I'd also add that it's pretty dirty that we broke our own international laws by invading Iraq. I say 'ours' because it was our government that created the UN and was instrumental in drafting international laws regarding conflict resolution, and now that that can of worms is open, we set a precedent sure to be emulated. 'Imminent threat' and 'weapons of mass destruction' can now be claimed by any nation to justify an invasion of another. The world is sure not a safer place, but a bunch of guys and a few industries are a whole lot richer now.

Which really is at point here. For ten years the military industrial complex sat on its thumbs trying to find a reason to exist since the Cold War was over. And now these guys are tripping over each trying to get in on this 'war on terror'. It's scandalous!   And it's not just Republicans, man, it's practically everyone! In fact, you could say that's the one common thing binding Congress all together ~ the sounds of their knees hitting the floor all at the same time when the money walks in. Now that's bipartisanship!

But seriously, spending fifty-one cents of every tax dollar on defense while millions of children do not get an adequate education and millions more go hungry in this country, I wouldn't call it dirty, I’d say it's damned immoral.

To me it's obvious that we have to get money out of influencing our elections and our representatives ~ we have to end privately financed campaigns. 'We the people' deserve a better method in choosing our leaders than we do when deciding on what kind of detergent or toothpaste to buy. And if not, why don't we just be straight up with it and have Congressman Enron and Representative WorldCom? At least that would be honest.

But in all seriousness, can anyone expect someone like Wally Herger to spend $800,000 to get elected for a job that pays a $150,000, and go off to Washington unencumbered? Are we really expected to believe after all that cash passed hands, that we regular people are going to be his ongoing and present concern? This current system is, I believe, right now a greater threat to democracy than a busload of shoe-bombers.

But I have a plan. I call it '50 Sheets of Paper and a Ball Point Pen'. That's what's given to any one who is running and eligible. Fifty sheets of paper and a ball point pen to write all their views, their differences with their opponents, and their qualifications. These pages are then copied and distributed to all voters in the cheapest and by the most effective means possible. Then the candidates are given a mandatory three debates to be televised at the expense of the network broadcast stations.

Hold on, I know what you're about to say, but more than fifty years ago the Supreme Court ruled that the airwaves belong to the American public and since then, each year the US Congress grants them free these airwaves of ours, in hopes that they'll be used for the public good. Well hope no more, this will be my first piece of legislation when I get to Washington!

You're right, I am more like a two-fisted democrat of a few decades back, but to answer you, I am pro all the amendments found in the Bill of Rights, and the right to keep and bear arms is the second right. The Bill of Rights is what kept this country together, without it no state would have signed on and we'd still be a bunch of little countries instead of one great big one with civil liberty protections. And besides, the framers of the Constitution knew only too well what happens when the people are defenseless against an abusive centralized government. That is why they preferred state militias to a standing national army.

But I'll tell you where I draw the line; I do not accept the practice of selling arms of all sorts abroad, to countries made dangerous by our disastrous economic and political foreign policies. A gun never settled an argument, it's only after they've stopped going off that progress is made.

Northern California, the very middle, and all the way up to Oregon ... just beautiful country. I guess a lot of people might say it's water. logging or agriculture versus the environment. A whole lot of difference of opinions up here, and that really is our biggest challenge. I mean this has got to be one of the most polarized districts around. And people have really dug themselves in, sometimes into very entrenched positions.

For instance, I was talking to this old wood carver in Chico a couple weeks back about logging and environmentalists. And he said 'You know what? If there's a forest fire and I go in there afterwards and try and pull off the burnt part of some fallen tree to get at the good wood I can't even do that. Damned environmental government won't even let me scavenge wood to work on, chop all the damned trees for all I care!'

And you know this was an old guy that spent his life's work outdoors carving, and he had a deep love of nature, but things had become so polarized here that this was the position he found he had to take. 'Just damn it all then.'

And that's not right. And you can find the same with people on the other side of the issue taking stands that they don't necessarily believe but are forced into, because no one is coming forward offering leadership. And I am speaking right now of my opponent.

For nine terms, nearly twenty years, nothing has moved forward, only further away from each other. Water. We have got serious water problems here. When it is more economically viable for a farmer to let his fields go fallow and to sell the water so people in Los Angeles can fill their swimming pools, while 18% of the families in this district go hungry three sometimes four nights a week, something has gone very, very wrong.

Why surpluses are ever viewed as a problem when our district, our country, our world, still has hunger is beyond me. Our farmers should be celebrated when the harvest years are good. It could mean millions of people each night need not go hungry, but instead we have all but abandoned the farmer to market forces, which should never come into play when we are discussing agriculture. How can there be too good a harvest when a quarter of the world goes hungry? How can it ever be possible that something as essential as food, can lose value by a successful year?

And likewise, the Klamath water problems have been with us for a long, long time and the best Congressman Herger has done for it is to further inflame the two camps instead of offering real leadership. In these last twenty years, residential gray water reclamation systems could have been put in place, land for water swaps could have been made with the Department of the Interior, but no, all Congressman Herger has done is to take the farmers' money and support, and be an 'opposing voice' in Congress. Well hell, twenty years later and still the same problems ... I'd start wondering what my money was buying because things sure aren't any better now.

This has become a bitterly divisive issue here and one that Wally Herger is using to keep his dwindling support in step. It's the boogeyman line, 'whachout fer them democrats, they'll steal yer water'. The fact is leadership sometimes requires the ability to mediate between opposing groups to help bring about a negotiation, a compromise. It is said that the fairest of any negotiation is that all parties go away from the table equally dissatisfied. And that's what's got to be brought forward. As much as both sides would like to see the other just go away, no one's going anywhere. Both camps are going to have to give some; otherwise it's just a stalemate. And life's a little too damned short for that kind of BS.

Well I'm not going to make any friends with consumers, which is, well, everyone, but the fact is we pay less now for what the American farmer provides us, than we did 10, nearly 20 years ago. The competition is international, so it is fierce by the mere fact that there are no international standards on labor or production, and unless consumers are willing to pay more, which doesn't seem likely, we are going to have to either curtail imports, facilitate in creating international standards, or to subsidize.

But specifically, when I get to Congress I intend to present legislation to subsidize conventional farmers who wish to transition to organic methods for the three years it takes them to be certified. I want to do this not necessarily because it is more healthful to eat organic produce, although it is, and not necessarily because it is environmentally sound, although it is, but for the mere fact that organic produce is a tremendous growth market and one which will right off the bat, increase farmers profits. And this is really a model in my approach to raising the economic standards of this district. A lack of imagination and a fear of the new is always at the heart of economic stagnation, and this will end the moment I take office.