Hey… it looks like annointed GOP senatorial nominee and Safeco CEO Mike McGavick will draw a primary challenger after all. Um… sort of. Fresh on the heals of his surprisingly strong third place finish in the 2004 Republican senatorial primary, Brad Klippert is once again seeking to represent the right wing of his party.
In the 2004 voter pamphlet Klippert wrote:
I, Brad Klippert, am a husband and father. I am a full time law enforcement officer, a veteran and active Major/pilot in the U.S. Army National Guard. I have a Masters Degree in Teaching and I am a licensed minister.
I am a God fearing, Bible believing, Ten Commandment honoring, evangelical Christian candidate. I firmly stand for and fully support traditional family values; the committed marriage between a man and a woman/husband and wife.
I believe that every life is precious and valuable with great potential; including the life of unborn children.
Hard to argue with any of that… that is, if you are a God fearing, Bible believing, Ten Commandment honoring, evangelical Christian. Which raises an interesting dilemma for McGavick, who needs to run to the left of his party to have a hope of capturing enough Democratic and independent voters to beat Cantwell, yet not so far to the left so as to disenchant the right wing of his party.
Now, I’m certainly not suggesting that Klippert can mount a serious primary challenge, but given the opportunity, his candidacy could serve to help Christian conservatives focus attention on everything McGavick is not. You know… one of them. Sure, he’ll try to pander to the religious right, but to win statewide he’s going to have to run one of those undefined, mushy centrist campaigns with a wink and a nod to the right. (Think Rossi.) But if Klippert forces him on a couple key issues, that won’t be so easy.
Where does McGavick stand on choice? On gay marriage? On teaching Intelligent Design? My guess is that the contrast between the ordained minister and the preordained nominee is pretty stark.
The problem for McGavick is that contrary to popular belief, Christian conservative voter turnout can be pretty soft, especially when the Republican candidate gives them little to get excited about. And as much as McGavick needs to draw votes from Dems and independents, he also needs a strong showing from the GOP base.
McGavick’s strategy will be to pretend that Klippert doesn’t exist, so don’t expect to see any candidate debates. But while the state GOPolitburo will surely treat Klippert like a fringe candidate, I hope the editorial boards give him his say and allow him to draw McGavick out on important issues of the day. Voters in both parties deserve to know where McGavick stands; it would be a disservice to allow him to duck controversial issues the way Dino Rossi did in 2004.
It’s not just McGavick who deserves a primary challenger… it’s the voters.
Holy shit! There is a God! And she’s a Democrat!
Goldy, if you check out Brad Klippert’s candidate write-up, you’ll notice his hero is Ron Puryear. Who is he? He’s the head of Quixtar, a cultish pyramid-scheme style business.
Brad Klippert, an evangelical Christian, could have said his hero is Jesus Christ. But he didn’t. That’s scary.
Also, Brad’s just to the right of Mullah Omar, head of the Taliban. Yikes.
The GOP, riding its crest, may seem like a monotholic and crackless juggernaut — but it’s not. The relationship between the fundies and party is like the uneasy alliance between the USSR and China in the last days of the Red tide — it’s not what it appears. The fundies have little or no party loyalty, won’t hesitate to walk, and eventually will revert to what they were before W came along — sideliners who refused to vote or participate in the political process if they couldn’t get their way.
Of course Maria’s got a primary challenger too. If he can move her on the war, that might be a good thing. So primary challenges can work to our advantage twice.
Now, instead of winning by 15 points, she Senator Cantwell will win by 20 points!
Thank you to all the bible-thumpin’ theocrats who want to run on the GOP ticket. You’ll assure a Dem win quicker than anything we could do!
YEE HAW!
One of your best assessments Goldy.
I find little to disagree with.
Which raises an interesting dilemma for McGavick, who needs to run to the left of his party to have a hope of capturing enough Democratic and independent voters to beat Cantwell, yet not so far to the left so as to disenchant the right wing of his party.
Which is similar to what Kerry tried to run in 2004, trying to be moderate enough to capture the middle ground but not too moderate to alienate the far left (then I would have said the Deaniacs).
Kerry’s problem, in my opinion, was that his method of doing so left him looking as if he lacked conviction because his positions were too nuanced. McGavick faces the same challange, be appealing without appearing too weak and lacking conviction.
I don’t think he can beat Cantwell, not this year. Rossi might have been able to leverage his momentum into voctory, but he chose not to run, leaving the GOP without a serious contender, as far as I can see.
Question: will Cantwell be working a similar strategy, considering her lead in the polls?
If not, should she?
It is interesting to realize that the moderates have become the swing vote.
I don’t think anyone can beat Cantwell this year. She has done a superlative job of grabbing headlines and leveraging Washington voters’ “green” leanings in one fell swoop. And Washington is, after all, a “true-blue” state.
Rossi is just background static. A real estate salesman and apartment house landlord whose experience in running large organizations consists of supervising one part-time janitor when he was in college. He leveraged good looks, a slick tongue, and a one-trick-pony legislative career into a run for governor against this state’s best qualified candidate since Dan Evans. He should not have come anywhere near succeeding — it should have been a blowout — but a never-to-be-repeated combination of W coattails, an energetic Libertarian siphoning away the gay vote, and a Gregoire stumble in the black community, nearly elected him by default. It won’t happen again. Rossi is a wisp of smoke in the wind; the closest he will ever get to the Governor’s Mansion or a U.S. Senate office is as a ticket-holding tourist.
“I believe that every life is precious and valuable with great potential; including the life of unborn children.”
Statements like this always make me wonder a bit….
Does this mean that Mr. (Rev.?) Klippert does not believe in the death penalty?
Perhaps, Mr. Klippert believes in increasing financing for all public schools so the children there can reach their potential.
Maybe Mr. Klippert believes that we should make sure all of our children have basic health care.
Or maybe he does not really have the courage of his convictions at all.
It will be interesting to see how much support Mr. Klippert actually can manage.
Like Nindid @ 9, I’m interested in the questions that can be brought up in the contrast between the two Republicans.
It would be interesting to see if the Republican taliban can come up with a Biblical justification for the insurance business. Maybe they’ll discover that Safeco Field is a temple of Satan!
Given Mk the Redneck’s tutorial on mathematical measures of average and central tendency yesterday, I have to wonder are there similar distinct and spinable measures of ideological stance?
That such an unapologetic evangelical whack-job as Brad would presume to represent Wash. in the U.S. Senate galls me as much as the notion of President Hilary galls the trolls who regularly cut and paste their nonsense here.
We hear a lot about the liberal bias in the media, though Noam Chomsky would disagree (and he’s not even talking FoxNews). We hear about the far left, but who is that exactly? Jim McDermott? Maybe, but might one say that opposing war and protecting hard fought progressive ideals in the face of militaristic mercantilistic extremists run rampant is pretty moderate.
Moderate republicans? I can’t think of many. Olympia Snowe, maybe. Moderate Democrats? Nearly all of them.
Poster @11
“Far Left” = anything to the left of the Republican or DINO speaking at the moment.
Phil,
It would be interesting to see if the Republican taliban can come up with a Biblical justification for the insurance business.
Why should they? I guess I don’t understand the question.
Thanks George…
For Domestic Espionage to keep us safe from Terrorists.
For Secret Prisons conducting Torture overseas to keep us safe from Terrorists.
For Over 2200 dead American Soldiers to keep us safe from Terrorists.
For Over 30000 dead Iraqis to keep us safe from Terrorists.
For Michael Brown and FEMA which did a great job down in New Orleans.
For Outing a CIA spy who had the audacity to be married to a person who disagreed with you.
For Scooter Libby who just doesn’t know when to tell the truth.
For KKKarl Rove, who has never told the truth.
For John Bolton, the US Ambassador to the UN who never let facts stand in the way of “good” intelligence reports.
For John Roberts, who will lead us forward into the 1950s.
For keeping the DOW below 11000.
For finally giving the Iraqis their chance at an Iran-type Theocracy.
For the Patriot Act to keep us safe from Terrorists, but not from YOU.
For Giving, Giving, Giving our tax money to the Big Oil interests.
For Giving, Giving, Giving our tax money to the Big Pharmaceuticals.
For Giving, Giving, Giving tax breaks to the top 1 percent.
For Losing 8.8 BILLION dollars somewhere in Iraq.
For the No-Bid contracts given to Halliburton.
You’ve had a busy year. Why don’t you take some time off. It appears that God is upset with you and is attempting to burn down Texas, kind of like He blew down Senators Lotts house. Maybe you need to get FEMA in….
Happy New Year to all on this Blog, see you next year, and keep up the good work Goldy.
oops, comment stuck in filter… anyway, Happy New Year to all, and see you next year…
There are websites that debate passages in the Bible, and how they could be interpreted today. I found one that seemed to say that lending money to poor people is against God’s law, which really scares the shit out of payday loans centers and the banking industry.
Some GOoPers take the Bible literally, but not that literally.
Poster – The left sees the world in two camps:
1) Rational intelligent reasonable people who just happen to agree with them.
2) Right wing kooks.
This shows that your biases are so deeply ingrained that you don’t even know they’re there anymore. I heard about people like you, but it’s interesting to actually see it here, in apparent seriousness.
Wasn’t Dukey a God fearing, Bible believing, husband, fighter pilot also?
Mk the Redneck,
au contraire. Without resorting to the personal attack, are you – someone who consistently blusters on the right side of the spectrum (at least as it’s debated here in HA) – really qualified to tell us how the left sees the world?
I’m quite aware of my biases. My handle here conveys that as clearly as yours does. I don’t deny that there may be rational intelligent reasonable people who might not agree with me.
In contrast, I tend to see people on the right dismissing those who disagree with them as naive, godless, elitist, orselfish. Am I wrong about that?
I’m not a democrat; I’m an independent. I just happen to find myself voting democrat the overwhelming majority of the time.
Happy New Year!
P.S. Goldy, what kind of beer do you like? I’d pledge online, but I don’t know what percentage of my contribution would actually go to the cause…
Poster Child @20,
I’ve become a big fan of Manny’s Pale Ale recently, though I don’t believe it’s available in bottles. I’m beginning to overdose on the winter ales, so I’ve started moving back towards the hops.
We should all Fear God and give glory to Him. Soon His hour of judgment will come! Worship Him who created the heavens and the earth!
Golly fire_one you forgot the Shaw Group no-bid contracts, led by a big time CEO democrate! But then again you would because the truth of both sides getting no-bid contracts would trash your diatribe above!
Poster-Child: We already a nut-case whack-job representing us. And she is a dumb nuj-case whack-job too. Patty “Maybe Osama is Good” Murray!
Goldy: You decided to eat another great Puddy post huh? It’s been many hours and I posted around the time you posted your response above at 1.24 PM. I thought you had a great appreciation for posters on the other side. I see now I was wrong about you. I guess I am SCARING you lately!
Puddinghead @23,
Jesus… get a life.
The only time I actually read your comments are when I find them in the spam filter.
Anyway, just so you don’t take any offense, I should warn you that I’m about to go out for the evening, and probably won’t be back to empty the filter until well after midnight.
Thank you Goldy. I hope your evening out is fruitful and jolly. I hope you are not driving home under the influence!
Pudding @25,
Arrived home safely… thanks for your concern. (FYI I always drive under the influence… but never of intoxicating substances.)
I was hoping you’d tell us if maria ever goes to church?
You can dump on the far right all you want (and you do), but what do you offer from the left…for those of us who are believers?
Part of this is, no really……do any local democrats regularly attend church? Ok, sims, good for him. Murray? Maria? Baghdad Jim? (1x a yr at st marks doesn’t count).
I think you could turn a lot of righties your way if the dems weren’t so negative towards religion
righton –
Bill Clinton atteded church regularly all his life. Still does. Does or did that ever mean a damn thing to you?
Maybe the difference between Right and left is that to us, Maria’s religious beliefs are her own damn business.
Re-elect Jimmy Swaggart!