Matthew Berry, a pro-gay rights Republican is challenging sitting Congressman Jim Moran after the Obama Administration failed to pass pro gay rights legislation or move to include open gays in the military. A former clerk for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, many see his effort as a lost cause.
He was recently interviewed about his run at my site, Jumping in Pools.
His resume has been impressive so far:
I am 37 years old and moved to Northern Virginia after graduating lawschool to pursue a career in public service. I have had the privilege of clerking for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and Judge Laurence Silberman of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, two outstanding jurists. I worked for the U.S. Department of Justice, primarily on counter terrorism policy. And I most recently served as the General Counsel of the Federal Communications Commission. As the FCC's chief legal officer, I was responsible for managing an office of approximately eighty employees, providing legal advice to the Commission, and defending the Commission's orders in court. During my tenure at the Commission, I am proud of the work that we did to promote broadband deployment, bring more competition to the cable television marketplace, safeguard consumer privacy, and use communications technology to protect public safety. Outside of my work, I am a huge sports fan. I follow football and baseball closely, and attend about 8 Washington Nationals games a year. I also like to go to the movies as often as possible.
And you can see some concerns with Moran's way of speaking:
I am also trying to get a campaign off the ground because I believe that Virginia's 8th District can do far better than Jim Moran. Throughout his tenure in Congress, Jim Moran has failed to live up to the standards to which we should hold our elected representatives. For example, I don't think that it is appropriate to take almost a million dollars in campaign contributions from the PMA Group, a Washington D.C. lobbying firm, and its clients and then channel over ten million dollars in earmarks to those clients. Nor do I think that it is acceptable to make offensive comments about Jewish Americans, such as blaming them for the Iraq War.
Read the rest.