Hunter has one fight left before retirement

Looking to retire after 27 years on the House Armed Services Committee, including two as chairman, Rep. Duncan Hunter isn’t eager to talk about the “L-word.”

“I don’t care about leaving a legacy,” the California Republican said in an interview. “‘You do the best you can for the country every day’ — that’s my motto.”

The committee’s top Republican, Hunter is retiring at the end of his 14th term, deciding to focus on his bid for the Republican presidential nomination rather than mounting a reelection campaign to the House.

Yet his legacy may very well live on with his son, Duncan D. Hunter, a Marine who served in both Iraq and Afghanistan and is now running to succeed him.

And the son has not been shy about offering his father some advice now and then.

In April 2004, while the congressman was in the middle of a committee hearing in Washington, he received a satellite phone call from his son in the midst of the siege of Fallujah, not so subtly asking his father why his unit was being ordered to stop attacking when it had the insurgents on the run.

“I ended up with this young Marine officer cussing me out on a cell phone,” Hunter recalls with a laugh.

Within minutes, the congressman was on the phone with top Pentagon brass, relaying his son’s message and demanding answers.

Hunter’s family has deep military roots. His father served in World War II, and he was an Army Ranger in Vietnam, earning a Bronze Star.

Away from the committee, the past year has been a tumultuous one for the congressman, as his presidential bid has failed to surge, leaving him an asterisk in the polls.

Hunter is particularly stung by criticism from Democrats that he did not conduct tough enough oversight of the Iraq war while he was committee chairman, citing efforts to bolster protections against improvised explosive devices and to provide “jammers” to scramble the triggers insurgents were using to set off roadside bombs.

“We produced 10,000 portable jammers and moved them out to the battlefield — from a concept to the field — in just 70 days,” he said.

In fact, Hunter’s zeal to come up with protective body armor to defend against improvised explosive devices earned him the derisive nickname “SpongeBob HunterPants” after a military staffer fabricated a picture of Hunter wearing the bulky contraption, drawing comparisons to the famous children’s television character, according to an account in The Washington Post.

When he was in charge, Hunter said, “this committee moved up the production of armored Humvees by seven months” after he took his case directly to the steel mills that manufactured the plating.

Despite their differing views on the war, Hunter says he and the committee chairman, Rep. Ike Skelton (D-Mo.), are the “best of friends” and maintain a positive working relationship.

“We arm-wrestle on issues that take on a political edge,” Hunter said, “but we find a great deal of common cause.”

While the theme fits nicely with his presidential campaign promise to defend against the loss of manufacturing jobs overseas, Hunter said he sees military implications.

“We have got to look at the horizon carefully,” he said, warning that military technology can be compromised when companies move production offshore.

Hunter said he would like to see next year’s Defense Authorization Bill tackle the China issues, especially undersea capability, electronic warfare and the ability to strike deep behind enemy lines.

Hunter has requested a meeting with President Bush and other top lawmakers to discuss the Chinese threat but has yet to hear back from the White House.

And after nearly three decades of tackling military issues on Capitol Hill, Hunter has some advice for his “hard-charging” son as he campaigns to succeed him in the House.

“He is going to leave one battlefield and go to the next,” the congressman said. “I am firing from all sides myself right now.”

I've been on record since Time1, that if things don't go my way: I vote U.S. Constitution Party (this from somebody who naturalized just because they were disgusted with BJ xClintoon42).

Without doubt there's been a big issue in contention concerning the "best" candidate to support. Some time ago this issue came up, was riotous, contentious, and a great many people left FreeRepublic.

That happened. Many of my brothers/sisters left/(were forced to leave) this forum.

I'm not about to dispute that/anything else pertaining to psaltry issue akin to that.

I will tell you this: when it comes down to the choice Nov '08: Hillary/Rooty U.S. Constitution Party party member will be my vote. I pray that I'm not presented that ultimatum. My very first vote as a U.S. citizen was Keyes, and my second vote was for Buchanen, my third vote was FOR Bush (even so I despised what he stood for).

Regardless of what my church, assembly, synagoge (or other officially recognized place of worship) establishes to be the candidate of choice, I'm going to vote for whatever U. S. Constitution Party candidate exists at the time.

Isn't that what I signed up for: to be able to tell you all to F* off? I'm telling you: do NOT give me that choice. I don't care HOW many votes I steal from the repuke candidate. IF the American people elect Hillar, they get what's coming to them.

From your link (and I hope you washed before posting that, I certainly need to after looking):

>>>>I deplore this kind of jingoism, but I get the impression that it's very strong in the Republican base.<<<

Jingos for Hunter! Woo Hoo!

>>>Certainly the United States has done a lot of great things, but it's done its share of bad things too, many of them while George W. Bush has been at the helm. There is no quantity of good deeds that ever removes the need to be contrite about bad deeds.<<<

Duncan Hunter: (Excerpt from an interview) This country has lost 619 thousand Americans on the battlefields around the world in the last 100 years making the world safe. The reason we are not sending people back to Nazi Germany because we took care of Nazi Germany and we liberated the Germans and the reason we are not sending people back to a Communist Poland is because we brought down the Berlin Wall. The reason we are not sending people back to a Marxist Dictatorship in El Salvador is because we liberated El Salvador. We have made the world much freer. And we have pumped billions of dollars into lots of countries to improve their economies.

>>>Even if you believe the war in Iraq was justified, and even if you think the Iraqis are better off with the mess in their country now than they were under Saddam, the death and destruction in Iraq due to sheer incompetence and horrible planning is definitely worthy of an apology.<<<<

Duncan Hunter: (Excerpt from an interview) First with the respect to imposing democracy from the barrel of a gun, the only guns we held on the days when they had Free Election in Iraq was the Americans along with the Iraqi Police who were protecting the voting places and that included the suicide bomber that rushed in to try to blow up a bunch of voters and one of the Iraqi Policeman bear hugged him and pulled him out of the voting area and was killed with him when that guy tried to kill voters. So those people that voted in the Iraqi Elections voted in a Free and Fair Election. All the international observers agree with that.

And I would say this Mike, over the last 60 years, we have brought freedom to large parts of the world. For example in WW2, after the war with Japan, we gave them a constitution while we were occupying Japan. We taught them to have free and fair elections. Today they have a democracy in Japan. In South Korea, we did the same thing. In El Salvador, and you know I was in Congress during the Contra Wars in South America. El Salvador which was once run by a military dictatorship was protected by Ronald Reagan while they stood up a free democracy, a free voting system. In which a person both liberals and conservtives both agree was a great leader, Jose Duarte was elected in a free and fair election while Ronald Reagan held that shield of military protection around that fragile government. I saw left wingers protesting in the streets. That was going to be our next Vietnam according to them. You know I think we have liberals that die of old age waiting for our next Vietnam. And yet, the President persisted, and we have a free El Salvador today. And people vote for their leadership. And we brought down the Berlin wall and now you have all those former captive nations that were under the Tierney of the Soviet Union.

This country have freed 100s of millions of people since WW2. And sometimes you have to be strong to free them. It wasn’t peace marches that brought down the Soviet Union. It was Ronald Reagan’s military strength of the Soviet Union. And when they tried to match us military equipment for military equipment they realized they couldn’t. They picked up the phone and said let’s talk. And when we talked, it brought down that massive empire that oppressed 100s of millions of people and you have free nations today. You ask people in Poland, who brought them freedom. It is the United States. Now let’s go to Iraq.

“Laura and Ann and Phyllis Schlafly and Michelle need to band together and give him a ringing, collective endorsement.”

They do, but we need to get his message out to Veterans, prolife groups, and everyone we know who cares about anything besides themselves.

It is shocking to me that I know alot of really smart, well-informed, conservative people who are so busy with their own responsibilities that they just don’t know Hunter’s running.

Most of them tell me they have not watched a single debate!

I know these people are ideologically in agreement with Hunter, but they’re not yet paying attention.

We need to help get Hunter’s message AND RECORD out to them.

Though his days on the committee are numbered, Hunter still has at least one more fight left, defending against what he sees as increasing military threats from China, which is bolstering its military capabilities as American manufacturing increasingly moves offshore.

While the theme fits nicely with his presidential campaign promise to defend against the loss of manufacturing jobs overseas, Hunter said he sees military implications.

“We have got to look at the horizon carefully,” he said, warning that military technology can be compromised when companies move production offshore.

We cannot ship all of our heavy industry to China and remain a viable military power, much less a superpower. We cannot ship all of our research to India or China, and remain a military leader. Congressman Hunter is the only candidate who is tackling these critical issues head-on.

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