Merkley visits Lincoln City

Lincoln City News Guard
By Patrick Alexander
June 23, 2008

Both candidates in Oregon’s U.S. Senate race visited Lincoln City on the campaign trail over the weekend, with the battle lines being drawn for November’s election.

The contest for incumbent Republican Gordon Smith’s seat is seen as one of the tightest senatorial races in the country and challenger Jeff Merkley has embarked on a tour of 100 Oregon towns to introduce himself to voters.

On Saturday, that tour brought him to Lincoln City and the home of Mayor Lori Hollingsworth where he told a crowd of supporters that Oregon needed to elect a someone who would work alongside Democratic Senator Ron Wyden.

“Right now we have Smith canceling out Wyden’s votes,” he said. “Voting against him over 1,700 times.”

Smith was first elected by a narrow margin in 1996 and scored a resounding victory in his 2002 bid for reelection — carrying Lincoln County on both occasions.

Merkley, who received a 95 percent score from the Oregon League of Conservation voters for his votes in 2007, accused Smith of putting on a facade of environmentalism when running for election and ignoring the environment while in office.

He said Smith’s 73 percent score from the national League of Conservation Voters for his 2007 senate votes had been accumulated by “taking every loose vote that makes no difference and voting for it” in preparation for putting himself before the Oregon voters this year.

Smith’s LOCV rating was 37 percent in 2005-06 before leaping to 73 percent in 2007.

During a visit to the Little Antique Mall, Merkley was asked by local crafter Michael Soeby why the Democrats had not “hammered” the Republicans since taking control of the House and Senate.

Merkley said the Democratic majority in the Senate was too slim to get things done but drew attention to his record as speaker of the Oregon House of Representatives during the 2007 session, saying the Democrats had achieved a great deal with a one-vote majority.

“We need six months in the U.S. Senate like we had in the Oregon Legislature last year,” he said.

Asked what questions he would put to Smith if the two were face to face, Merkley returned to his theme of Smith as a political opportunist.

‘Why did you promise in the last election to to lead the charge against drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and then vote three times to support drilling in the ANWR after you were elected?” he said.

“Why are your positions so different when running for reelection from when you are serving?” he added.

In a Sunday night meet and greet at Mo’s Restaurant, Smith introduced himself as “a moderate Republican with a bias for for bipartisanship.”

In answer to Merkley’s first question, Smith said he did not support drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge but had voted for a bill that authorized drilling because it also contained provisions relating to Medicare and military spending which he did support.

He said he later voted to strip out the drilling portion from the bill.

“I can appreciate that he [Merkley] doesn’t understand the senate rules,” Smith said.

In response to the allegation that he changes his colors when running for reelection Smith said both his reelection bids have come at times when the Democrats have been in control of congress.

He said the Democrat majority resulted in a different range of bills coming to the senate floor, including more environmental bills.

Addressing the crowd of diners, Smith said he supported free enterprise, low taxes, modest regulation and “the use, not abuse, of natural resources.”

He won a round of applause for saying: “American security should be protected by the U.S. and not the security council of the United Nations.”

Smith said the top issues on Lincoln County voters’ minds seemed to be the price of energy, health care, the war in Iraq and the state of the fishing industry.

Asked what questions he would put to Merkley, Smith’s campaign team first asked: “What have you done in the past 10 years to create timber jobs? How many?”

Merkley spokesman Matt Canter responded by saying Smith had catered to out-of-state timber interests, Merkley had helped create more Oregon timber jobs through his work on tax, regulations, health care and renewable energy.

“While it is difficult to quantify an exact number, Merkley has been fighting hard to create timber jobs by addressing the challenges timber workers and timber companies face in the new economy,” a spokesman said.

For their second question, the Smith camp asked: “Do you support having out-of-state, third party special interests run TV ads — such as the one falsely attaching Senator Smith right now — interfering in the Oregon Senate race? If no, will you commit to condemning all third party TV ads in this race?”

Canter said the ads attacking Smith were nothing to do with the Merley campaign but “do raise serious questions about the way Senator Smith has sided with big oil and against Oregonians.”

“Big oil companies, big drug companies, and other out-of-state, third-party special interests are funneling hundreds of thousands of dollars into Gordon Smith’s campaign because of the way Smith has delivered for them in Washington D.C.” he said.

Posted June 23, 2008
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