiar to 25th LD voters; she’s a registered nurse, a moderate Dem and the chairwoman of the House Democratic Caucus. But what do we really know about Zeiger, other than the fact that he might win? Well, if you read the papers, not all that much.
In covering the “tight race” in the 25th, the Seattle Times merely refers to Zeiger as Morrell’s “Republican challenger,” while NW Digest is only a bit less concise, describing Zeiger as a “young GOP upstart … poised to make this a huge upset in November.” The Bellingham Herald also focuses on what it calls a “tough re-election runoff,” but is at least a bit more expository, describing Zeiger as a “political newcomer … a writer and nonprofit professional,” while in its post-primary coverage, the Fife Free Press couldn’t even bother to describe Zeiger at all, instead choosing to let him paint a picture of himself with his own carefully worded written statement:
“As we go forward, I hope that we can conduct ourselves with integrity, civility and a bold determination to preserve our freedom in this most beautiful corner of creation called Washington state,” Zeiger said.
My gosh, what a nice, pleasant, well-spoken, young man, you might be thinking, and you might continue to think just that… if not for Zeiger’s long written record of not quite so carefully chosen words that establish him as a batshit-crazy, far-right-wing, Christianist nutcase whose utter lack of civility, toleration, statesmanship and rhetorical restraint makes Pam Roach sound like Adlai Stevenson.
In one of his many commentaries written for right-wing mouthpiece WorldNetDaily (yes, he’s a regular contributor to WorldNetDaily), Zeiger displays his profound intolerance of religious diversity, railing against Americans United for Separation of Church and State and its president, Barry Lynn:
Frustrated with the fact that the bulk of people involved in the National Day of Prayer actually believe in God, Lynn and his left-wing atheist-secularist-ecumenist allies are holding their own counter-events this year. […] Unitarians, mainstream Baptists, Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, members of the “Military Pagan Network” and other watered-down ecumenists will hold an “Interfaith Day of Prayer and Reflection” on the steps of the Oklahoma State Capitol today to pray to the generic god.
But … the significant difference between the kumbaya sessions and interfaith vigils and atheist protests of the Religious Left and the Bible studies and prayer circles of the Religious Right is that our God is real.
Man… hating on Unitarians, Baptists, Muslims, Jews, Buddhists and their false gods. If that’s Zeiger’s idea of being civil, I’d hate to see him in a bad mood. But in fact, that type of harsh rhetoric is nothing compared to Zeiger’s screeds on education in the oxymoronically named Intellectual Conservative:
This week, the National Education Association at its annual convention is bestowing an award for Creative Leadership in Human Rights to Kevin Jennings, co-founder and director of the Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network (GLSEN). This is notable, not because the NEA is championing the radical homosexual agenda (it has long done so), and not because GLSEN is in our schools (it has long been there), but because both are terrorist organizations and we ought to be reminded of that.
[…] We speak much of terror networks in our time, and here is one of the vilest, for it has made greater progress in the tearing down of American institutions and ideals than Iraq or Al Quaeda have. NEA and GLSEN are not the only groups in the network; the ACLU and NARAL and Planned Parenthood and Americans United for Separation of Church and State and others come to mind.
And we all know what we do to terrorists.
Okay, yeah, sure, the NEA and its “Bolshevist platform” are standard right-wing boogeymen, as are the queers, the pagans, the atheists (and I suppose now, the Unitarians, mainstream Baptists, Muslims, Jews and, of course, those war-mongering Buddhists). But it’s not like Zeiger is so completely batshit-crazy that he’d stray into attacking, say, cute little girls wearing badge-covered sashes…
Next month, the Girl Scouts USA national convention will be held in Atlanta. It will be a gathering of radical feminists, lesbians, and cookie peddlers… During the last couple years, it has become clear that the Girl Scouts – nationally and, in many cases, locally – is allied with the abortion industry and Planned Parenthood… The Girl Scouts is almost as much a part of the radical feminist movement as the National Organization for Women. Knowing the radical agenda of the national Girl Scouts organization, parents need to take action.
That’s the Girl Scouts, for chrissakes… the goddamn Girl Scouts! Cookie peddlers, yes (mmm, Thin Mints)… but radical feminist lesbians? Is this guy out of his fucking mind?
Well… um… yes, he is — and you’d think that a competitive legislative challenger who abuses Unitarians, Baptists, Muslims, Jews and Buddhists for praying to a “generic god,” who accuses teachers unions and gay rights organizations of being a more dangerous “terrorist” threat than al Qaeda, and who derides Girl Scouts USA as a gathering of radical, feminist, lesbian, cookie-peddling abortionists… well, you’d think Zeiger’s own rather radical and offensive views might have earned him a tad more coverage from our local press. There’s a treasure trove of material to work from, just in the Google cache alone; I mean, this is a great story!
Instead, the voters of the 25th LD are treated to crickets from their local reporters, even after a press release went out alerting the media to the more than 50 pages of embarrassing rants that he’s already scrubbed from websites like IntellectualConservative.com. How is this even possible? If I were to run for office, would the press really ignore my long, foul-mouthed record here on HA?
Oh, we’ll get the usual horse race coverage as the November election approaches, no doubt, but if voters actually knew Zeiger for the vile, hateful, intolerant, dominionist theocrat he really is — you know, if voters knew Zeiger from his own words — there’d be no horse race to cover. Which I hope doesn’t explain the pathetic coverage we’ve seen thus far.
“mainstream Baptists”? Yoiks…why didn’t he include Catholics? Maybe he thinks we’re all as crazy as him and Rick Santorum.
Holy shit. Is there a sane Republican left out there? Where are these people coming from and how have they taken over the GOP?
You’re misrepresenting him, Goldy. Having met Zeiger and talked to him for about an hour, I can tell you authoritatively, with little fear of contradiction, that he’s far worse than you make him out to be.
Ummmm…he also lists his opponent as one of his endorsers. Wonder how accurate the rest of that list is…Mainstream Republicans?
it’s bellwether.
Bellwether: a castrated ram (wether) with a bell on its neck that the rest of the flock blindly follows.
notaboomer @5,
So it is. Thanks for the correction.
So if the Girl Scouts are all lesbians, what does that make the Boy Scouts?
Read his bio; Hillsdale College in Michigan. . .says it all.
westello @8,
Well, according Zeiger’s book “Get Off My Honor!: The Assault on the Boy Scouts of America” (with a foreword by Oliver North), I think that makes the Boy Scouts victims of the radical, gay, atheist agenda.
WTF is a ecumenist?
Any word on Zeiger from the Tacoma paper, seeing how the race is in their back yard?
bluneck @ 4:
Dave Morell (one R) is a BIAW-type Republican who held the seat for one term before Democrat Dawn Morrell (two Rs and NO relation) beat him. I hope that clears up your confusion. You’re not the first to stumble over that one.
goldstein, what is “hate speech”? speech is speech, and except for the constraints put on it by court rulings, i can express my thoughts however i see fit, not just how you see fit. its funny how liberals think. massachusetts governor deval patrick said yesterday, regarding glenn becks rally. “its a free country, I WISH IT WASN’T, but it is”. no, misprint, no taking out of context, that’s what he said. is that hatred of american freedom. and he only gets away with it because he’s black, and liberal also.
manoffilth @13,
Most of what you post here is “hate speech.” Hope that clears up the confusion.
Ivan, thanks for the clarification…a bonehead maneuver on my part. I was so excited!
Anyway, the TNT is no longer a newspaper…it’s now merely a place where Peter Callaghan gets to remind people how clever he is. Oh, and they have Shaun Robinson, a great investigative true-crime reporter, too. Otherwise it’s a sad, sad paper.
Joe Turner would have knee-capped Zeiger by now.
mot,
It’s been a tough day. Telling you to fuck off would make me feel better. So, please indulge me as I tell you to fuck off, you piece of shit.
@15
Yep!
@16
mot,
It’s been a tough day. Telling you to fuck off would make me feel better. So, please indulge me as I tell you to fuck off, you piece of shit.
no problem, indulge away
Made the mistake of reading this in a public place, now everyone’s staring at me for laughing my head off.
Have to agree that those little cookie peddlers always get me with the thin mints, bless them–ecumenically of course!
Haven’t a few Republican Congressmen been caught in public restrooms dressed up like lesbian girl scouts?
I think I’m a lesbian.
@20
Haven’t a few Republican Congressmen been caught in public restrooms dressed up like lesbian girl scouts?
i’m guessing it’s the girl scouts you have a problem with, not the lesbian part.
Sludge Puppy needs to take a bath after reading his stuff.
The Freeper’s are carrying on about lesbians and the girl scouts too. How much you want to bet they were doing their “research” and typing up their reports one handed…
I find it interesting that this guy doesn’t tell us what non-profit he works for. What is he hiding????
From the News Tribune
What a bunch of fucking hacks.
Come back Joe Turner, we need you!
@14
Most of what you post here is “hate speech.” Hope that clears up the confusion.
we all have different definitions of hate speech i guess. mine would be you eating choclate and yukking it up to raise money to kill more unborn babies.
Proud Leftist spewed:
That was good. I’m stealin’ it!
Maybe the media aren’t covering it because a GOP legislative candidate being fucking nuts isn’t really news; or, at least, is old news. The path for Zeiger was paved back in 2006 by Mark Griswold with this rant:
“Congratulations Speaker Pelosi, now let the bombs fall where they may. My prediction: terror attack on domestic soil passenger aircraft within the next six months. Casualties in the 2-300 range. And, unfortunately, maybe that’s just what we need. It’s obvious people don’t remember what happened 5 years ago.”
Posted by FullContactPolitics at November 8, 2006 10:52 AM [Emphasis added.]
http://blog.usefulwork.com/cgi.....ry_id=7430
That’s right, a GOP legislative candidate publicly wished for the deaths of innocent Americans in hopes of giving his party a boost at the polls. If that isn’t fucking nuts, nothing is. Gratefully, Griswold got only 15% of the vote, and we can hope Zeiger suffers a similar fate. But that’s still 15% of the voting population in Frank Chopp’s district who are fucking nuts and running loose in the streets. Do you know where your kids are?
@27 So you guys are better because you wait until they’re born before you kill them?
@29
Good point.
TNT posted a blog item on this at 4:30 this afternoon.
@32
After getting scooped and schooled by Goldy at 1:15 PM.
The should have had it in their fucking newspaper the day primary ballots dropped.
O’ God, they still can’t call the guy a fucking whack job.
http://blog.thenewstribune.com.....more-15001
Joe Turner, come back!
Speaking of “false gods”….did you know Glen Beck is a Mormon? He thinks a guy called Joseph Smith was the last profit of god, that Jesus appeared in America, and worships from a “book” added onto the end of the Bible with “new” stuff god told us (Book of Mormon). All those folks out there in Beck land to listen to his show and show up at his rallies, do you know he’s worshiping a satanic false god! I mean there is ONLY one real god obviously, Vishnu. Duh.
@35,
Vishnu my a**, FSM is the one true god.
Oh I know FSM is a real god, I’ve been touched by his noodley appendage (Fremont Fair), and just saying he’s not the REAL god, just A god. Vishnu is the real creator god. Or was it Odin and his 2 brothers? No, wasn’t it the Titans? Whatever. Point is everyone knows Mormons are nuts and (insert your religion) is the only true religion. Duh!
(p.s. “profit” used on purpose, not only to taunt the real estate scheme that is Mormonism, but Becks used car salesmen like tactics…say, did you want to buy some gold!? It’s at an all time high! Remember what the say, buy high, sell…er…wait…)
More frightening, Beck wasn’t born into Mormonism. I can see if you’re born and raised and fear losing your family if you don’t follow the faith, how you can be a Mormon. But Beck joined as an adult in 1999. As a grown up he learned about it and said “yep, that makes sense” and joined up. Wow.
Just had a thought. Last year this time it was:
“Keep your grubby socialist hands of my Medicare!!!”
from the lipton teabaggers..
This year it’s:
“You socialists are committing “generational theft”! Give the rich, the corporations and me our tax cuts NOW!”
“And keep your grubby socialist hands off my social security!!!”
“You’re ‘bankrupting” the country!!”
@38
yeah, you are funny ylb. but whats funnier, is when a democrat says “we can’t AFFORD a tax cut”. thats like saying , “i cant afford NOT to take out a loan”. ylb, you’re almost like mastercard, priceless.
Is Rep. Morrell raising these issues? I agree that the media should lead the way on this, especially since it is so overt, but since they aren’t, wouldn’t it be prudent for Rep. Morrell to start mentioning these insane ramblings every chance she gets? Or does she subscribe to the same milquetoast go-along-to-get-along school as No-Drama-Obama?
@40
Looks like the Democratic Party brought it up because the “journalists” were too lazy and corrupt to actually look into a candidates background.
Alki @ 37: “Beck wasn’t born into Mormonism. I can see if you’re born and raised and fear losing your family if you don’t follow the faith, how you can be a Mormon. But Beck joined as an adult in 1999. As a grown up he learned about it and said “yep, that makes sense” and joined up. Wow.”
Exactly. I have said the same myself. Converting to Mormonism is a truly remarkable feat. No family pressure. The holy underwear, the having family stand around when you fuck your bride for the first time, the tablets requiring the special eye pieces to read . . . There is some weird shit going on there. On the other hand, for my agnostic friends out there (atheism is a religion unto itself, I believe), I know that my religion (liberal Lutheran) seems strange to you. But, really, don’t you think some religions are stranger than others, particularly those that didn’t start until the 19th century?
@37
Beck also talks a lot about his mother’s suicide. Only problem being that she didn’t commit suicide, she skipped work on a sunny day to go on a boat ride with a married man she’d been seeing, they got drunk, went for a swim, couldn’t climb back in the boat and died from hypothermia/drowning.
The Tacoma paper covered his mothers death when it happened and someone dug up the old new story and police reports back when Beck was given the key to the city of um… what the fuck ever city that was… I’d look it up, but I’m lazy. Hey, I’d make a great reporter!
@39 Actually, “We can’t afford a tax cut” is more like saying “We can’t afford to give up the income from our jobs.” And there are times you really “cant afford NOT to take out a loan” or otherwise go into debt, such as emergency medical expenses or when your business requires new equipment in order to expand. The fact is that no conservative lawmaker would consider running a home or business the way they say they want to run the country. Well, maybe Bush – he was a business failure, too.
Republican cant and hypocrisy has one purpose alone: to keep the people divided.
It isn’t speaking to the mind, but to people’s prejudices.
Pointing out that Ted Kennedy was a NIMBY hypocrite and that Al Gore rides in airplanes does not refute the proposition that alternative forms of energy must be found or we’ll poison our environment.
Taxes are society’s way of house training the rich.
@39 You guys like to complain about deficits, so okay, try this on for size, the Reagan and Bush tax cuts for the rich created massive deficits. Shall we say wingnuts are two-faced? Or wingnuts can’t do simple arithmetic? Which is it?
Informed people know reckless GOP policies plunged us into the current economic mess, so why would anyone even think of returning Republicans to power in this lifetime? But many voters are uninformed, and wealthy interests spend billions on propaganda designed to mislead and confuse them. The solution is educating the public. We must get more people to see that voting Republican is like shooting yourself in the balls — it doesn’t make sense, and it’s gonna hurt.
@47
ya, because runaway spending had nothing to do with it.
dumbass.
@48
Correction to the Goebbels Rabbit: informed people dont vote along partisan lines.
An educated public does not vote along partisan lines.
But you wouldnt know anything about that…
Goldy, Goldy, Goldy–
Here is what Americans care about…that Democrats are going to raise taxes and continue massive Deficit Spending!!
Friday, September 03, 2010
Anything to deflect from the actual Voting Records of Dummocrats.
It won’t work Goldy.
The Progressive Movement has had it’s chance in DC and certainly decades in Olympia.
You blew it.
Now prepare for the consequences in 2010 and 2012. ImamObaMao desperately wants the R’s to take control of the House/Senate or both….even though he publicly says he doesn’t care if he is a one-term president.
ImamObaMao says lots of things and does/means the opposite.
You KLOWNS have been duped.
ImamObaMao cares about ImamObaMao.
How can you not see that??
He is throwing the rest of the Dems under the bus.
Deliciously off topic:
Oh my!
Even MORE deliciously off topic:
That good old satisfying ‘told ya so‘ news just keeps rolling in!
Dems cheer for the lipton teabags!
I thought about this too last night.
When a right wing President wants “4 more years”?
He starts a war.
When a left leaning President wants “4 more years”?
He lets the right wing take over Congress and uses his veto pen to keep their batshit insane legislation at bay.
Politics as practiced in this country in the beltway is too freaking weird.
@49
Gimmie, that’s an excellent point.
Yes, Reagan and W. both liked to engage in runaway spending (on things that really help the majority of the people in this nation like Star Wars and an ill-conceived war in Iraq) as well as give out massive tax cuts to the rich.
And since you seem to be agreeing that this is awful economic policy, why do you keep defending these people?
YLB–
What you say is sad…but has a ring of truth to it.
When Obama says “I don’t care if I’m a one-term President”….do you really believe him?
When Bush said he’s a “fiscal Conservative” and proceeded to demand huge blocks of money for the wars and then have close to zero accountability for the spending…that’s when he lost me. Say one thing..really mean the opposite. Politics 101.
The dumbfuck KLOWN sez, “When Bush said he’s a “fiscal Conservative” and proceeded to demand huge blocks of money for the wars and then have close to zero accountability for the spending…that’s when he lost me.”
Yeah, Bush really lost you, KLOWN,
The dumbfuck KLOWN continues, “Say one thing..really mean the opposite. Politics 101.”
It’s more like Psych 101 with you, KLOWN.
Mr. Cynical –
We wanted FDR and we got Bill Clinton. Having a right leaning Congress between the turncoats in the Senate and the Blue Dogs in the House didn’t help.
A smart politician deals with the world as it is. So getting a Bill Clinton is a fait accompli
.
But the Republicans and these lipton teabaggers aren’t interested in solving this country’s problems.
I just wish Republicans would admit that they hate freedom. Look at Zeiger, for example. He’s typical of Republicans. They want to tell you how to live, who to love, which god you will worship, they want to crush the governments of foreign countries, and create a slave class here in the US.
And the fetuses they want delivered to term? LOL They just want ’em alive long enough to die in the factories making war machines, or executed for stealing to feed their families. Republicans only car about the lives that can get them something. They’re selfish people who care nothing of humanity, the earth, or their next door neighbor.
Well, at least in my opinion, that’s what Zeiger and the others in this comment thread seem to be. I’m sure there’s a decent Republican somewhere. Just not here.
60
Republicans like their own freedom. They’re just not too fond of other people’s freedom.
freedom @60 is a clueless, brainwashed lemming.
you fit seattle well. keep surfing those moonbat websites you dolt.
@61
and proud communists like Proud Communist like nobody to have any freedom – accept of course themselves and their party leaders.
why do you hate being a real man – instead you act like a ball-less sissy, constantly wanting to be coddled and taken care of.
cradle to grave, cradle to grave.
lemmings…its whats for dinner
@50
An educated public does not vote along partisan lines.
now you exactly know why the public schools are purpoely set up to turn out morons.
63
You don’t know me. That, of course, hardly precludes you from having some rather detailed opinions about who I might be. Do you wingnut fucks, I mean folks, pardon the French, ever try to reason about anything?
@60
You mean the fetuses they want the state to be able to force women to cary to term! So much for freedom and individual liberty.
@66 I keep trying to help Lost develop his faux-libertarian view of women as murderers of America’s little baby zygotes and blastocysts but I never get any feedback from him. Rather than increasing the size of government by creating a new Department of the Womb and hiring tens of thousands of Pussy Police for the nation’s Pussy Patrol, and as well as overburdening the court and prison systems, I suggested exploding chip implants for women. The chips would monitor a woman’s bodily functions and the moment she aborts – BOOM! Well, not a big boom, actually, just enough to take out a major artery would likely do the trick.
@67
Him and Cyn might go for it if the company that makes the chip is publicly traded, doesn’t employ union workers, and receives huge public subsides.
My family and Hans’ family have been close friends since our parents went to college together. His father Walt and his brother Joe are some of the nicest, most down-to-earth people I know. His grandfather, Ed Zeiger, is a local legend for his work and commitment to the school district, having Zeiger Elementary named after him.
Having said this, I feel awful. I (and the rest of my family) want to tell everyone within shouting distance not to vote for Hans, but we’re afraid to ruffle feathers. So, for me, can we please shout it from the rooftops and make it known how unqualified this guy is?
He door belled my place last night. He seemed nervous and checked my name off a list???????
Did little talking and had a hard time finding his way off the porch. Not impressed.
Clearly this kid does is not who we should be trusting to represent us in Olympia. It scares me to think that he could actually be a threat in this election. Reading his articles motivated me to donate to his opponent Dawn Morrell at http://www.dawnmorrell.org. Hopefully the rest of you are disturbed enough by this guy to do the same…