As many of us are, I am a transplant to this region. I have opened and operated a retail business here for several years.
I attended the recent Pizza and Politics event in Hailey and listened to all the candidates for the Idaho Legislature with great interest. However, a few moments gave me pause.
First, several people were allowed to ask one-sided, negative questions directed solely at Republican Senate candidate Jim Donoval. Although Mr. Donoval answered the questions thoughtfully and directly, they should have been stricken as having been out of line.
Second, in his closing, radical Senate candidate Randall Patterson stated that Democrat Michelle Stennett represented "business as usual" and Mr. Donoval represented "Chicago-style politics."
Like Mr. Donoval, I am originally from Illinois, and am a Republican. The "machine" politics that Mr. Patterson referred to is operated by Chicago Democrats, not Republicans. It is a Democrat organization that is plagued with corruption and patronage, and which works to attack any opposition. It is the same type of political organization that helped elect Barack Obama.
Unfortunately, it is the same type of organization that has sprung up locally to criticize Mr. Donoval for simply raising important issues that will affect our future and to defend the Democrats who have represented or are for what I believe has been too long.
I have gotten to know Mr. Donoval. He is a fiscal conservative who has already voiced his disdain for governments that waste public funds. That is the exact opposite of what political insiders would do.
Mr. Patterson's radical views were disturbing, especially when it came to eliminating any and all social programs—a position that Mr. Donoval rightly criticized as being cruel. And his stereotype of Mr. Donoval as a "Chicago-style politician" was far from the truth.
Maureen Schwendener
Ketchum
Editor's note: All candidates were given equal time and opportunity to respond to the public's questions at the Pizza and Politics event in Hailey.
