What Are They Thinking?

The Salt Lake Tribune saved the best for last apparently. They endorsed candidates for the 1st and 2nd district on Saturday and today they endorsed for the 3rd district. It was not a surprising endorsement.

Utah's 3rd Congressional District hasn't been represented by a Democrat since the early 1990s and is the most Republican of the state's three districts. Right up there with the most conservative in the country, in fact.
The question that 3rd District voters will answer on Nov. 4 is whether they want to be represented in Congress by the radical right-wing idealogue Jason Chaffetz, who is at odds with much of his own party, or Bennion Spencer, a right-of-center Democrat and erstwhile Republican.
But setting aside any consideration of party labels,The Salt Lake Tribune editorial board believes Bennion Spencer would better represent Utah County and the rest of the district than would Chaffetz, who cites party reform, not the drafting and shaping of legislation, as his top priority.

Party reform is needed within the Republican Party (as I noted on Friday) however now is not the time for that discussion. Now is the time to totally dissect the SLTrib's "reasons" for supporting Bennion Spencer.

First is Spencer's "opposition" to drilling in ANWR.

Chaffetz favors drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge; Spencer does not.

One has to wonder what exactly Spencer DOES support. In response to a question at the UVU debate, where Spencer was asked specifically about drilling in ANWR he said "Drill everywhere, I say!" If Spencer is so easily swayed between positions depending on who he is speaking to, how can we expect him to stand up for the district in the face of intense lobbying or his caucus leadership?

Then there is his support of the Bush Administration's bail-out. That is not going to sit well with the Bush hating, far left in his base. Then there is the fact that this bail out was horrible policy to begin with. Groups like IBD and Market Watch were opposed to the bail out as were many prominent economists. Especially after the Senate got done adding $150 BILLION in pork projects to the bill.

Then comes the obligatory reference to Chaffetz' purported "xenophobia", a lie that I addressed here, here, here, here and oh yes here.

The next two paragraphs were by far the funniest (although I suspect an attempt at humor was not on the editoral boards mind when they wrote it).

For us, the chief difference between the candidates is that one has the instincts of a collaborative problem-solver and the other has the markings of a self-righteous zealot.
Chaffetz vows he will be "pounding on lecterns" when he gets to Washington. We acknowledge that this rhetoric plays well with voters justifiably angry with their government. But unbending adherence to political ideology is partly to blame for the current mess, and it surely is no recipe for getting out of it.

Given the fact that Bennion Spencer went from supporting an "all of the above" energy policy on his website to repeating (ad naseum) the Democrat House Leaderships "we can't drill our way out of this crisis" mantra, it sure seems that if anyone is kow towing to the dictates of party purity it is Bennion Spencer.

The SL Trib closes with this.

The art of politics is principled compromise, and it is regrettable that Jason Chaffetz seems to have no eye for complementary colors. Bennion Spencer clearly does, and would take that vision to Congress.

The problem is we have too many people in Washington DC that are compromising their principles in order to "get things done" in Congress. We need people in DC who can stand up to the compromisers and do what is best for the country, rather than what will get them re-elected. That is what propelled Jason Chaffetz past Rep. Chris Cannon in the primary and what (I suspect) will propel Jason to Congress in 9 days.

Disconnect

One of the hot economic issues of the season has been the cost of energy. One of the people who has been less than clear on their stand on this issue has been Bennion Spencer. On his official campaign website issues page he has this under the heading "Energy Independence"

There is no single issue that is having a greater impact on our family budgets, our nations economy, and our national security than our dependence on foreign oil. America currently consumes 20 million barrels of foreign oil per day, 70% of of which is for automobiles. America must move towards greater energy independence. We must invest in clean energy; this includes the next generation of biofuels and development of commercial scale renewable energy. We need to double our efforts in science and research funding for energy projects that include biomass, solar and wind resources. According to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), in 20 years, wind can generate 20% of the U.S. electricity supply. It would reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 25% while creating half a million new American jobs.

We must continue to find new ways to: reduce carbon emissions; develop cleaner coal technology, and digital smart grids that could be used not only in America but also throughout the world. We must support and provide incentives to the development of more fuel-efficient vehicles, hybrid vehicles, and transportation that uses alternatives to gasoline. A mass transportation system for Utah County is critical in reducing congestion throughout the county and providing citizens with an alternative form or transportation.

I support developing oil shale in Utah. Here in the west we are sitting on 1.8 trillion barrels of oil from oil shale. We can ease our dependence on foreign oil while creating jobs at home.

For the most part, I do agree with everything he said except for the one big whole in the policy.....DRILLING. There is no mention of drilling anywhere. However in radio and television interviews during August's "Don't Go" debates, Mr. Spencer made it clear that "we can't drill our way out of this crisis". At both the Sutherland Institutes bloggers debate and the UVU debate last week (both of which happened in September after a month of voter outrage over the Democrats stalling on the subject) Spencer had this to say:

Question: ...Your proposal for relief at the pump says nothing about drilling for more domestic oil. Why not drill offshore and in Alaska now?

Mr. Spencer:

"Drill everywhere...I say...I think we have to make sure that the oil stays in the United States for part of it and we can't say, 'Well, because it goes on the open market that's part of our free trade policy.' It's not free to subsidize the oil companies so what do we benefit from this? China's putting 1500 cars a day on the road. By the time we get oil in ANWR, China will have more cars than we have. So we've gained nothing. But I think drilling, we have to have the incentive that we have a comprehensive energy policy so that we're not going to drill our way out of this problem. But I guarantee you talk to oil executives and every drop you drill out of ANWR is going to go on the open market, and this country may not even see a drop."

Emphasis mine. It seems to me that there is a discrepancy between the official position found on his website and the position that he holds in debates where the public is watching. One must wonder why the discrepancy in positions. Is it because he honestly changed his mind on the issue? If that is the case why hasn't the official policy on the website been changed? Maybe it is because he really does not believe that drilling, combined with other energy sources that include wind and solar and conservation and shale, will really make a difference? If that is the case then why does the candidate not say what he truly believes? Is it because he knows that it is not politically expedient to admit? Maybe it is simply that Mr. Spencer does not have a passion for an issue that hits all Americans hard in the wallet every single day! Maybe he just does not care that this country is sending $700 billion dollars a day to foreign countries who don't like us much...that Utahans are hurting financially because of the high cost of gasoline in Utah. Maybe it is just not his priority.....

Well high gas prices (and the high price of food and everything else that is shipped here) are a priority for every middle and lower class family in the state. Every dollar that goes to pay for gasoline and diesel costs are taken away from things like mortgages and other necessities. Representatives Bishop and Matheson get it....why doesn't Mr. Spencer?

3rd CD Debate Wrap Up

It was a very interesting debate. To say that Mark Maxon is a passionate and opinionated conservative is putting it very mildly. While he did interject his own opinions in his questioning he did give the three candidates plenty of opportunity to get their points across.

On the economy, there were definite differences between the three. For the most part Jason Chaffetz and Jim Noorlander agreed when it came to getting the government to quit picking economic winners and losers - something I wholeheartedly agree with. Where Jason and Jim parted ways was changing over to the gold standard. Mr. Noorlander is on the Ron Paul gold standard bandwagon - he brought it up ever chance he got and that was often. Jason had a decent response (which I missed adding in my live blog as this was where the debate was jumping back and forth quickly) about the implementation of such a change. Whether it was the fair tax or the gold standard, Jason had concerns about how we could make this change and do it in a way that did not kill the economy.

Spencer brought up the "lack of regulation" a couple of times - making sure to follow the Democratic talking points that this was a failing of the Republican Party - the party of deregulation. There is only one problem with that. There is a video on You Tube (I will post that in another post) that shows the REPUBLICAN chair of the Government Sponsored Entity Subcommittee hearings into improper book-keeping practices at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac calling for further Congressional oversight and regulation into Fannie and Freddie and having that call BLOCKED by the Democrats in the subcommittee (including Barney Frank and Maxine Waters). Woops.....then in another answer, Bennion admitted that the problem was not caused by any one party but by the failure of both parties - a stand with which I agree, but then in another answer he went back to his "blame Bush" talking points. His biggest one was that Bush "laid off the regulators" at the FDIC. The problem with this thought process is that the practice of taking mortgages and turning them into "investments" (a la Freddie and Fannie) is not a practice that is regulated by the FDIC. Because Freddie and Fannie are "GSE"s the oversight and regulation FALLS TO CONGRESS and Congress failed to do their jobs yet again!

The second half of the second hour was immigration talk. The host did a fantastic job of pushing everyone on their answers which gave the listeners a much better understanding of where the candidates stood on the issue. I was mildly surprised when Bennion Spencer brought up a talking point version of the "Razorwire" ad that I wrote about yesterday and Jason did not get after Spencer for an apology. This has been a source of fireworks between the two all campaign. Although I found it interesting when Maxon actually went after Spencer on this allegation. He spoke at length about the fact that men as well as women commit crimes and that a "law enforcement first" strategy is going to ensure that men AND women are locked up and that there was not way to "immediately deport" the criminal aliens as Spencer advocated (after much pushing by Maxon in response to Spencer's claims that he was pro-enforcement).

I had to laugh when Spencer talked about how the Democrat Party was not a party of "litmus tests" like the Republicans were. This is the same "Democratic" Party that has bent over backwards to stifle any moderate opinions within the party - chasing such notables as Joe Leiberman and Zell Miller from the party! This is the same "Democratic" Party whose leadership threatens members with their committee assignments in order to guarantee the proper vote on an issue. No litmus tests?????? Pull the other leg Spencer!

The bright spot of the debate to me was Jim Noorlander. While I can't vote for him (there is no way we can go back to the gold standard as he and Ron Paul advocate) I did appreciate greatly his reminders that we are rapidly marching toward socialism and BOTH parties are leading the parade. It is nice to know that others are seeing this. If the majority of big "L" libertarians are of this mindset, I may find other candidates to vote for!

My thanks to Mark Maxon for hosting this debate. It was a lot of fun and a worthwhile two hours. Now if you guys could just do something to boost your signal - I had to listen on line because I could not get the station in at all here on the West Bench.

3rd CD Debate Hour 2

They are still taking calls on the economy right now - had a couple of democrat seminar callers who were more interested in pontificating instead of answering questions which took up time. Hopefully after this break we will get into the immigration question.

The last seminar caller brought up Iraq which lead to a couple of questions to the candidates from Mark. Jason's answer was typical - support the troops let them finish their jobs, it was no accident that we have not been attacked since 9/11. Bennion's answer was equally typical - bring the troops home now we can't do any more. Jim agreed with Jason.

Now on to the hot topic of illegal immigration. What would you do about Illegal Immigration - Jim first.

JN - 13 citizens a day are killed illegals driving drunk - 13 a day murdered by illegals. Need to secure border. Those that are here must get liberty card that allows him to get his affairs in order before leaving the country. Would finish the wall and nationalize Mexican assets in US in order to pay for border enforcement.

BS - guest worker program, secure borders and we need to give border states more resources in order to enforce the border.

More after the break (ooooo Van Hagar outro....)

We're back and on to Jason Chaffetz.

JC - The current status quo is a very immoral position. 7 point plan that starts with fixing legal immigration and no fence will work if we don't fix that. No amnesty - no pathway to citizenship. Fix visa situation - enforce current laws. Give business the tools to hire legally without being ICE.

MM: You were on another show recently and I guess it got heated. The host was going to walk out on you. Why?

JC: Because I support enforcing the current law. There are fugitive aliens that we need to find and deport....these are people who broke other laws and were ordered to be deported and I want that enforced. Talked about the designation on aliens from countries other than Mexico and how the majority of them are from countries that are state sponsors of terrorism.

JN: talked about how this generation of immigrants has not assimilated and how they turn to the first person who promises them goodies and expands the welfare rolls. Talked about SPP and NAFTA.

BS - brought up the razorwire tent cities. We need guest worker program so that we know who is here.

MM: don't we racially profile anyway?

BS: I am not sure we should be doing that but we do. I am hearing double speak from Jason.

JC: Are you or are you not going to support the law? If we do, some of these criminals are women...what are you going to do?

MM: enforcing the law is not pretty - if you can't do the time, don't do the crime....and commercial break.

MM: Jim Noorlander brings up a good point that neither presidential candidate wants to close the border - we don't want to hire people without checking out their background. Bennion I want to press you on this...if you are going to enforce the law are you going to look for people with an Australian accent or are you going to look at Hispanics. What are you going to do with the 650,000 people who are criminal aliens?

BS: We need guest worker program...

MM:what do we do with the criminals we can't put them in already overcrowded prisons?

BS: we don't need to go back to the barbaric practice of tent cities a la Japanese internment camps.

JC: that has nothing to do with what we are talking about here. This is not about WWII internment camps - this is about enforcing our laws.

Back to callers. One caller wanted to talk about "evangelical interference" in the elections.

MM: Do you think that there is too much involvement with Christians in the process? (more on this from me later)

JC: I think we need to remember that we are "one nation under God". We need to remember that we are a Christian nation. Mentioned that the Democrats are pushing an agenda that does not line up with a majority of Christians.

BS: I am pro-life, pro-second amendment - Democrats do not have the same litmus test that Republicans have (excuse me?)

JN: quoted Patrick Henry that this country was not founded by "religionists" but by Christians and not by multiple religions but by Christians!

MM: Take the jobs away and they won't come.

BS: renegotiate NAFTA. We enacted NAFTA and it took away Mexican jobs.

Jason and Jim both agreed.

MM: NAU and SPP - is it real?

JN: Yes it is real....commercial break...back - go to the book "Tragedy and Hope" it's all there.

JC: - yes it is real and I want to shut it down.

BS: It's real we have to shut it down it has already done enough damage but we need to focus on our financial dealings with China and India.

MM"Quickly the Patriot Act your thoughts.

JC: Opposed - there were parts that were good, but it is an overall bad bill that needs to go away.

BS: Opposed to it.

JN: I would have it repealed as it goes against the 4th and 5th Amendment.

Caller - economy and immigration go hand in hand support our local business - quit supporting businesses that take jobs overseas.

Caller - what about Afghan poppy fields? Everyone agreed - destroy them and quit propping up an enonomy that is hurting our kids.

That is the end of the show. It was a fascinating debate. I will write a post with my thoughts on the debate later.

3rd CD Debate

For those of you in Utah's 3rd Congressional District, KTKK-AM broadcast a debate this morning between the three candidates for the US House of Representatives. I will be quasi-live blogging the debate between Jim Noorlander, Jason Chaffetz and Bennion Spencer as I am expecting a delivery here at the house this morning. Jim and Jason are in the studio and Bennion called in to the program in order to allow Jim to be part of the debate.

Gentlemen - did any of you catch 60 minutes last night? Bennion since you are not in the studio I will start with you.

Bennion Spencer - talks about deregulation and how this is President Bush's fault. Says layoffs at FDIC were in part cause. No mention that the Democrats in Congress (more on that later) had oversight and neglected their duties. Pushing for oversight and regulation.

Mark Maxon - Jason let's move to you.

Jason Chaffetz - the claim that there was a lack of regulation is not true. The heart and soul of the story was how Wall Street skirted regulations. For the sake of the country I hope that this bail out works, the markets are telling us it won't and I said from the beginning that this was a flawed plan. Government needs to get out of the way.

Station break - back with more....and we are back.

MM - Jason you have another 40 seconds left

Chaffetz - we are over taxed and over regulated. We need responsible capital formation. I disagree with Mr. Spencer and his support of the bailout.

MM - How about you Jim?

Jim Noorlander - there is nothing worse than trying to solve a problem without understanding the problem. Government has given us 5 ways to cause a problem but nothing to fix it. We need to go back to the days of the Founders and the gold standard - there is no money only paper and if there is no confidence in the paper we have no money. America is supposed to be that shining city on the hill - we need to go back to the blue print of the Founding Fathers. The bailout was pure socialism. Both parties are morally bankrupt which is why I am running on a third party.

MM - Bennion - I believe there is an article that stated you were for the bail out is that correct?

Spencer - we needed to do something. China and Saudi Arabia were coming in to buy our banks. Their goals are not ours and we can not allow that to happen. We had to do something to prevent it.

Another station break.

Back

MM - lets go to Jim Noorlander with this question.

I missed Jim's answer as the phone rang.

MM - Jason...

JC - Social engineering got us into this mess. Both sides have plenty of blame in this mess believe me. We need to get back to our core conservative principles which is why I am running. Deficit of $9trillion came from both parties.

MM - Thank you Jason. Just a couple of things....

JN - Mark can I interrupt - the deficit is 120trillion. The only thing that will solve this is if we go back to the gold standard.

MM - why is that Jim?

JN - It's a paper game. If we go back to the gold standard we have real money.

MM - Bennion what do you think?

BS - I don't think that there is enough gold to make that workable. That is one reason why Richard Nixon pulled us out of the gold standard. This is not a Republican or Democrat or ideological problem it is a world problem.

JC - This goes back to the social engineering....

OK - I am falling way behind as this is a really spirited back and forth. We just cut to commerical and I will fill this part in as soon as the podcast (if there is one) is available.


MM - we're back - Jason I wanted to give you a chance to finish your thought.

JC - we are not at a panic point yet. While things are bad, there is some good left in the economy (low unemployment) let's not panic.

JN - I need to interject - I don't buy that there is not enough gold. We need to let the market define the value of gold and if that means it goes up to $30,000 an ounce so be it.

MM - Back to the swap Jason you saw the show last night. AIG can take these bad loans and change the name on them and claim to guarantee them even though they are not guaranteed. If we tried to do something like this wouldn't we be in a federal pen somewhere?

BS - I have to disagree with Jason - unemployment is not that low. People losing their jobs is not good. There is not enough oversight...

MM - Answer the question - wouldn't we be in a federal pen somewhere if we tried to do this?

BS - yes we would.

MM - Jason how about you....

JC - I would hope so....

Again I am getting behind so I am going to start paraphrasing....

MM - Should we hold people accountable?

JC - Oh yes.

JN - Yes

BS - Bush laid off all of the regulators...

Going to take callers soon. I am going to quit here and try to ask a question. Scratch that....second hour is going to be on immigration. I am going to end this post here and give the second hour it's own post.

Selective Law Enforcement

Oye....Bennion Spencer has a new ad out that he knows is flat out false. It is a 15 second ad titled "Razorwire".

Jason Chaffetz wants to put undocumented women and children behind razorwire. That's an awful place when your only crime is seeking a better life.

In every debate between the candidates the issue of ILLEGAL immigration has come up time and time again. And time and time again Jason has said that he wants to put ILLEGAL immigrants behind bars if they have been arrested of a crime in addition to breaking our immigration laws...not children and only women who have committed other crimes. If Spencer does not think that our immigration laws are worthy of enforcement, one has to wonder what other laws Spencer thinks are optional. Maybe the statewide smoking ban? How about the speed limit? OH or how about environmental protection laws???? And why is it so hard for some people to differentiate between LEGAL and ILLEGAL immigration?

Really Bennion - are you that bereft of ideas that you have nothing better to do that to air false negative advertising?

UPDATE - I forgot to add this. The Western Governors Association has proposed a similar facility to the one Chaffetz proposes.

The Western Governors Association has proposed construction of regional correctional facilities to hold immigrants convicted of crimes. Chaffetz has suggested tent cities surrounded by barbed wire instead, as a way to cut costs.

I can't wait to see how Mr. Spencer and his supporters spin THIS!

Debate Thoughts

First off - again thanks to Lyall and the Sutherland Institute folks for hosting us this morning. It was a lot of fun. Oh I know my non-political friends and family are all scratching their heads but it really was. I got the opportunity to chat with both Jason Chaffetz and Ben Spencer before and after the event (respectively) and they both struck me as being fine, gracious gentlemen. There were not a lot of fireworks - which I have to say coming from Minnesota struck me a bit....I am used to more "explosive" debates.

There were a couple of comments that I highlighted in my notes because I really felt that these were comments that needed a little more scrutiny.

First on energy there was agreement and disagreement. Both candidates said that energy was a hot issue and both agreed (to an extent) that more drilling and advancement of alternatives was necessary. Where the two appear to disagree is where Mr. Chaffetz said that we need to make the best use possible of ALL domestic resources - something that I have been saying all along.

During Mr. Spencer's opening remarks he made the comment that if we had a foreign policy that supported Hashemi Rafsanjani over Mahmoud Ahmadinejad then we would not be in Iraq. Is he really suggesting that we should have a foreign policy that routinely interferes in the elections of sovereign nations? I was also mildly taken aback to hear a serious candidate for national office refer to the duly elected President of a foreign country as "nuts". While arguments could be made for the mental stability of said president, it is not a good idea to express those sentiments in such an open forum.

There was only one time where a question really never got answered. When the question what would YOU do to foster transparency, Ben Spencer never said what HE personally would do. While I agree that the press needs to be made accountable to their customer, saying what the people need to do and what the press needs to do does not say what YOU will do...

All in all I was very glad to have attended this event. I look forward to a couple of more in the coming 56 days.

Q&A Time/Final Remarks

The Q&A format was pretty straight forward. Lyall would ask the questions and each candidate would get one minute to answer. Because I was writing (long story) this all out all questions and answers are paraphrased from my shorthand.

Q1) What will you do when you get to DC to try to get rid of the partisan rancor?

Jason Chaffetz - I don't care who gets the credit as long as a solution is found. Take the Legacy Parkway for example (not to try to take credit) - I forged relationships on both sides of the aisle so that all concerns were addressed so that the highway could get built.

Ben Spencer - Term limits and you have to take a stand against leadership. He talked about how he spoke out against Speaker Pelosi adjourning 5 weeks ago leaving a bill on the floor that was trying to address the energy crisis.

Q2) What do you think are the two biggest threats facing the country today?

B - International or Domestic?

Q - each.

B - Russia Pakistan and Iran are the greatest international threats. Pakistan has nuclear weapons and political unrest. Russia - we just don't know if the old guard or the new guard are in control. Iran - Ahmadinejad is "nuts" - we are not sure who is in power or what their intentions are.

J - We are hearing no solutions here just a list of problems. We need to drive down our debt. Debt notes devalue our currency. Billions go daily to people who don't like us. Immigration is a national security issue that must be addressed.

Q - Domestic?

J - You can not separate domestic and international issues as they are intertwined.

B - Immigration - I agree with Jason. We need to rework NAFTA. Weakened dollar increases interest rates. Dollar value has direct impact on gas prices. People gave President Bush a hard time for going to Beijing for the Olympics but we can not longer push China around anymore on human rights issues. They own too many of our debt notes.

Q3) When does life begin?

J - at conception. I am opposed to abortion

B - I agree with Jason. Life begins at birth and I am opposed to abortion.

Q4) Do you consider health care to be a "constitutional right"?

B - Nothing in Constitution that says that. The Founding Fathers were "divinely inspired" when the wrote the Constitution. It is a "moral" response - it is because government already subsidizes so much health care and government can not "discriminate".

J - No this is not the proper role of government. We need to put more into the hands of private providers and in the individual states. We need to transition away from a Medicare/Medicaid model in a methodical way but no socialized medicine as is being proposed now.

Q5) Define "excess profits" and if we get into taxing "excess" oil company profits what industry is next?

J - I am opposed to "windfall profits" taxes. Rather than taking federal money in the form of earmarks, we need to just give "block grants" to the states and let THEM decide where the money needs to be spent. Transportation decisions need to be made by the states and not the feds. We don't have a "revenue" problem we have a spending problem - cut irresponsible spending and the money for necessary spending will be there.

B - I agree that we have a "spending" problem. It is easy to pick on oil companies because they are successful at running their business. The Senate "investigations" into the oil companies were mostly grandstanding. I am against the Obama "windfall profits" plan because companies are entitled to make a profit. We need to let the oil companies work on what they are good at.

Q6) What steps will YOU take to foster government transparency?

B - The press needs to step up and do their job (in fostering transparency). One thought (from Senator Obama) is to make CSPAN more accessible and put more content on it but who really watches CSPAN. The people need to hold the press accountable and make them do their job.

J - I think how you run your campaign is a good indicator of how you will act as Congressman. I fully disclose all my donors - not just those who give over $250 as is required by the law. We need to make the budgeting process more accessible - put budget bills on line. One thing I will do is to reject all airdropped earmarks until the system has been reformed.

Final Remarks

Ben Spencer - thanks for being here and thanks for holding the press accountable. While my opponent and I disagree on much we will have a "good" campaign.

Jason Chaffetz - If we get the principles right we will then get the process of governing right.

My thoughts next.

Chaffetz/Spencer Blogger Breakfast Debate

I am probably the last to get my post on this morning's debate up...with good reason - life got in the way. However, this morning was the Jason Chaffetz - Bennion Spencer debate hosted by the fine folks at the Sutherland Institute (for my MN readers think along the lines of the MN Free Market Institute). The moderator was Lyall Swim from the Sutherland Institute. The forum started out with a 15 minute intro from each candidate, approximately 30 minutes of Q&A followed by a 5 minute closing statement.

Jason Chaffetz started us off talking about how honored he was to be with us and what an honor it was to be the Republican nominee for Congress. He mentioned how the Republicans needed to get back to it's core principles as it was what was best for the country and the party. He said that the party blew it when they had control and governed against their principles - being more concerned about putting the party before principles. He then went on to talk about how he set out to run a "different" campaign - eschewing paid political operatives and polling for volunteers and common sense. He said that he didn't do polling because he didn't need polls to tell him how to vote! (No Minnesota you can't have him!). He touched briefly on the fact that he was outspent 6-1 during the primary and that he refused to go into debt in order to get elected. He said that was part of the fiscal discipline that this country needed. On fiscal discipline he said that we needed to quit trying to be all things to all people. He also mentioned a website Expectmore.gov which lists out the programs that are performing and those that are not. He said that we needed to look at the under performing or ineffective programs and cut them where we can. He also spoke on energy and education calling energy security a "national security issue" and that NCLB needs to be repealed and the Federal government needed to get out of what is a local/state issue (education).

The fireworks of the event came when Chaffetz spoke about illegal immigration. He said that his comments on tents (we should take a look at what Maricopa County AZ is doing with lawbreakers) were taken grossly out of context. His detractors say that this is a racial comment and Chaffetz said both here (and on Nightside last night) that he didn't care what race - if they are here illegally and they broke other laws it does not matter what their race is they need to be punished. He demanded an apology from Mr. Spencer and his surrogates. That was the end of his first 15 minutes.

Ben Spencer got up and apologized right off the bat for having little voice (bad allergies - I can sooooo sympathize!) and said he was happy to be at the event. He agreed with Mr. Chaffetz that the Republicans "blew it" when they had control of all three houses, but went on to say that the problems we are facing today are not "Republican" or "Democrat" problems they are American problems. He said he was a firm believer in term limits and that he did not want to go to DC to "die" (I think Paul Wellstone did something similar and then when his self imposed term limits came up he ran again!). He said that he will draw on his experience as a journalist in DC (more on that later) - talking about the time he spent with then Governor George W. Bush while filming a documentary. He related a story about how they had Governor Bush for an unscheduled 45 minute flight back to Austin and how Governor Bush never talked policy - just talked sports. He said that was a smart move. He stated that energy was the number 1 issue today and that we needed to develop alternative fuels. He said that if drilling were expanded we needed a guarantee that the fuel would stay here to solve our needs and not go to China or Russia. He repeated the Democrats "we can't drill our way out of this" mantra. While I agree that "Drill Baby Drill" is a simplistic response to this crisis, so is the "we can't drill our way out" response but that is another post. He finished talking about foreign policy saying that if we had a foreign policy that supported Hashemi Rafsanjani (a pro US Moderate) when he ran against Mahmoud Ahmadinejad then we would not be in Iraq today!

Q&A and analysis in the following posts.