Yes, I wish Iraqi veteran Paul Hackett and Congressman Sherrod Brown were not going up against each other in the Ohio Democratic primary prior to challenging incumbent Republican Senator Mike DeWine in 2006. Brown has been a consistent fighter in Congress for everyday, common folk and deserves a broader political pulpit. I don’t know what caused him to delay his announcement and allow Hackett to be the first to come forward, but that’s what happened. Not being a resident of Ohio, I have no vote to cast but it would be a difficult decision.
The November/December issue of Mother Jones contained the following David Goodman-written article on Hackett. Do read the entire article but even just the excerpt here will warm the heart and spirit of Democrats who are fed up with being out-framed, negatively distorted, ill-labeled and mis-caricatured.. In fact, the first 11 lines will suffice.
The Ohio Insurgency
By David Goodman
November/December 2005 Issue of Mother Jones
Paul Hackett is out for one last day of pressing the flesh.
It’s August 2, Election Day, and the lanky, blond, 43-year-old Marine has taken up position outside the polling place in Loveland, a burg on the outskirts of Cincinnati, flashing his toothy smile for the early risers. Hackett is dressed smartly in a blue shirt and striped pastel tie. His khaki pants hang loosely from his wiry, 180-pound frame.
“That’s low politics, punk!” a heavy-set man sneers as he marches toward the poll.
Hackett wheels around. “Pardon me?”
“You know, that radio ad that says, `You don’t know Schmidt.'” He’s talking about one of Hackett’s attack ads against Republican Jean Schmidt. The man spews a stream of epithets, and Hackett lets out a crybaby whimper: “Waaaaaaa!”
“What’s that, punk?” the big man growls.
A TV crew is setting up nearby, but Hackett doesn’t seem to care. “What’s your fuckin’ problem?” the candidate snaps. “You got something to say to me? Bring it on!” Hackett, all 6 feet 2 inches of him, is nose to nose with the heckler. “Problem?” he taunts. The man turns around and storms away.
“These guys in the Republican Party adopted this tough-guy language,” Hackett tells me, still steamed, an hour later. “They’re bullies. They’re offended when somebody takes a swing back at them.”
From the beginning of his quixotic campaign in a special election for U.S. Congress this summer, Paul Hackett relished taking swings. His rhetoric was scorched-earth: “I don’t like the sonofabitch that lives in the White House,” he told USA Today, “but I’d put my life on the line for him.” He declared in a debate that the biggest threat to America is “the man living in the White House,” and he slammed President Bush and Vice President Cheney as “chicken hawks.” He described Bush’s infamous taunt to Iraqi resistance fighters–“Bring ’em on”–as “the most incredibly stupid comment I’ve ever heard a president of the United States make. He cheered on the enemy.” The flame-throwing rhetoric belies an analytical attorney with an (often) understated persona; apologetic, however, Hackett is not.
“I said it, I meant it, I stand by it,” he said when I asked if he regretted any of his comments. “Bush is a chicken hawk, okay? Tough shit.” As for the SOB barb, Bush “talks the tough talk. He should appreciate that.”
A major in the Marine Corps Reserve fresh from a tour in Iraq, Hackett proved to be that rarest of modern political animals, a fighting Democrat. Storming through a deep-red district with freshly minted veterans from his Marine unit, smacking down the religious right, ripping into President Bush, he transformed what was supposed to be a sleepy exercise to fill a safe GOP seat into a rowdy brawl that blindsided the national Republican and Democratic establishments. While he lost the election in a 52-to-48 percent squeaker, he scored decisive wins in the white, lower-income, high-unemployment rural areas that Democrats long ago abandoned–and took one-third more votes in the district than John Kerry had pulled in just eight months earlier. His near upset would turn the state that handed George W. Bush his 2004 victory into a much-discussed bellwether for 2006 and 2008
To read the rest of the article, go here:
http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2005/11/paul_hackett.html
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Undecided – Why Run Against Paul Hackett?
Who is Sherrod Brown?
On August 17, Brown posted a letter on his Web site http://GrowOhio.org/, announcing he wouldn’t run for Senate, and since 17th District Congressman Tim Ryan had also declined to run, it looked like the Democrats might have trouble finding a candidate. That’s when Paul Hackett stepped in. The 43-year-old attorney gained national attention this summer when he returned from a tour of duty in Iraq to his suburban Cincinnati home and ran in a special election to replace the 2nd District’s Congressman, Rob Portman, who’d been appointed United States Trade Representative.
At first Hackett, who’d never held an office higher than city council in a small suburb, escaped the attention of the national media and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. But his campaign was followed avidly by blogs, and Democracy for America, which together raised more than $500,000 and pushed him into the national spotlight. Hackett’s credibility to talk about the mistakes in Iraq, coupled with his tough-talking demeanor (he called Bush a “son of a bitch” and Rush Limbaugh a “fatass drug addict”) made the netroots swoon. It was like Howard Dean in uniform. Hackett ultimately lost the August 2 election in an overwhelmingly Republican district by just four points. A star, of sorts, was born.
MyDD
Philip did make correction —
Hey, everyone at <s>MyDD</s> Booman Tribune.
I’m with Sherrod Brown’s campaign for the U.S. Senate in Ohio.
“Treason doth never prosper: what’s the reason?
For if it prosper, none dare call it treason.”
▼ ▼ ▼ MY DIARY
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RW news bits really upset our true BooTribbers!
To recover, you can read the European trashing of Dr. Victor Davis Hanson, PhD from Fresno, Ca. — a reply to Hanson’s “A Letter to the Europeans“.
“Treason doth never prosper: what’s the reason?
For if it prosper, none dare call it treason.”
▼ ▼ ▼ MY DIARY
Hackett is serious in his campaign efforts – including the primary – and starting early. Just got a call from CA Dems raising funds for the Hackett senatorial campaign this weekend.
CA = home of cash…
We gave last year to the congressional run and will give again this year to the Senate run.