>. With roughly 6 weeks to go until Dennis Kampe joins the long list of failed democrat candidates, his campaign, unfortunately, has already started the mud-slinging contest so reminiscent of the Jon Russell campaign.
Russell, who has publicly endorsed Rivers while privately supporting Kampe, who Kampe has described as his “good friend and political adviser,” ran one of the most underhanded, filthy, inaccurate and flat out lying campaigns it has been my displeasure to witness.
Well, here’s your sign: stick to issues, Dennis.
Look, I know you’re a democrat with both hands tied behind your back: first, as I said, you’re a democrat. In the 18th, that means you’re in the wrong party in a year where democrats have become the political equivalent of child molesters due to their demand for tax increases in the middle of a recession, their kow-towing to union thuggery, their out of control spending, their efforts to bury this nation under a horrific mountain of debt, their failed economic strategies that screw the tax payer and their corruption and incompetence at the top.
Your second hand tied behind your back is your positions.
You support the bridge. You support light rail. You support a state income tax. You oppose privatization of liquor stores and any other government function.
So, you go so far as to attack Ann Rivers directly instead of talk about the issues… because, of course, you know you can’t win on the issues.
“The voters of the 18th Legislative District have an important choice to make this November. Some people seem impressed that Ann Rivers already has plans. But are these plans that have been informed by her time lobbying for special interests?”
This is an excerpt from a canned Kampe campaign letter directly from Kampe’s campaign organization that was farmed out to get someone who has no clue to sign it and send it in to a newspaper. (As a general rule, any letter that sounds like campaign talking points is, well, campaign talking points.) It is precisely the same thing that Jon Russell did, talking about precisely the same subjects.
And I’m surprised by all of this, given that Dennis now seems to be reduced to Russell’s talking points… in this case, attacking a school district as a “special interest.”
Of course, as a union leftist school administrator, Kampe wouldn’t know anything about “special interests.”
Would he?
So, here’s the deal: stick to the issues. That way, when this is over and you get flattened, you’ll at least have some shred of integrity intact.
>. So, Steve “Unmarked Bills” Stuart was out and about today. And what was he doing?
He, Stuart, was PERSONALLY taking his 4×8’S off Russell’s 4X8 frames, removing Russell’s signs, and then replacing them with the signs he’d screwed on directly over the top Russell’s as shown in the post below.
How weird.
Of course, I’m sure Stuart’s had a few questions to answer just like Russell over his strange bed fellows.
How sad is it that Russell is so screwed up that he’s given his locations and his wood to a fringe left democrat like Stuart, instead of Alan Svehaug, Stuart’s GOP challenger?
And how sad is it for Stuart that he can’t use his own wood and put up his own signs?
But to take Russell’s signs down… and then put his own back up using Russell’s wood, as if none of this had happened?
That is totally bizarre.
Note the Svehaug 4X8 attached to what had formerly been a Republican sign. Note the obvious signs of removal and re-attachment on Stuart’s 4X8.
Why didn’t Russell invite Svehaug instead of Stuart to use his sign locations and frames?
The others running but not fund raising include the excitable Rich Carson, and Jon Haugen.
With the NRA’s endorsement of Ann Rivers and her continuing enviable fund raising prowess, unmatched by all the other candidates combined, The Vancouver Business Journal called it right when they named her the Republican front-runner. She banked around $8700…. last week.
Dennis Kampe, the lone announced democrat running (Jon Haugen ran for the state senate against Zarelli as a democrat back in 08) Banked a respectable $2400 or so for the week.
Jon Russell impressed, just not the way he might think; by banking $160, $60 of which came from Russell himself.
Brandon Vick, whose family landscaping business must be in the height of their season, has not raised any reported funds since June 20.
Anthony Bittner stopped campaigning months ago. He last reported income in April, and last filed a C4 (Expenses) for May; he’s skipped all campaign events to include parades, editorial boards, forums and CVTV’s video voter guide. He does not have a picture or statement in the Voter’s Pamphlet, although he claims he submitted both.
But the fact remains that Rivers is receiving the most POLITICAL support in addition to her monetary accomplishments.
Russell has gone increasingly negative, following the pattern that, well, has resulted in precisely zero political victories around here for candidates where Russell has received a pay check, to include $16,000 from Liz Pike.
His minions are scrambling. But he lacks the time and money needed; too many people know about his proclivity to lie and exaggerate; too many are turned off by his use of Washougal City Government as a campaign prop and far too many find it impossible to believe, as he finds it plausible to believe, that he bears no responsibility for the Beverly Hillbillies type government in place on his watch.
Brandon Vick has worked hard and well. He hasn’t been able to devote the time he’s needed to run an all out campaign but he’s done the best that could be expected under the circumstances.
Bittner, on the other hand, seemed to think that all he needed to do was file and put up a few signs.
Good luck with that.
The “independents” running for this gig have yet to address the “how are you going to get anything done” aspect of the “what next?” in the equation.
Out numbered 97 to 1, chances are few that they could get anything done, or keep anything harmful from getting done.
It’s been a fascinating 8 months are so… a learning experience for some, and exercise in futility for others. And we’ll know 2 weeks from today who moves on… and who moves into obscurity.
Candidates look to join SW Washington’s state legislative delegation
BY PAUL LEONARD of the VBJ
July 9th, 2010
With the primary campaign season just beginning, only one thing seems certain: whatever the outcome, in at least two key state races, Southwest Washington’s legislative delegation in Olympia will get some new blood.
….
In the contest to replace Herrera, who is currently making a run for Congress in the Third Congressional District, Republican front runner and small business owner Ann Rivers hopes to make it through a broad field of GOP candidates to face the Democrat, Clark County Skills Center director Dennis Kampe.
“We’ve been down this road for six months,” Rivers said. “It’s almost like giving birth.”
The owner of a public and government relations company since 1996, Rivers has based her campaign largely on business issues, advocating against what she called “onerous” regulations and taxes – in particular, the state’s controversial Business and Occupancy levy on gross receipts.
“I’m fighting this idea that government can squeeze and squeeze businesses until they can’t take it anymore,” she said.
As in the race to fill Wallace’s seat, the 18th Legislative District contest was overshadowed by a yawning state budget deficit and a persistently-high unemployment rate in many communities throughout Southwest Washington.
Kampe, the only Democrat appearing on this year’s ballot in the district, told the VBJ last month he first considered running for the seat because of concerns about education. A fiscal conservative, Kampe looks to attract independent voters in this traditionally GOP-friendly district.
“I think Dennis is a pretty conservative guy,” Probst said. “He’s always described himself as a ‘Republicrat.'”
As of VBJ’s press time, Rivers led with over $42,000 raised thus far, followed by Kampe with $16,495, according to PDC figures.
Rounding out the Republican field in the 18th District, Position 1, is Russell, Brandon Vick and Anthony Bittner, as well as independent candidates Jon Haugen and Richard Carson.
With turnout in Clark County expected to hit 35 percent, according to Clark County Elections supervisor Tim Likness, the election may hinge on who gets out more of their supporters to return their ballots, which will be mailed out July 28.
“It really comes down to how much effort the candidates put into it,” Likness said.
Well, Rivers is, of course, the front runner and has been since she announced.
.
(Note to Probst: Kampe is no conservative. No one who actually believes we should indebt the people of Clark County $100,000,000 a year to build a bridge to give his union buddies temporary jobs at our expense is a conservative. You can call Moeller a “moderate” all you like, and that doesn’t make it so… to put a point on it, “Republicrat” my ass.)
Nevertheless, when a publication like the VBJ uses a label like that, it’s got to hurt the more delusional of candidates.
>. Of all the candidates in the 18th District, only one actually filed this week.
Neither Dennis Kampe, Brandon Vick, Anthony Bittner (who hasn’t filed a C-3 form since late April… not illegal, but a sign of zero fund raising) nor the educationally and integrity-challenged Jon Russell filed C-3’s this week.
It is, of course, perfectly legal to not file C-3’s when you haven’t raised any money over the preceeding week. But lacking the ability or reason to file?
That’s not so good.
Ann Rivers, on the other hand, filed for $1300 for the week.
Russell, of course, has been and continues to be in violation of PDC laws since he announced as a state representative candidate, failing to file electronically; using state representative funds to pay congressional campaign debt (I’m looking into an FEC complaint over that one) and various other violations.
I won’t be filing a complaint against Russell this week because he hasn’t filed this week.
But until he gets himself into compliance with the law of this state (Kinda bizarre, ain’t it? A state representative candidate who has deliberately violated the law for months?) EVERY time he files a manual report I’m going to nail him with ANOTHER complaint.
>. Well, here’s the numbers based on C-3’s filed by the candidates.
Brandon Vick………………$200 to $7300 ($4,415 actual donations)
Jon Russell …………………$195 ($175 in personal funds) to $11,500 or so
Anthony Bittner…………..0 the same at $4571
Ann Rivers………………….$3550 to $43,679 ($35,470 actual donations)
Dennis Kampe……………..$1335 (Plus $1000 in personal funds) to $16,960 ($14,160 actual donations)
Anyone else running has either dropped out or filed short form, limiting their financial involvement to $5000 or less.
So, what’s it all mean?
It means Bittner, Russell and Vick have no serious support.
It means that the democrats have written the 18th off and made Kampe their token candidate, when he has to write himself thousand dollar checks…. that aren’t even loans.
I’ve been doing this long enough to know that money is certainly not the only indicator of support. I’ve been to a couple of parades, for example.
I look at Ann Rivers’ US Senatorial size parade posse, in comparison to lesser candidates like Jaime Herrera or any of the others running…. and I’ve got to wonder: who really has the support?
When Russell finally accepted the inevitable, that is that as a congressional candidate, he had little chance to rise above punchline status and ditched that to run for the 18th, I figured he was a kamikaze candidate.
Russell knows he can’t win. While he claimed he had an “Army of 200 volunteers” when he bailed out of his flaming congressional run, there’s no evidence that he has anything of the sort.
Two hundred volunteers could hold car washes and raise more money than Russell has. And an abysmal showing in this election will fortunately mean he’s through.
Recent events verifying his propensity to lie will follow him for the rest of his hopefully short political career.
Bittner has almost completely disappeared, sullying what otherwise could have been a promising political career by engaging in rather rank cowardice.
While a painful conclusion to draw, the fact is that Bittner has yet to attend a single, solitary forum of any kind. He’s blown off the 18th District PCO’s, the Columbian Editorial Board (An act that for incumbents I recommend, but for new candidates represents something of a vital learning experience and name recognition opportunity) a couple of forums and has, so far, blown off CVTV as well.
From all appearances, this has long since ceased to be a political campaign as much as it’s become an ego boost to a kid who seems to be incapable of taking representation of the people seriously.
Brandon Vick is a young man with a possible future in this business at some point… but now ain’t that point.
He has shown himself incapable of raising anything approaching the necessary money to get his message out. And, unfortunately, it seems he’s saddled himself with many of Shannon Barnett’s campaign herd… and, well, they weren’t all that… and as a result… well, we see the result.
Except for some minor exaggeration on his web site (No Brandon, in fact you’re NOT “the only candidate that has the strength, vision and energy needed to win these battles.”)he has not engaged in the falsehoods of a Russell as a campaign strategy.
At some point, with more experience and a better plan, he could become a force to be reckoned with.
This, however, is not that point.
There are 4 candidates fighting over what amounts as the same universe of disaffected and fringe elements. Haugen has gone completely off the reservation by espousing the idea that we should just eliminate the House of Representatives (ala the Nebraska plan) while Carson’s issue, allegedly based on a failure of the mainstream parties to assist him in his now finished crusade to keep the BPA from running power lines down the street from my place, has vaporized as much as his ability to raise money.
Russell, who is now dealing with 6 different PDC violations (1 repeated) along with allegations that will dog him for the rest of the time he’s in politics, (Concerning his almost pathologically false portrayal of his wife as a doctor) and as someone engaging in a whisper campaign because he’s afraid to make allegations in public, attempts to take ownership of Tea Party affiliation. Vick, who at least showed up for several weeks at the We, The People vetting sessions (also, come to think of it, blown off by young Mr. Bittner) while Russell didn’t seem to be all that frequent a guest; as something of a claim in.
Unfortunately, these people are pounding each other over the same group of voters, and are likely to cancel each other out. Kampe will get the votes of the few democrats who will actually vote in the primary before being destroyed in the general, but his percentage of the vote will likely put him in the top two positions come primary night.
Rivers has run a superior campaign in every respect and looks like she’ll win all of it in the general, but will certainly be in the top two in the primary. Focusing on the issues an staying on target is it’s own reward. .
Candidates Ann Rivers, Jon Russell, Richard Carson, Brandon Vick and for the first time I’ve ever seen him in public, Dennis Kampe, the lone democrat running in the 18th were there.
The only thing I had any real heartburn with was they would ask some really complicated questions requiring thoughtful answers, but then they’d give them 30 seconds on occasion to answer.
Candidates for any elective office must realize both their capabilities… and limitations. My almost 6 years on legislative staff in Olympia taught me nothing if it didn’t teach me that no one coming up to that city can snap their fingers an effect change just because they were elected.
Legislation is a collaborative effort. It’s not as if any candidate will roll into Caucus on Day One of their first session, twitch their nose like Samantha on Bewitched and then magically, see that candidate’s agenda implemented.
Candidates who claim that they, personally, will be able to “fix,” or “change” or DO anything other then make a serious, concerted effort are delusional or they’re attempting to scam the voter into believing they have super powers.
When, for example, Brandon Vick claims that he will “fix” or “privatize L&I on Day One when you send me to Olympia,” this causes me to wonder if he has even a remote clue as to what goes on in Olympia; or more importantly, if he knows HOW it goes on in Olympia.
I’m a supporter of Ann Rivers. I didn’t see much of anything to change my mind… and I doubt that many (any?) minds were changed by what they heard or saw at the BGHS Commons.
Dennis Kampe toed the democrat line, mistakenly believing that the government is somehow directly responsible for employing people to the point that he wants to saddle us with this bridge project “to put 17,000 people to work” as if they all came from Clark County when, in fact, very few from this county would be employed; and as if our local economy wouldn’t have a $100,000,000 yearly hole blown in it for tolls.
Kampe appears to believe that government does have a direct responsibility to put people to work while taxpayers pick up the bill. He claims to be big on “looking” at privatization, but refuses to support privatizing either the state’s liquor monopoly or the state penal system.
So, while making the claim that “privatization” had to be “looked at,” he failed to offer up any example of what he would privatize, and said “no” to the two options presented. In short, he does not support privatization… he just SAYS that he does because he’s running in the 18th District.
He also supports a state income tax. Did Kampe SAY he supported that tax? Of course not. But while all of the other candidates opposed such a tax outright, Kampe refused to say… code speak for support.
Brandon Vick also supported replacing the bridge, wrongly telling us that the bridge was “unsafe,” a conclusion disproven by head bridge bureaucrat Don Wagner, Region 6 DOT Administrator, who is quoted as telling us
“If we don’t have an earthquake of any magnitude, those two bridges are going to stay there until something hits them,” he said.
Wagner is getting paid to replace these perfectly serviceable and functional bridges with a price tag of $4 to $8 billion, and even he says they’re safe.
That it is, as Vick put it, the only bridge with a light on it for the entire length of it provides no excuse to replace it given the horrific cost and the damage our local economy will suffer if this massive waste is built.
No candidate supporting the replacement of this bridge will be acceptable to me or thousands of others who will have to pay the tolls, estimated at $1300 per year, that will be unavoidably required to get this built. Blowing a $100,000,000 per year hole in our local economy isn’t the way to make this county prosperous or to keep our economy humming.
I believe that the ONLY acceptable alternative would be a 3rd and 4th bridge, with the 3rd being built to the West/North of the current I-5 Bridge to relieve pressure on that span for a great deal LESS money than that projected to replace the I-5 Bridge.
That the I-5 Bridge “has a light” on it is no reason to spend billions on replacing it.
Jon Russell was much more subdued then in past appearances. He apparently read the memo about lying too much.
He did have some bizarre ideas: for example, implementing a sales tax to pay for everything, guaranteeing even more cross-border purchases and even less revenue and in-state economic development as citizens in Spokane, the Tri-Cities, and SW Washington vote with their wallets and increase their shopping trips to Oregon and Idaho… precisely like they will for cigarettes… an idea that also seems to be supported by Brandon Vick.
Amassing an increased tax burden on retail purchases, particularly in these horrific economic times, seems to me to be exactly the wrong thing, at the wrong place and at the wrong time.
Russell also advocated bringing back the direct route idea between Camas and Battle Ground that’s been floating around since long before his recent (2004) arrival. What was missing in his assessment was a lack of costs and a way to pay for it.
That doesn’t make the idea a “bad” idea. What it makes it is a “not well thought out” idea. Russell also was positively giddy about his efforts to refuse any stimulus funding for Washougal. He made that point at least twice.
Russell relies a great deal on the verbiage of running on his record. He never addresses the most telling parts of his record, which is why I’ve started Jon Russell Watch.
Richard Carson is running as an independent. He makes it a point to exclaim that no independent has been elected since 1889… our year of statehood. Well, there’s a reason for that.
Carson also never misses the opportunity to remind us that he is related to “Kit” Carson. Unfortunately for Carson, that’s really not a reason to vote for him, and he lacks little reason otherwise.
I’ve addressed Carson’s run before: He’s a former Republican who looked the field over, decided he couldn’t compete, either monetarily or politically, and made the decision to run as an independent, using that along with the “short form” pledge to avoid the nasty aspect of politics known as “fundraising.”
He tells everyone that he won’t “take special interest money.” The problem here is that when you’ve declared that you won’t raise over $5000, that’s an easy pledge to take. When you deliberately set the bar so low that a blind man could jump over it in their sleep, that’s certainly not a difficult goal to attain.
The problem here, again, is like his Kit Carson connection, it doesn’t stand as any reason to vote for the man.
There are precisely 98 members of the State House of Representatives. None of them are now independents. And when session starts in Mid-January, 2011, none of them will be independents then, either.
It was a fascinating thing to watch. Slowly but surely, the differences between them are becoming apparent. And with 60 days or so left before ballot drop, it’s not a moment too soon.
>. I just had the dubious pleasure of watching 3 of the 4 declared candidates for the 18th go at it at GOP HQ’s as what was originally billed as part of the weaning process. This is, or was, a defensive measure in the event the dems announced a second candidate to take advantage of the “top-two primary” system we have in place.
By now, we’ve likely all heard of democrat Richard Blumenthall, the multi-term democrat Attorney General of Connecticutt who deserves a great deal of credit for the Carceiri decision that has jammed a stick in the spokes of the Cowlitz Mafia’s efforts to ram their economic black whole down our throats.
Seems that Jon Russell has something of a similar problem; specifically, Russell’s claim that his wife is a “physician.”
When I sat through the 18th District meeting today, I was struck by a couple of things. First, he felt compelled to lie about his wife, referring to her as a “physician.” That’s where the Blumenthal thing came in.
She is not a “physician.” She is, if anything, a physician’s ASSISTANT. It’s much the same as calling the guy putting the air in the plane’s tires a “pilot.” That only works if, in fact, that guy IS a pilot.
I have been hearing for months now that Russell has been lying about that, but this is the first time I’ve ever heard it from his mouth.
Oddly, he neglected to mention that aspect of his “Port” work.
In short, this “Chameleon conservative” made a LOT of money off of HIS efforts to jack up OUR taxes.
Not very conservative of you, Jon.
And then, it came to the issue of money. The candidates were asked how much money they had raised.
I was startled that Jon, who’s PDC’s report showed a paltry $5421 in both cash and in kind contributions just 12 days ago, has somehow managed to almost double in 12 short days since he reported. Yes, he indicated that he’d put together around $10,000.
But the oddest thing about his campaign figures wasn’t the small amount of money he’s collected; after all, given who he is, that was sort of expected.
The oddest thing is that according to his records, he hasn’t given his campaign a dime.
REALLY odd considering the “quarter of a million dollar per year” clinic he claims to have.
You don’t suppose that he “Blumenthaled” the amount he’s actually collected, do you? I mean, as someone of proven, selective exaggeration, is that even possible?
But then, Russell was an abysmal failure as a money raiser during his congressional campaign; why would we expect anything different now?
The problem with a serial exaggerator and fake conservative who made money off a serious effort to jack up our taxes is that you cannot trust them to be anything other than what they need to be to get elected.
And that’s what makes Russell the “Chameleon conservative,” in other ways that I’ll make clear over the upcoming weeks before the primary… ways that make him unfit for any elective office of any kind.
Jon never passes on the opportunity to talk about those aspects of his career as a part of the Washougal city council that HE wants you to hear about. He seems strangely reticent about the rest.
But then, I guess that’s what people have me around for, isn’t it?
>. In reviewing the most recent PDC’s for fundraising, we see the following numbers of note:
So, what we have here is Rivers having raised about $28,000 or so, Russell (who filed manually) at $4500 or so, and Brandon Vick at $2750 raised (The rest of the money showing is in-kind and loans.) . According to the records, Brandon Vick raised $300 in the month of April. Shannon Barnett’s endorsement availed him nothing. . Russell, abortive Congressional candidate, raised $1524 for the month of April. . People, your horse is so dead that the corpse has walked away. Beating it any further… I dunno… just seems like an exercise in futility. . For your political futures, the one thing I would think you’d want to avoid is humiliation. But that’s what it seems you’re facing. . You can’t win a campaign on $300 months. You can’t. And you can’t do much better on $1500 months, either. . But hey, that’s the beauty of our system. So, if’n you’re of a mind, knock yourselves out.
Clark County Politics 