Pombo's Big Precinct Walking Kick-Off
This past Saturday, on a beautiful morning at the Pleasanton/Dublin BART station, Richard Pombo's campaign held their first precinct walk of the general election. They had a whole two people show up: Anne Volz and another unidentified staffer. They put up their "Pombo" sign at 10:00 and then waited in her black SUV. They waited there until 10:45, and then, after ZERO volunteers showed up, they packed up their campaign sign and headed home.
(Apologies for the poor picture quality — our secret agent had to use a camera phone. The arrow indicates the Pombo yard sign fastened to a tree.)
So, ouch.
Frankly, it seems to me that this lack of enthusiasm is not too surprising. After all, can you imagine how embarrassing it would be to have to go door-to-door explaining to people how your candidate voted to destroy the Endangered Species Act, to sell off our National Parks, and to bring oil drilling back to our American coastlines?
Or maybe you could tell them all about Pombo's great plans to export our jobs to Mexico. And if that failed to persuade them, you could always let them know about how he has supported forced prostitution and forced abortions for garment workers in the Marianas Islands.
Of course, you could always fall back on explaining to them how Pombo accepted over $50,000 from Jack Abramoff and the Indian tribes he represented and is currently listed by CREW as one of the 13 most corrupt members of Congress.
You see how it could get a little discouraging.
Now, I realize that Pombo has gotten huge financial contributions from developers and the big oil, mining and timber interests; but it seems like none of those CEOs are ready to get out and walk precincts for their sock puppet.
When Pombo opened his campaign office in Stockton on July 22, reports are that only 12-15 people even bothered to show up. So can Pombo win a campaign with money alone and no conservative grassroots support? His incredibly sleazy activities seem to have made it harder and harder for him to generate any enthusiasm among his Republican constituents.
But maybe none of this is really news. Maybe that’s why Richard Pombo was out there back in June trying to hire 60 college students at $10/hour as full-time precinct walkers.
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posted by babaloo @ 12:08 AM
4 Comments:
Some ammo - FYI
Pombo donated at least $5,000 to DeLay's Legal Defense fund over the last few years.
DeLay's LDF contributors
Old news but it couldn't hurt to keep it out in the open.
Hey Rip: It was $10,000 to DeLay's legal fund. Pombo also paid a $10,000 fine to the FPPC for the Republican Central Committee for distributing illegal money to candidates. I was there and they want to keep it out of the press.
He bought them off.
Tom Benigno
It would be really nice if the McNerney campaign were getting as much going with the press as they are with putting volunteer feet on the street. It looks to me like there are two battles going on here: one on the street and one in the media. It also appears that McNerney is winning the volunteers on the street, walking precincts, battle, for now Of course, Pombo can always start paying college students $10/hr. like he has done before. But, the last walk was embarassing.
On the other hand, it also seems like Pombo is winnning the media battle. There are just too many times when Pombo's minions are on the attacck and McNerney defending himself. It should be the other way around. Pombo has so many openings for being shown up, and they are being passed up, handled late, etc. This is not good, because the media is losing interest, losing the sense that there is a story here. If that happens, then funders migh find other things to do with their money.
McNerney has a good story to tell. What is it not getting out?
Jerry Mc Nerney's Delima is the district is so huge it is hard to get to all places. We need to offer an alturnitive as Pombo does. People gather to see him because he has people like Hassert, Cheney, and others coming out to see him. Only because he is the Incumbunt. Lets me use this analogy to get a big fire going you need to fan it. We are not fanning the fire. Small fires get make big one. Lets start getting out with some fund raisers.
Soon the signs should be going up. That should help. Lets start a fire.Get Jerry elected
Tom Benigno
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