Matt Rexroad (pictured to the left) is someone that I hold in high regard. I’ve known Matt for over a decade. His political acumen is pretty sharp. He is a friend. I thought a recent commentary that he wrote was very interesting.
Former Assemblyman Howard Kaloogian is one of the ten thousand Republicans vying to replace the disgraced Randy ‘Duke’ Cunningham in Congress.
At his firm’s Cal Races website, Rexroad says:
When he announced his candidacy for Congress from the highway between Baghdad and Kuwait City — it was a press stunt I considered to be really lame. As someone that has driven that highway many times — the last thing you need to be doing along that stretch of Iraq is announcing your candidacy for Congress. Keep your eyes open and your head on a swivel. The military personnel protecting him weren’t there as security for his little mobile press conference."
He goes on to question Kaloogian’s advertising of an endorsement of the California Pro-Life Council that he apparently does not have.
You can read his entire post here.
I thought this very interesting because it highlights one of the challenges that Howard Kaloogian has as he runs for Congress – within the conservative movement, he is divisive. There is no doubt that he is a hard-charger, and has stood tall for the conservative cause.
But I have heard from many who believe that he stands taller for the "Howard Kaloogian" cause.
By and large, my personal experiences with Howard have been positive. When I was State President of the California Republican Assembly, Howard was someone we always counted on as a conservative leader. I’ve always admired Howard’s drive and willingness to ‘mix it up’ so to speak.
But you have to take it seriously when a Marine Corps veteran like Matt Rexroad, who served a tour of duty in Operation Iraqi Freedom says, "This is not the kind of guy I would ever want to be sharing a fox hole with."
This division of opinions from hard-line conservatives about Kaloogian will be a big challenge for him to overcome in a race were every little thing is scrutized.
February 18th, 2006 at 12:00 am
I care about how reps will vote when they get into office and not personalities. Sure I hope people can get along with each other, but I’d rather have a guy vote right than the other way around. The best example I can think of currently is the immigration bill winding its way through Congress. I’d rather someone vote against amnesty/guest worker proposals who’s a jerk than have a nice guy personally screw his constituents by voting for amnesty. Did that make sense? David Dreier is a nice guy, but he votes pro Mexico/anti America so much that what good does he do us.
February 18th, 2006 at 12:00 am
Allan, I couldn’t agree more. But as someone who helped elect Duke, you need to look past the ideology and look at conduct. Matt’s point about Howard announcing his candidcay in Irag provides a unique glimpse of the candidate.