Friday, April 28th, 2006...3:03 pm
Boy Named Sue for Senate?
Lefty Progressive Pooh-bah Kevin Spidel has revealed the name of the mysterious individual who wishes to run against Jim Pederson in the Democratic primary: former Senator John Verkamp. Spidel says that my research was not very complete, but maybe it was all part of my plan to get him to reveal the name. Yeah, Spidel fell right into the trap I laid for him.
Verkamp was part of a gang of moderate Republican senators in the middle to late 1990’s. Remember moderate Republican legislators? Who knew we would look back on the Jane Hull years with such nostalgia?
The senators that Verkamp ran with were mostly named Sue, so they were quickly dubbed the “Sue Nation.” Verkamp, for obvious reasons not named Sue, was given the moniker “Boy Named Sue.”
Spidel reports that Verkamp has been making the rounds in progressive circles in Phoenix and will be at anti-war actions over the next few weeks to get his signatures. Good luck to him, but I don’t know if he’s got the oomph to put all of this together over the next six weeks.
NB - I’m lucky that Spidel spilled the beans on this. Otherwise, I would have had to make another guess…progressive party switcher and former legislator from Northern Arizona…hmmm…“Buckey” O’Neill?
13 Comments
April 28th, 2006 at 3:59 pm
I have to wonder about his sincerity in terms of even being a Democrat. As I recall, he was not term limited out, but chose not to run for re-election when they drew the district lines because Flagstaff was thrown in with the reservation. He retired because he concluded (correctly) that a Republican couldn’t win from that district. But if he wanted to switch parties then, it’s not like a Democrat from Flagstaff won’t be listened to by voters on the reservation (just ask Ann Kirkpatrick.) It’s more a matter of he wasn’t willing to run for the legislature as a Democrat. That immediately makes his ‘progressive’ credentials suspect.
April 28th, 2006 at 4:38 pm
Oh goodie. The ideological purity test. That’s always fun.
Will he get a lame acronym-cum-epithet too? Is it DINO or perhaps something more creative?
April 28th, 2006 at 5:35 pm
yup… fell into the trap. spilled it from the pressure of the rum and the rebellion. not so much the romanism.
April 28th, 2006 at 7:28 pm
BNS?
April 28th, 2006 at 11:19 pm
boredinaz:
Actually, I have no problems with former Republicans running as Democrats, IF I believe their conversion is sincere. I voted for Wes Clark in the 2004 primary and intend to vote for Slade Mead this year.
My problem is when I smell a rat. Verkamp made the specific decision not to run for re-election because he didn’t feel he could win as a Republican in the newly redrawn district. Not because he thought he couldn’t win as a person who was from the quarter of the district that is not on the reservation, or whatever, but because he couldn’t win as a Republican. So at that time he placed party loyalty to the GOP ahead of a desire to serve his constituency and an opportunity to continue doing so if he’d switched parties then.
So, it’s not about the party switching, it’s about the WHY he is switching parties. I smell a rat, and when I heard the name the thought popped into my head that the GOP could be setting him up to run against Pederson in the primary for the purpose of running a smear campaign.
I’m not saying that I have any evidence that this is so, but neither do you have any proof it’s not.
April 29th, 2006 at 9:00 am
Kevin didn’t stand a chance, sensei!
Sooooo, what is the deal with Verkamp? He get religion or something?
Why the Filp Flop, er change of heart?
I’m all for a good tussle in the primary, as long as most of the focus is on how bad Bush/Kyl is and how we are going to turn things around.
Getting the policy ideas out there and forming a real platform using all the candidates to promote it and get behind the winner.
Is that too much to ask? Yea, I figured it was . . .
April 29th, 2006 at 7:26 pm
I collected my thoughts about Verkamp running for Senate and posted them here
April 30th, 2006 at 11:28 am
Anybody remember what Verkamp said when he decided not to run? “Maybe if my name were John Yazzie Begay.” Um, not funny, John.
Anybody remember when he got pulled over in Flagstaff with a blood alcohol level of over twice the legal limit? Or the second time that happened?
Now if Randall Gnant had decided to run, I’d be all about it. But Verkamp? I voted for the guy every election he ran, but he’s simply not qualified enough, or together enough, to run for Senate against Pederson.
April 30th, 2006 at 2:44 pm
Oh boy. Even better than the ideological purity test … the conspiracy theory.
Excellent! Thanks for making my day, eli.
April 30th, 2006 at 10:42 pm
I would say he’s probably sincere about this. I ran into Verkamp about a year ago and he was raving about the book “What’s the matter with Kansas?” and talking about how the GOP had deserted him. Not really a surprise that he’s gone all the way to the other side now. Of course that doesn’t mean he has a prayer of winning the primary.
May 2nd, 2006 at 8:41 am
I know he’s sincere. I have read his position paper on the issues, and he represents the Democratic Party 100% better than Jim “I’m an Independent” Pederson.
Pederson is not anti-war, and he’s not running an anti-Bush campaign. He doesn’t realize that all other issues will fall into place after these 2 cancers on our society are eradicated.
May 4th, 2006 at 1:20 pm
I think we’ve missed one of the major points in this discussion: why would anyone, especially a progressive, actually support Verkamp at this point?
Jim Pederson is not perfect, but he is viable. Verkamp will never be able to raise enough money to even compete with Pederson or Kyl, so why aren’t Spidel and other progressives encouraging him to run for an office that he can actually win and create change? Why isn’t Verkamp running against Renzi or for Secretary of State or State Treasurer? Is this run just symbolic and, if so, why back it?
We need real change, not symbolic change. Good candidates too often run for offices they can’t win to make a point, when they could be making change by running for something a little lower down the political rung. We need to encourage the Verkamps and the Latases of the world to help the progressive movement by running for the leg or state offices that they can win. Jeff Latas would be a great legislator and lives in a district he might be able to take away a Republican seat. But he’s running for Congress instead.
As progressives, we need people running at every level, and we should be honest with people about that and about their chances. If we’re not, we’re not helping the movement, we’re hurting it.
May 14th, 2006 at 6:50 pm
Hello , this is Leonard Clark. I am the other democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate. I have been officially filed with the Federal Elections Commission for over a year as a candidate for this race even though I have not raised the $5,000 dollars that would require me to file.
Ladies and Gentlemen, I believe I am a personal victim of Mr. Kyl in that when I first filed to run for the U.S. Senate in Iraq (months before Pederson and a year before the other candidate) he had in my opinion a corrupt general or civilian leadership or both go after me like vicious dogs and I believe someone in the leadership of the U.S. Army carried out his or one of his friends desires to have my platoon go out on a section of road that was known to have already killed many other soldiers including some people I loved very much. I did not know if I would be “allowed” to return alive from Iraq but I thank GOD that some how I did.
I believe that I am not exaggerating when I tell you that I have collected a good many signatures and that if the people of Arizona continue to do so that they will hopefully put a candidate on the ballot who does not run from Neo-Con corrupt leaders like Senator Kyl. Again, I have seen personally, the results of gross icompetence and corruption of leaders like Senator Kyl in the worst form: the needless killing of my fellow soldiers in that we were sent out without proper equipment and that as a result of this icompetence and corruption personal soldiers I knew were killed.
Ladies and Gentlemen, I hope that you will know that I am a serious candidate supported by many serious grassroots people who feel they are being ignored. I and the rest of the people on our campaign: “Grassroots Democrats for Leonard Clark” only ask that the people of Arizona who do not know that I have returned alive from Iraq be told so and that I am keeping my pledge to them and my fellow soldiers (alive and dead) that I Leonard Clark a proud native of Arizona and child of the greatest mother and father who ever lived (Lillian and Roy Clark) am running as a Democratic Candidate for the U.S. Senate.
Ladies and Gentlemen, one last thing I would like to state is that some (not all) of the leadership of the U.S. States Army has lied and tried to smear me and my family name. This is the same leadership that lied about the Pat Tillman case. I am proud to have served in the U.S. Army but I believe that it is being destroyed by a few corrupt leaders who are foregoing their ethical duties to their men and to the constitution whom are throwing low ranking soldiers such as myself in jail while they clear themselves of “inhumane treatment of detainees.
They claimed through the central command (CENTCOM of The U.S. Army) that due to a “Freedom of Information Request” by NPR that they released private details of my punishment that would normally be kept under their own privacy laws (and I was assured by U.S. Army Lawyers that would be the case. There’s just one thing wrong: Rene Gutel of the local NPR station (KJZZ) who worked on the story told me that she never on the behalf of NPR put in a “Freedom of Information Request on me” . The Public Affairs Colonel who stated this through U.S. Army Centcom was a Colonel whom I believe was stationed in Iraq at the time. I personally believe Mrs. Gutel over these same leaders who been proven to be liars in the past.
Thank you to the producers of this blog, for having the journalistic integrity to report my side of the story. More information can be found on my campaign at : thedamnliberal.com and a google search with leonard clark soldier blog will also shed more information. Thank you.
Leonard Clark
Democratic Candidate for the U.S. Senate in Arizona
Below, is a letter I just have just sent via the Internet to Senator Kyl and will be going on my website soon:
Mr. Kyl. It is you and your ilk in the Congress and in the Senate who continue to claim we are at war. But, sir, you disingenuously left out the fact that without a declared war against that first monster Al Qaida (the second one being your Fascist blood-money Industrial Complex hooligan friends that control the congress) that you have given your king and god George W. Bush a blank check to wage a war in which you and your Fascist ilk are not held accountable. Even Abraham Lincoln, had to answer to the Congress about little matters like generals who would not fight or why the confederates were winning.
Just as a child who goes to school must be held accountable by a report card you and your crooked politician friends must be held accountable.
After all, if you and your conservative ilk demand that our children be held accountable with grades on report cards then you too must set the example. But instead, all you and your congressional ilk can do is say that this undeclared war on the terrorist and our constitution will continue on for years and years and years. Hmm… sounds like your blood-money contracts will continue on and on for years while my fellow Americans and soldiers die (along with our constitution) in cold blood while you make your damn blood money.
Shame on you! Disgrace on you! You may be used to those other democratic leaders who run from you like victims running from vicious dogs but you sir, have met your match! You may tear me to shreds (like you tried to do in Iraq, when you found out I was running against you and had your corrupt general or generals helping you) but I will stand against you and your fasicst ilk for this is not just your country!
Of course, I do not imply violence like you and your thugs practice but in the end you and I will all meet our maker and our day of atonement!
Just remember: this damn liberal does not run from fascist Neo-cons like you!
P.S. If you think you are going to send your hooligans to harm my near family just know that the world is watching you and your fascist Neo-Con party’s every move just like it did in Iraq when you came after me.
Leonard Clark
The Damn Liberal thedamnliberal.com
Inner City School Teacher
and Democratic Candidate for the U.S. Senate in Arizona
IMPEACH BUSH! NOT ONE MORE AMERICAN SOLDIER SHOULD DIE IN IRAQ! N.O.M.A.S. !
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