Posted on 10/18/2005 7:59:38 AM PDT by calcowgirl
LIFE FROM THE SEAT of the tractor feels close to perfect, the mid-day sun warming your back and the earthy smell of manure mixing with the dusky scent of fall.
"Why would I give this up?" asked former Congressman Pete McCloskey as he tipped his shovel into a pile of horse crap and dumped it around the trunk of an orange tree on his Capay Valley farm. "I ask myself that a lot."
But at 78 years old and more than two decades after he left Congress, McCloskey may well park his tractor and run in the June 2006 primary against Rep. Richard Pombo, R-Tracy.
For those too young to remember, McCloskey became a national household name in the 1970s after he opposed the Vietnam War and ran against then-President Richard Nixon. The following year, he delivered a dramatic speech on the House floor calling for Congress to impeach Nixon for obstruction of justice.
McCloskey has already served during one of this country's most turbulent eras. Why go back?
"He's a Marine and he's Irish," says his wife and obvious soulmate, Helen Hooper McCloskey.
If it happens, it will illuminate, in stark relief, the disparate philosophies of two Republicans who disagree on just about everything, particularly environmental policy.
McCloskey co-wrote the 1974 Endangered Species Act, while Pombo has devoted most of his 13 years in Congress trying to curtail it.
McCloskey co-founded the first environmental law firm in the nation, while Pombo fights on behalf of property owners who say they bear an unfair burden when it comes to environmental regulations.
McCloskey co-chaired the first Earth Day in 1970, while Pombo co-founded the property rights group, the San Joaquin County Citizens Land Alliance.
Now, McCloskey insists that he won't run if he finds a "reasonable Republican to take Pombo on." (He co-founded earlier this year a nonprofit group called Revolt of the Elders Coalition devoted to unseating ultra-conservative Republicans.)
The ex-congressman believes it will be easier to beat Pombo in a low-turnout primary, particularly because the Republican Party is under heavy fire in the wake of ethics charges against several of its top officials, including ex-Majority Leader Tom Delay of Texas.
Thus far, an acceptable candidate has been as scarce as a kit fox.
Only the Democrats have fielded challengers. Jerry McNerney of Pleasanton officially announced his candidacy last week, and United Airlines pilot Steve Filson of Danville has said he will run.
McCloskey blames, in part, geography for the absence of eager moderate Republican candidates.
District 11 is split one-third in the Bay Area, from Dublin to Morgan Hill, while the balance of its residents live in Tracy and rural San Joaquin County.
On the other hand, there's no indication that Pombo's constituents are unhappy. They've re-elected him repeatedly by healthy margins.
And while conservative Central Valley voters may prefer McCloskey over any candidate with a Bay Area address, some may howl over a man they view as a horned RINO, Republican in Name Only.
And that's not just because of what he did in the 1970s. McCloskey infuriated conservative Republicans when he endorsed Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry over GOP President George W. Bush in 2004.
There's also a little matter of residency: McCloskey doesn't live in the district.
The law does not require congressional candidates to reside in the districts in which they run, but "carpetbagger" is an ugly word. If he runs, McCloskey says he will move to Tracy or perhaps Brentwood.
In his 16 years in Congress, McCloskey served in a San Mateo County district, a seat now held by Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Palo Alto.
Today, McCloskey splits his time between a couple of places that include his former district, where he teaches legal ethics and political science at Stanford and Santa Clara universities.
He and his wife run an organic orchard and raise horses on their farm near Rumsey, a rural blip of a town 50 miles north of Vacaville in the lovely Capay Valley.
But that doesn't mean McCloskey lacks ties to District 11. For example, he represented Pombo supporter and rancher Tony Souza when the Contra Costa Water District took a portion of the ranch under eminent domain to make room for the Las Vaqueros Reservoir.
Seated on the wooden deck outside his farmhouse, with his and Helen's half-dozen rescue dogs lolling under nearby shade trees, McCloskey is clearly torn.
He's not a young man anymore. A campaign is physically and mentally grueling. Pombo will be a formidable opponent with homegrown support and ample cash.
But McCloskey, who led six bayonet charges in Korea, says he can't drink coffee on his deck and gripe about how many trees he has lost to the gophers while "religious zealots, big business, lobbyists and war-mongers take over the party," he said.
Agree or not with McCloskey's assessment, if he enters this competition, it will generate interest in a primary race that hasn't been in question since 1991 when Pombo, then a young Tracy city councilman, won in a surprise upset over better-known opponents.
Spoken like a true Kerry Republican.
Is this a disingenuous attempt at slamming the proposed California re-districting?
Too bad old man. We need more Pombos, not more stealth socialists. Bring it on!
This bottom dweller foisted both the Endangered Species Act and Earth Day?
Wonderful!
He has cost us trillions$ for marginal speculative benefits, and at a real and huge cost to an economy which is a shadow of its former self, and condemned to deteriorate further unless those abortions are repealed or extensively modified.
Pombo is about to get not only my moral support, but also my financial and time support also.
The Valley is fed up!
McCloskey is all for redistricting. He's all for anything that helps his mission to oust conservatives. He's been after Doolittle, Cox, and Cunningham in California, as well as DeLay. There's some recent stuff posted on this thread, including the article he wrote titled:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1464708/posts
He's leader of a group called "Revolt of the Elders". Plenty to gag at if you do some googling. His record is also colorful (red) as you'd find him siding with the likes of Jane Fonda during the Vietnam war, more often than not.
RINOs like McCloskey make me sick. Another one is Rebecca Morgan, a purported Republican from the San Jose area. She is a leader in the campaign to defeat the Parental Notification for abortion initiative (Prop 73) and has donated $250K to it.
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