Warning - Fairly juvenile snark ahead. Put your kids into their bedroom before proceeding with this post. They out of the room? Ready? Good.
My heart bleeds for this guy.
The San Francisco Chronicle is publishing a piece on the stunned Richard Pombo, who just cannot absorb the fact that he lives in a democracy and lost an election. He fumes:
He's convinced that his successor, McNerney, will be ousted two years from now.
"There's no doubt," Pombo said. "We're already hearing guys are talking about running against him in the primary because they know in a different atmosphere the chances of him holding that district aren't that great. Because he's going to have to vote. Nobody would cover him before, who he was, but as the incumbent they will have to. He's going to be voting on things that the people in that district don't like."
He said there are several Republican mayors and state legislators in the district who would make good candidates. And he added, "I may consider running again for Congress. I really haven't made that decision, and I don't want to make that decision right now."
...But his post-election sentiments are clear: He's furious at his opponents for the very personal campaign they waged against him, and he is still stunned because they pulled it off.
Pombo said he respects McNerney -- "there's probably nothing I agree with him on, but that doesn't make him a bad guy" -- but he's livid at the major environmental groups who targeted him for defeat two years ago and ran a well-financed campaign to do just that.
Such a shame that outside groups actually had the temerity to exercise their speech rights to attack you politically. After all, the sludge under your name that I heard repeatedly on the radio, on your behalf, well, that was all in good fun, wasn't it, Dickie? Ads saying "Jerry McNerney takes 20 different positions on any issue.... it just depends on which way the wind blows."
And all that money the Rethug RNCC threw at you... and all that fundraising Dick & Dubya threw at you. What'd you outspend McNerney by, 3:1? Just about every dollar McNerney got was from the grassroots and the netroots (including, I'm proud to say, a decent chunk from yours truly).
Here's an especially delicious quote from the Chron:
"They couldn't win with the Democrats. They had to suppress the Republican vote," he said. "The last couple weeks what they were doing was walking, calling and mailing Republicans with a heavy, 'He's corrupt, it's time to get him out' thing to try to drive down the vote of Republicans. And it worked."
Well, actually, Dickie, that message was targeted at independent voters. Or did you actually think you were automatically entitled to that voter cohort as well?
How sad, that they picked on l'il Dickie so.
Oh, and there was this little matter of an unpopular President who made it a point to stop by your district for a huge fund-raiser about a week before the election. Of course, that couldn't possibly have anything to do with your poor turnout, now could it?
Man, talk about turnout suppression! Even Conrad Burns's campaign said that when Bush showed up in Montana before the election, whatever last-day momentum they had vanished!
And of course, as we all know, the Rethuglicans would never do anything like that, now would they?
<cheep cheep... cheep cheep>
Good freaking riddance to this dickwad... Oh, I'm sorry, that's your NAME! Dick! Get it? Your name... heh heh...
How does it feel, punk? HOW DOES IT FEEL?
***Update***In a passing comment about a wildly overspending Hillary Clinton Senatorial campaign (this might be subscriber only),
Representative Richard W. Pombo, Republican of California, spent $17,250 on balloons for a single event in July.
Shee-it! 17 large for a bunch of stupid balloons? 17K! I guess Dickie really needed all those fat fundraisers to keep himself in the pink. How is that even possible? Those better have been NICE balloons! Nah, can't be. Can't be. Can it? With that crazy Dick, ya never know.
Also, a nice post below by Predictor adds some more texture to Pombo's tale. I guess Fightin' Ricardo won't be goin' to bat for those Mashpee Indians anymore. Poor Dick - he really was a Congressman for all of America.