Beware the Good Ol' Boys of Boise who seem to be determined to have things their way, as usual. I am trying to understand this so be patient. First, understand that in the last election there was a perfectly fine Democratic candidate for U.S. Congressional Representative, Larry Grant. In this red state he came very close to winning against the Republican eccentric (I am being generous), Bill Sali, who was supported by no less than Vice-President Cheney who made two trips to Idaho for him, and also rather handsomely by the Club for Growth. Larry Grant is running for this office again in this election cycle. I believe there is little doubt that with even nominal support from the Idaho Democrats he would easily defeat Sali who has proven to be a virtually useless body in the House of Representatives.
But for whatever reason the Good Ol' Boys of Boise have decided to run another candidate, thus potentially splitting the Democratic vote. Their rationale for this seems to be their claim that Larry Grant ran a lackadasical campaign which, personally, I do not believe. In any case, their candidate, Walt Minnick, has lots of money and thus believes he can win against Sali (which is probably true as my useless cat, Katie, could probably win against Sali this time). So if it was simply a case of money the Good Ol' Boys could have contributed to Larry Grant and the Democratic party would be pretty much assured of a victory. So why Walt Minnick? He is well-known and widely liked but, more importantly, he is a Good Ol'Boy and Larry Grant is not.
But the plot thickens. The Chairman of the Idaho Democratic party, Richard Stallings, just resigned and has to be replaced. Apparently, taking a page out of the Republican game plan, John Foster, acting in conjunction with ex-Governor Cecil Andrus, simply wanted to appoint a new Chair for the Party, a procedure not in accordance with the rules. Not only did they want to improperly install a new Chairman, they wanted to install one who has already endorsed their candidate, Walt Minnick, which would appear to me to be somewhat unethical. Thwarted in this endeavor, there is now to be a meeting via telephone conference call tomorrow afternoon (Friday, January 4th), to vote on a new Chairman. There is one candidate, a lawyer, Keith Roark, who has promised to be entirely neutral in this procedure, and is widely respected. But undaunted, the Good Ol' Boys are going to nominate John Brady, the very person who has already endorsed Minnick. Their argument for this, such as it is, is that it would result in all three of the important offices (IDP Chair, Senate Minority Leader, and House Minority Leader) all being in the hands of people from Blaine County (no doubt a calculated attempt by Blaine Country to take over the State of Idaho). In short, the Good Ol' Boys are determined to have their way and their candidate for the House, no matter what.
So where was Walt Minnick during the last election cycle? Why didn't he run for Congress then? What is it, if anything, they actually have against Larry Grant except that he is from Fruitland rather than Boise? And why, if they are really interested in furthering the Democratic party in Idaho, rather than their own interests, would they risk splitting the Democratic vote when it is entirely unnecessary?
Larry Grant is a lawyer, he was General Counsel for Micron before he retired, he is a life-long Idaho Democrat, a hunter and fisherman, husband, father, intelligent, personable, hard-working, fair-minded, and dedicated to the people of Idaho. I cannot imagine a better candidate for Congress. He has done the work and demonstrated that it is possible for a Democrat to win in Idaho. I urge everyone to support him.
I was right about Huckabee. I knew the evangelicals would come through for him. Do you think the rest of the country will vote for a President who wants to bring the country back to Jesus?
I was wrong about Hillary. My apologies to the Democrats and Independents of Iowa who are apparently not as racist I thought they might be. But remember, it's not as easy to be a racist when you have to expose yourself in public as one. Will what happens in the privacy of the voting booth be the same? I sincerely hope so but I would not risk a lot of money on it. Congratulations to Obama. The fact that Hillary was third (one percentage point behind Edwards) I find inconsequential.
LKBIQ:
"He spoke with a certain what-is-it in his voice, and I could see that, if not actually disgruntled, he was far from being gruntled."
P.G. Wodehouse
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4 comments:
I think Brady endorsed Obama, not Minnick. See my comment at Idaho Rocks.
And it's Jerry Brady, not John. You know, the guy who ran for governor twice.
But I take your warning about "the good old boys."
Pretty funny stuff. You've got wonder if Grant is behind this bizzare attempt to smear both Jerry Brady and Cece Andrus. If so, it shows the arrogance that turned so many democrats off during his last campaign.
Anonymous,
I can assure you, as a long time morialekafa reader, that he doesn't speak for the Grant campaign, or that Larry would used morialekafa as a way to get a meme into the blogosphere; M speaks only for himself, in his own inimitable way. As morialekafa has himself pointed out, his blog posts are "sometimes exaggerated".
Having lived both north and south of the great Idaho divide, I can relate to "Boise running everything," because of course it does. (It's for your own good.)
Your idea that the good old boys running things are any of them Democrats makes me think there's too much lead in your soil up there in wide-open Wallace, though.
You seem to have a line a lot of interesting insider gossip, but when you say that Larry Grant "demonstrated that it is possible for a Democrat to win in Idaho" by losing, I worry about those heavy metals again.
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