Factual realities of local voting.

So, your ballot is in front of you.  As a conscientious voter, you've done more than merely review the propaganda in the voter pamphlet when it comes to researching these people and when it comes to your vote; you are going to make an informed decision.

Right?

Please?

Pretty please?

You're not going to hold up your ballot and use it like a dart board, are you?

And you're not going to vote merely because of some meaningless label, are you?

The first thing I learned some 18 years ago as a State Republican Party staff Executive Director is that labels are meaningless.

At the local level, for example, 3 members of the county council (Olson, Blom, Stewart) claim to be Republican but in fact, vote no differently than any other democrat for the most part.

The county chair USED to be Republican (He now claims "No Preference") and used to vote like one as well, but that was almost two decades ago.  Electorally, he was elected with 39% of the vote, meaning 61% of us didn't want him to have the job.

Their labels are, of course, utterly meaningless.

The ONLY thing that matters when it comes to sending incumbents back is their record.

On the county council, for example, only one council member claiming to be Republican votes Republican, Eileen Quiring.  As a voter, you can, of course, vote for whomever you like.  But in casting your ballot, shouldn't you at least know what these people have done?

As I watched these clowns screw up our county, increasing taxes and fees and beg for the resurrection of the hated and despised Columbia River Crossing/Loot Rail scam that would blow a $100,000,000 per year hole in our local economy to get light rail into our community, I desperately hoped for at least some sign that the Republicans would actually VOTE that way.

Instead, had they all lost their elections... their democrat opponents would have voted exactly the same.

Here's an example of how much alike Julie Olson and her 2015 opponent actually were:

Chuckie Green was Olson's democrat opponent.  John Blom is a total RINO.  Since he, like Olson, typically vote democrat, naturally Green would join with a RINO like Olson in endorsing a fellow leftist.  Olson, for her part, votes the same as Green would have had he won; routinely voting for tax and fee increases that no real Republican would be caught dead supporting.

So, for me, I look around for who the local RINOs are coalescing for and vote against them.

As an indicator of who to support, their endorsement is the kiss of death for me politically; because in my case, there is zero reason to vote for fake democrats like these when you can get the real thing on the ballot.

Others share their view, of course; as a result, 6 RINO former party chairs that haven't held that office for years have put their names to a letter when they attack certain PCO candidates.

This sort of thing is unheard of because, primarily, none of these clowns live in the precincts in question and the reality is that who those precincts elect and why is none of their business.

Those on the letter include Ryan Hart, best known for selling out to the utterly worthless Jaime Herrera, endorsing her while party chair in return for a nice job and a fat paycheck when she got elected over David Castillo, who actually WOULD have voted Republican had he won the seat, unlike the incumbent.

Brent Boger, who has quit the GOP more times than an elevator opens and who recently supported the declared democrat running for Washougal mayor over the Republican candidate is also on that letter.

Why?

Well, their hatred of conservatives is one of the primary reasons.  Boger is a rank hypocrite, having openly attacked me and my little blog effort here... while conveniently forgetting that he'd fed me information whenever the mood struck.

But then, to be a RINO is to be a hypocrite, right?

Because here's the deal:

These same RINOs that hate conservatives... demand that conservatives vote for their candidates.

Look, here's the reality:  No GOP candidate will win... or can win... in any statewide election that matters, which includes the US Senate.

Susan Hutchinson will join the long list of RINO candidates who will get clobbered in the general... presuming she makes it to the general, for example.  Instead of acknowledging that reality, local RINOs are all abuzz, putting up her signs like it's "God's-Own-Work" and otherwise wasting their time on her behalf.

Now, that's not a biased judgment based on my RINO dislike.

For example, THE most worthless member of Congress is our own RINO congresswoman, Jamie Herrera.

Yet, I doubt she will have any real trouble getting reelected.

I sincerely HOPE that doesn't happen.  But my conclusion isn't based on what I hope will be the outcome.  It's based on my professional judgment.

Herrera does everything she can to bury her record.  She constantly attacks what she sees as her number one competitor, carpet-bagging Carolyn Long.

The irony here is that Long and Herrera are, essentially, interchangeable on Herrera's voting record.  Had Long ran and won in 16, we wouldn't have noticed much difference between Long's behavior and Herrera's.

Both would have attacked the president as Herrera did, siding with our democrat Senators.

Both would have voted for somebody besides our President, as Herrera voted for somebody besides our President.

Both would have voted to keep Obamacare as Herrera did when the vote came to get rid of it.

And neither would have done a damned thing about our transportation issues, as Herrera has also failed to do in the 11 years she's been in elective office, including 3 in the State House.

But the voters won't care, because you know what?

Her child beat the odds and made it... and Herrera used her like a pair of ear-rings as if her baby was any kind of reason to reelect her.  For many voting for her, that's all they're going to remember... her actual VOTING RECORD (which, when it comes right down to it, is the only thing that matters) and her cowardice when it comes to town hall meetings aside.

This is a GOP congressional district.  And it's going to stay that way.

At the local level, some RINOs know they're in trouble.  Sen. Ann "Gas Tax" Rivers, for example, is responsible for the explosion of our property taxes this year.  And you'll note she's disappeared.

She's even vaporized when it comes to her hand-picked replacement for Rep. Liz Pike, Larry Hoff, who will be Rivers' sock-puppet and who has proven how worthless he is in terms of policy (Exactly what... and how... is he going to do anything?) and responsiveness (I've asked him... repeatedly... how he would have voted differently than Rivers on her Gas Tax/Tab Fee scam and her property tax explosion and he refuses to answer.  Why is that?) because she knows she's toast here after costing Clark County $700 million as a result of her gas tax scam and several billion statewide as a result of her sell out to the teacher unions... not to mention her flip on the hated, unnecessary, unaffordable and unwanted I-5 Bridge replacement/loot rail scam.

Her record is building up like a case of lead poisoning and there's little doubt that were she running for reelection this cycle, she would get clobbered.  And in two years when she is up, that IS going to happen because between now and then, there is no doubt that her record will get much, much worse.

So, at the local level, the question is clear:

Do you want office holders who give a damn what you think, instead of the special, moneyed interests who own them?

Do you want your property taxes to continue to explode like they did this year?

Do you want state and local taxes and fees to continue to go up?

Do you want the horror of the resurrection of the Columbia River Crossing/Light Rail scam shoved down your throat... without even the courtesy of a vote?

Do you want RINO political hatred to govern you?

Then vote for those who are RINO... and who are endorsed by RINOs. And before you vote, you NEED to find out who they are...

Because if you do vote that way, rest assured, that's what you're going to get.