This morning's Standard-Examiner reports that U.S. House Representative Rob Bishop (R-Utah) has filed for re-election to his current seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. Charles Trentelman presents some of Rep. Bishop's rationale for seeking a fourth congressional term:
Bishop said he is running again because, “there are still some things that upset me, and some things that I’m making slight, but sure, progress on.”Rep. Bishop would appear to be closely adhering to the same game plan which successfully kept the 1st Congressional District seat firmly in the grasp of former Utah congressman Jim Hansen (Bishop's GOP predecessor in the same office for 22 years): being a very good friend to the military -- Hill Air Force Base in particular.
For example, he said he is concerned that the Democratic leadership of Congress has submitted a budget for the federal government that includes “about $200 billion more in domestic spending and still, in my estimation, not doing enough for the military, especially for the Air Force.
“The Air Force chief of staff said he needed $200 billion right now for infrastructure, and that’s the low end of the game,” Bishop said.
He said the lack of sufficient support for military spending is especially frustrating to him because Hill Air Force Base is in his district.
He said he is constantly attacked by representatives who don’t understand the needs.
“We have to move forward on the F- 35 and F-22, and the hard part is to get through to people who don’t have military in their district, who don’t realize that the Air Force is very technology intensive. You can’t do any ground action, they have to be in a plane and they cost a lot.”
Find more information on Rep. Bishop's official website.
We have yet to hear an announcement from any Demo challenger.
And what say our gentle readers about this?
20 comments:
I hope we can have a challenger, one that would vote listening to their constiuents. He might say he is for the military, but he isn't informed on their needs. He just states whatever he thinks will get him re-elected. When was the last time he was on base or among the military asking what they needed? He wrote op ed piece awile back and stated that Hill AFB was the only base that had ammunition. All bases have ammunition, but Hill has a munitions mission. If he didn't know the difference between ammunition and munitions then he really needs better advisors. I would run if I had the money.
Bishop is running again. Ah, yes. I've been waiting for this. Every two years, come nomination and election time, famed Bush Lemming Rob Bishop opens a trunk in his attic, rummages around, and finds his "fiscal conservative" suit... which he took off the morning after to votes were counted last time round, and hasn't worn since.
Mr. Bishop is worried, he says, that those evil Democrats in congress want to spend too much on domestic spending and too little on the Air Force. This is the same Bush Lemming Bishop of course who in his six years in Congress voted for Bush budget after Bush budget, which ran non-military spending to heights Lyndon Johnson never dreamed of, which has doubled... so far... the national debt during his term in office. And Bobble Head Rob dutifully nodded his little head "yea" for every one. For every pork-loaded Bush budget since the first... including the one funding the "bridge to nowhere" [at about $225 in taxpayer funds] in Alaska for Republican Senator Ted Stevens [now under investigation by the FBI for corruption in office]. When the press blew the whistle on that one, the embarrassed Republican majority... including Bobble Head Rob... told Alaska it could use the money for something else if it wanted to. [Yes, Virginia, contrary to what most hard working Americans think, it is possible to embarrass a Republican Neo-con Congressman, but it takes something that a normal person thinks would gag a maggot.]
And of course, Bush Lemming Bishop also went meekly along, nodding is bobble-head as his Neo-Con handlers directed, for Bush budget after Bush budget which cut support services for veterans. While, of course, trumpeting his "support for our troops" at every opportunity.
We might fairly ask of Bobble Head Rob this question on this exciting day when he announced that he will give us the chance to have him continue for two more years to run the deficit and debt into the stratosphere in the name of Fiscal Conservatism: Bush's war is now expected to cost us three trillion dollars in direct and indirect costs. Three trilling dollars. If we had not squandered, with Bobble Head Rob's approval over the last six years, all that money [never mind the lives and suffering of American service men and women] invading a country that hadn't attacked us to destroy weapons of mass destruction that didn't exist, we'd have had enough to update Air Force capabilities beyond Bobble Head Rob's wildest dreams. And only 40% of the money squandered on Iraq would have been enough to put Social Security on a sound financial footing for the next three quarters of a century.
But you wont hear that from Bush Lemming Bishop. He's running on his record, he say. That record consists of mindlessly nodding "yes" to Bush administration profligate spending, "yes" to the doubling of the national debt, "yes" to sky high deficits, "yes" to tax cuts that mostly helped the super rich... the kind of guys who get $28 million dollar bonuses when they're asked to step down as CEOs of companies they've run into bankruptcy or close while thens of thousands of working Americans face loss of their homes as a result of those companies actions; "yes" to economic policies that have us sinking into a Bush recession, hemorrhaging jobs [63 thousand last month]; "yes" to Bush economic policies that have seen real average family income decline since Bush and his faithful lemming, Bobble Head Rob took office.
And he's running on his record?
And the saddest thing of all is, here in the reddest of the red states, Bishop's disastrous record of mindless support for Bush economic, diplomatic and military incompetence will probably get him elected again.
All the rest of us can do, I guess, is turn to John 11:35 for comfort.
Typical republican... Blame the democrats for all the FEES, TAXES, and DEBT that the republicans raised for the past 12 years.
when robbie was in the majority what in the hell did he do for any of you?
Kick his but to the curb.
Rob Bishop is a product of the Utah State Legislature. Enough said
Ow Wow:
While I heartily approve of your suggestion to relocate the Hon.[?] Congressman to the political thoroughfare's margin, it's not going to be possible to do that without a Democratic candidate, and at the moment, I don't know of anyone who's running.
Do you?
Unless of course all those N. Utah Republicans who claim to be fiscal conservatives and not Neo-cons deny him the nomination. But I wouldn't bet the farm on that happening. At least you'd think one of them would challenge him for the nomination on the grounds that he's about as much of a fiscal conservative as Lenin was. If for no other reason than to send a shot across his bow and get his attention. But I wouldn't bet the farm on that happening either.
Sadly, the Utah Republican Party seems to be composed mostly of lemmings these days.
Try writing a letter to him on a concern thaqt you have, you will never get a reply, never ever.
I have written several times, he must be too busy fighting off the evil Democratic congress to respond to his constituents.
I believe Dr. Bob Becker would make a very fine Representative from Utah.
don Quixote
Sorry, you got the wrong guy on that one. Becker is way to intelligent and honest to be a Utah politician.
Rob Bishop was responsible for heading off the Goshuites putting nuke waste on their land, all the while neutered politicians looked on and complained. Rob worked with many types of people and stopped this cold.
Also, when I had an issue and wrote him about it, he called me personally.
Those are two positives.
Voting democrat because you want less government isn't going to work. Liberal as the GOP is, they aren't as wacky as the Dems.
Folks should read the Dems immigration bill from last year if they are ever so foolish to consider voting for one.
For me, the alternative to the Reps, is the Libertarian Party. The Dems are just visitors from Kookville.
Don:
Bad idea, I think. Last thing N. Utah Dems need is a pointy headed liberal running for Congress on their ticket. Surely Utah should be chock-a-block with Blue Dog Democrats, like Matheson. I hope one of them, with deep pockets, steps forward to make the run. Be nice, too, if he or she was also a real stem-winder on the stump --- a kind of Sockless Jerry Simpson or Mary Ellen Lease in a Blue Dog wrapper. So to speak.
Hey I saw Hansen wearing a Blue Dog pin. Wouldn't it be nice if were to run for congress? But who would want Jesse do nothing Garcia in the Legislature? To bad for us. OH well.
Curmudgeon I say, the dems. need the wisedom of an historical perspective combined with a keen sense of where we are headed. "The historical sense involves a perception, not only of the pastness of the past, but of its presence." T.S. Eliot
We must understand where we have been and why in order to know where and how we should go to stake out the moral high ground. Knight errant
Miguel:
T.S. Eliot wrote poems about cats. I think that says what needs to be said about him as a fount of political wisdom....[grin].
Danny, I don't know if I've ever met you or not, for all I know of you is from your participation on this blog. That said, I tend to like you, though politically we seem to differ on some things.
But you really struck a nerve and I am compelled at this time to offer you a thorough bitchen out.
NNNNever try to prop up the doughboy, milque toast, selfserving, ex school teacher from Box Elder by trying to demonize Leon Bear and the Skull Valley Gosiutes.
Rob Bishop is like a gnat compared to Leon for leadership and concern for his people.
How can you demonize Leon Bear and the Skull Valley Band of Gosiutes for grabbing the first and only ecconomic opportunity they've had since the Mormons stole almost all of their homelands and destroyed their way of living? They were left with some small acreage in Skull Valley, with some new foreign way of living that the land cannot sustain. Farming was a bust, they tried sheep ranching, only to have the Army kill all their sheep with nerve gas. Can you blame them for trying to improve their state of living? These peoples historic annual migrations covered thousands of miles for sustenance, they were and still are some of the most amasingly resourseful people the world has ever known.
Rob Bishop is their represenative too. To highlight Bishops hypocracy try looking at it this way. Everyone's concern was about not wanting nuclear storage in Utah. The whole time Bishop is fighting a group of his constituents to stop their only ecconomic opportunity he's taking money from and aiding the most hated nuclear waste storers in the states history. Enviorcare, now Energy Solutions. And these guys are storing their nuclear waste on historic Gosiute homeland.
I'm not holding Bishop totally responsible for the plight of the Gosiute, but he's a piece of shit for not trying to work for improving the ecconomic condition of the Band. But, he doesn't like, or want to help Indians because neither do Bush and Cheney, in fact the same could be said for the rest of his constituents.
Bill:
Two points. First, conceding everything you've said about the plight of the Goshutes and the bad hand the state and feds have dealt them, that still does not entitle them to a pass or a freebie if what they turn to for economic salvation, however understandable from their POV, is bad for the state in general, and the public therein. As Goshute land becoming a nuclear waste dump would be, I think.
Second, in re: Mr.Bishop's stand against the Goshute nuke dump, let us not forget Mr. Bishop's brave work in his first term in DC, doing the work of the laughably renamed "Energy Solutions" when it was seeking permission, as I recall, to store higher level radiation waste at its facility in the west desert than it was then permitted to accept. As I recall, he earned the nicknam "Radiation Rob" for that one. Until public outrage rose to such a level that the Hon. [?] Congressman Bishop began to back peddle frantically. As he did on "the bridge to nowhere." So it seems Radiation Rob's views on the storage of nuke waste from other places in Utah boil down to this: it's just fine so long as companies that contribute to his campaigns, like Energy Solutions want to do it. But if a native American tribe wants to do it, why we can count on Radiation Rob to oppose.
Have the Goshutes contributed to Rob's latest campaigns? That might turn the man around on the matter of the Goshute nuke dump.
Bill C.
Forgive my tardiness in replying. I tend to spend more time watching the collapse of our economic system, stopping by here from time to time.
NNNNNever feel bad about disagreeing with me. You are a giant to me. How can I learn, if people will not tell me when they disagree?
Your comments about Bishop helping the honky (low level) nuke dump take waste then cutting off the Indians' (high level) dump is appropriate. The former made me swear I'd never vote for Bishop; the latter made me change my mind.
Keep the info coming. I will always be very interested in what you have to say.
Danny
I am very curious as to just why it is that you think Bishop is single handedly responsible for stopping the Goshute storage proposal.
For starters, it is not officially dead although for all practical purposes it probably is.
I am intimately familiar with the proposal and the Goshute leadership, having worked with them on this for a number of years.
I do not recall Rob Bishop having any real effect on this one way or the other. He did come in at the end and do a bunch of grandstanding, but the real death of the project, if it is dead, was caused by Hatch, Bennett and Leavitt in behind the scenes dealings with the Bush administration.
Interesting to note that there is a nuclear plant proposal for Utah that is starting to gain ground, will be much much more dangerous for the citizens of this state than the Goshute proposal, is being promoted by Republican insiders and most likely will happen without near the resistance the Goshutes met.
Had the Goshute proposal been put out there by Curtis, Valentine, and the other republican robber barons in the Utah Legislature, they would already be storing the stuff right here in Zion.
It was never about the true safety of storing nuclear waste, it was always about political game playing and grandstanding - initially by Leavitt and then by the rest of the NeoCon establishment.
Oz:
You wrote: Interesting to note that there is a nuclear plant proposal for Utah that is starting to gain ground, will be much much more dangerous for the citizens of this state than the Goshute proposal, is being promoted by Republican insiders and most likely will happen without near the resistance the Goshutes met. Had the Goshute proposal been put out there by Curtis, Valentine, and the other republican robber barons in the Utah Legislature, they would already be storing the stuff right here in Zion.
Absolutely true. Not to mention that the Legislative Good Buddies Nuclear Plant [if they name it honestly] will, radiation aside, be an environmental disaster as it swallows gargantuan amounts of water in the red rock country south of Green River.
The Goshute project was also termed a temporary storage facility, while Envirocare/Energy Solutions is premanent.
What we're doing on the Goshutes ancestral Homelands is beyond belief. Chemical testing and incineration, bombing ranges(plural), highly toxic waste storage. What economic opportunities have come their way? Atleast we've shown the same respect for their homelands as we do them as a people, none.
Leon took alot of flack from some of his own people over this, they don't view the land as some commodity, to them it's sacred and a part of them. But without any economic opportunities, their running a risk of ceasing to exist as a people, his choice was a very difficult one at that.
I'm not advocating anything Nuclear in Utah, period, but the hypocracy of Envirocare/Energy Solutions operating a nuclear waste dump on traditional Goshute homelands is representative of how sick we are as a society. This could also extend to all are other uses of their homelands, despite their importance to our civil society. Might makes right and money can buy you anything. I usually feel like hurling anytime someone on the right expouses what a moral people we are.
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