McCLOSKEY TO TAKE ON POMBO IN REPUBLICAN PRIMARY

Is there a California congressloon more corrupt than Dick Pombo? There is A LOT of competition but Republican voters in California's very gerrymandered 11th CD, which includes Morgan Hill and Gilroy in Santa Clara County, Danville and San Ramon in Contra Costa County, Pleasanton and Dublin in Alameda County and Lodi, Stockton, Tracy, Manteca and Tracy in San Joaquin (the Pombo heartland), won't have to wait 'til November to render a verdict on the ethically-outrageous right-wing extremist. Today's CONTRA COSTA TIMES is reporting that moderate Republican and former distinguished Congressman Pete McCloskey will announce his candidacy on Monday. "It's time to take Pombo out," said McCloskey.

"McCloskey, a decorated Marine who served in the Korean War and an attorney, says he wants to restore Republican values such as fiscal restraint, reduced government and balanced budgets. He also believes Pombo has behaved unethically on several fronts, such as hiring family members to work on his campaign. And he says the incumbent votes too often with former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, who is fighting a campaign money laundering charge back home in Texas. McCloskey and Pombo will also knock heads over environmental issues."


MONDAY AFTERNOON UPDATE: NOW IT'S OFFICIAL-- McCLOSKEY GOIN' FOR POMBO'S SCALP

Former Bay Area Republican congressman, former marine, ardent environmentalist (and, alas, possibly anti-semitic loon), "Pete" McCloskey has finally gotten off the pot (or the other thing) and announced he is indeed taking on Northern California's waste-layer of the environment/close associate of Tom DeLay and droolingly eager participant in a plethora of schemes that helped define the Republican Culture of Corruption in Washington over the past several years, Richard Pombo. Today, in his new adopted home town inside the district, the 78 year old McCloskey ("good for a Repug") laid out the reasons he's taking on Pombo: "I believe the key question of the Republican Party today is whether we go back to historic Republican principles of integrity, fiscal responsibility, limited government and environmental balance, or do we go the way of the DeLay Republicans, (1) with no ethics enforcement, (2) an understandable public perception that Republicans give undue preference to big-money contributors, (3) a huge and ever-growing bureaucracy, and (4) a constant erosion of the environmental protections for community health, and park and wilderness lands that have been established over 30 years... I would characterize this campaign as a battle for the soul of the Republican Party."

The right wing extremist and very corrupt Republican congressloon, one of the biggest bribetakers in American history, had one of his local hatchetmen, a Ray McNally savage McCloskey already, saying that there is no chance, no matter what issues he raises, that McCloskey will make any headway with the people in the 11th CD. "I think there is a greater chance that the sun will stand still in the sky. Very few voters will know who he is, and when they find out, they will disagree with what he stands for." Another shady Pombo associate, one Wayne Johnson, also insisted McCluskey has no chance among Pombo's constituents. "We don't take him seriously as a Republican candidate." Johnson scoffed at the idea of Pombo deigning to debate McCloskey or Jerry McNerney, the Democrat likely to win in the November general election. "We might as well debate Austin Powers," said the abrasive and arrogant Johnson. "They're both stuck in the 70s."


MONDAY NIGHT UPDATE-- A REPORT FROM POMBOVILLE

Our pal Matt from SAY NO TO POMBO has a great first-hand blow-by-blow of the McCloskey press conference in Lodi today-- plus his brilliant and incisive analysis. If you're not sure you want to read it, see if this McCloskey quote gets to you: “Congressmen are like diapers; they need to be changed, and for the same reason.” Here's the full report.