The folks over at left-leaning Loaded Orygun have endorsed Democrat John Kroger for state Attorney General. (I previously wrote about Kroger’s ambitious, silly plan to end the “meth epidemic” here). However, reading through LO’s justifications for endorsing Kroger makes me wonder if they are actually running some sort of back-handed smear campaign against him. I mean, if someone wrote this about me, I might ask them to take the endorsment back (emphasis mine):

As pleasant and apparently very competent as Macpherson is, Kroger’s enthusiasm, sharply detailed vision and obvious desire for public service–in all senses of the phrase–make him the more compelling candidate. He better exemplifies the borderline-angry demand of the electorate for post-partisan change, post-fear. He’s ready to fight, but on principles for people, not for parties and politics.

What does “post-partisan change, post-fear” mean? Post-fear of what? Post-fear of witches? Post-Fear of a Black Planet? Read on to see the rest of the endorsement, with emphasis on the especially humorous parts.

His profile is not perfect; there’s a swath of Eastern law-and-order swagger from a former Marine that manifests itself in a relatively firm personal validation of Measure 11–but with rationally compelling arguments for keeping parts of it. He’s properly and starkly dismissive of Kevin Mannix’s proposed extension, calling it “stupid public policy.” And while he’s careful to protect the lives of juveniles and those of low IQ [?!], he’s still for the death penalty overall, and is “skeptical” of medical marijuana. He’s not the groovy uncle AG who’s going to let you get high on the Capitol grounds in Salem, that seems clear.

But Kroger is doggedly focused in an almost John Edwards-like way on how the DoJ can address the serious, small-scope but vastly important challenges the lower and middle classes face– things like child support, consumer protection and clean food and water. There’s an almost To Kill a Mockingbird corny charm to the way Kroger harps on ‘the citizens of the state,’ sounding as if he really believes that’s who the Attorney General should be acting for on a daily basis, in court and out. There’s guile in his ambition for sure, but it’s guile reserved for when he has to put the cape on and fight the bad guys. Otherwise he wears a sweater and rescues kittens.

Well, it’s not THAT bad. But in this season where we cynics are being constantly bombarded with nasty messages of hope and faith from all sides of the aisle, it’s becoming harder and harder to ignore people who really and truly just are passionate about impacting people’s lives in some kind of positive way, because they think they have learned a thing or two and know how to lead others to get things done. One of those folks is John Kroger, and he has our endorsement for Attorney General.

John Kroger: he wears sweaters and protects people of low IQ … unless they want to get high.

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 14th, 2008 at 02:47 by CJ Ciaramella and is filed under Elections, Oregon, Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.