Nice article on Dave Obey's opponent, Sean Duffy

Please support Sean Duffy in his attempt to unseat the king of earmarks, one of the authors of the $887 billion Pokulus package, and one of the meanest dicks around, Virginia's own (he doesn't really live in Wausau anymore) David, older than dirt, meaner than a junkyard dog, all around embarrassment to Wisconsin, Congressional lifer, Obey.



Can the former lumberjack fell the mighty congressman?

Posted: March 5, 2010 |(2) Comments

Sean Duffy sits in his sparsely furnished campaign headquarters in Ashland and suggests that, by the time he's in his 50s, he'd like to be able to spend his days chopping wood and climbing trees.

Right now, though, the Hayward native is trying to chop down one of the most powerful politicians in America. The 38-year-old Ashland County district attorney, father of five and former "professional lumberjack" is out to fell Dave Obey - the longest-serving U.S. representative in Wisconsin history.

Obey is a colossus, a guy who has been in politics so long they are already naming buildings after him. The famously acerbic and all-powerful chairman of the House Appropriations Committee was first elected during the Nixon administration - and, suggests Duffy, he acts like it.

"I think he is arrogant," said Duffy, sitting in an office in downtown Ashland across from the courthouse one recent morning. "I think he is smart, but he is arrogant."

For years, Obey could afford to be. The guy has won so many elections - 21 - that voters seem to think his last name is pronounced like the verb. According to Federal Election Commission reports, the 71-year-old Democrat already had more than $1 million on hand by the beginning of 2010 - and that appears to be without even trying. Everyone seems to know him - and pity the fools who don't.

It's been reported that a producer at an Eau Claire television station once made the mistake of not only keeping Obey waiting but asking who he was. Obey was so put out, the story goes, that he walked out and made the producer plead with him to come back. Shortly thereafter, somebody posted two pictures of people everyone was supposed to usher in immediately if they ever happened to show up again: Dave Obey and Jesus Christ.

I wasn't able to ask Obey if any of that is true because neither he nor anyone from his campaign returned my calls. Reaching him through prayer didn't work, either.

Duffy, in the meantime, is making himself accessible in all the modern ways. He pops up in living color on his Web site and proves he's still just as comfortable on camera as he was back when both he and his wife were reality TV stars on "The Real World."

He is unabashedly conservative, "pro-life, pro-traditional marriage, pro-gun, pro Second Amendment," he says. Most years, that would likely sink him in a district that Obey last won by 20 points and that Barack Obama carried by 14. But this is not most years.

"I am running a race on fiscal responsibility," he said, "balancing the budget, reducing the size of government."

He never fails to mention that Obey was one of the primary authors of the $787 billion stimulus package. He is betting that taxpayers are sick of massive levels of deficit spending and fearful of "serious economic consequences down the road."

It's "necessary to have a safety net there for people who need assistance," says Duffy. But the country "needs solutions focused on the private sector, and this is a bill that focused on the public sector."

His coffers are far from full, but his campaign says it has raised $400,000 and a shout-out from Sarah Palin helped. So does the fact he is a world champion lumberjack "speed climber." Lots of politicians engage in log-rolling. Duffy might be the only one to make it literal. People are starting to take notice. The Cook Political Report recently took Obey out of its "safe" column.

True, Obey probably doesn't spend much time worrying about the likes of Duffy when he has the ear of presidents. But that's just going to make it all the more interesting.

Mike Nichols is former full-time columnist with the Journal Sentinel and is now a senior fellow with the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute, a nonpartisan conservative think tank. His column - which reflects only his personal perspective - runs every Saturday in the Journal Sentinel. E-mail MRNichols@wi.rr.com