Saturday, July 15th, 2006...6:55 am
The Arizonization of National Politics?
I am so jealous.
See, for the past couple of decades, Arizona has had some screwball politics. Lately, not so much. In some ways it’s a good thing. Better to debate actual policy than whether or not the Governor wants the word “pickaniny” in public school text books, I say.
Now, everyone else seems to get the strange campaigns. As hot as the CD-8 race has been, there hasn’t been anything there to cause us the national embarassment of past candidates and scandals.
For example: Florida. They have been outdoing us lately. Well, “they” may be a strong word, it’s really “she.” She meaning Republican Senate Candidate Katherine Harris. Frankly, the fact they couldn’t find a better candidate in what they claim to be the “red” state of Florida speaks volumes about some of their party’s troubles this year. This woman’s bizarre behavior has been fodder for every liberal blogger (an amusing, and creepy, incident can be found here) and led her entire staff to quit. Twice even. No word yet on whether shoe-minder Gator is still working for her. Now it has come out that she leveled allegations at talk show host and former congressman Joe Scarborough in a strange attempt to keep him out of the race. It almost seems that the woman is spending more time fighting off her fellow Republicans than running against Senator Bill Nelson. I’m not complaining. I hope she moves to Arizona after this.
No surprise about Florida, but a surprise about this one: Connecticut. Most of you are familiar with the race between Ned Lamont and Joe Lieberman. What you may not know is that, yes, the Republican Party is actually fielding a candidate: Alan Schlesinger, a former state representative and former mayor of Derby. Yeah, I don’t know where that is either. Even a junkie like me couldn’t name this guy until last week when a report surfaced that he had been picked out as a card counter at a couple of casinos and started registering at them under a false name to avoid detection. Justin Rood of Talking Points Memo had a talk with the guy:
That’s what happens to you when you try to do something for the people…I just picked up 10 points in name recognition.
And…
I’m like a cult hero now…I guess I’ll never be able to go to another casino.
Um, yeah, being picked out as a problem gambler is a good thing. Republican leaders are pressing the guy to quit.
That isn’t to say that the Democratic Primary isn’t any fun. Lieberman is running a suprisingly inept campaign. If you want proof of this, check out one of his amatuerish ads. Also fun is to check out Lamont’s response. If nothing else, you’ll see that Lamont’s strength in this race is not his, uh, personal charisma.
6 Comments
July 15th, 2006 at 8:18 am
Derby was the location of Charlton Comics back in the day. The two big companies, Marvel and DC, were located in nearby New York City and struggling comics artists and writers would work there before they got their start.
Charlton had a reputation for being a bit half-assed as a comic book company.
July 15th, 2006 at 8:31 am
Suh, Son of Vulcan and Peter Cannon…Thunderbolt were not “half-assed.”
Now Atlas comics, that was half-assed.
July 15th, 2006 at 9:00 am
The CT race has been getting a lot more coverage, and to be fair it’s earned it, but the Harris antics have certainly been a lot more fun to follow. Very weird.
July 15th, 2006 at 9:24 pm
There’s a good reason why Arizona politics today are noticeably less corrupt than in some other states.
It’s called the Arizona clean elections law.
Even with the recent revelation that some lobbyists have been buying lunch for our legislators, this pales into insignificance compared to the big money they’ve been able to dump in other states and at the national level. And donating a ton of money doesn’t do any good for them if it is to a candidate whose opponent is running clean (Matt Salmon and his backers got a lesson in that four years ago), so they don’t, and therefore our candidates don’t get bought that way.
In this year that has brought us the ugly end of Jack Abramoff, Duke Cunningham, and Tom DeLay, let us be thankful for the Arizona clean elections law that has spared us this kind of scandal here.
Now, if only the rest of the nation would pass something like that on a national level, then we wouldn’t have Senators and Congressmen who sell their souls in Washington.
July 15th, 2006 at 9:27 pm
I don’t hope that Katherine Harris moves to Arizona. I hope she moves to Bhutan or some similarly obscure place so we never have to see or hear of her again.
July 15th, 2006 at 9:27 pm
If Katherine Harris moves to AZ, Tucson has to take her - karmic payback for you wishing she would move here. lol
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