Reichert’s (7:30 am!) Campaign Kickoff
Above is a picture that I snapped while sitting bleary-eyed at Republican Congressman Dave Reichert’s campaign kickoff early this morning at the Meydenbauer Center in Bellevue. With me on the press risers (which, by the way, were set so far back from the stage that my only hope of getting a picture of Reichert was to snap the above shot off a video monitor) was the one and only Cienna Madrid. She came along because she’s a fellow devotee of the race between Reichert and Democrat Darcy Burner, and because a 7:30 am campaign event seemed like something The Stranger’s Worst Enemy should experience.
Outside, we walked through about 20 liberal protesters gathered to remind “moderate” Reichert’s supporters that the Congressman is anti-choice, has voted against student loans, and has a record of casting the vast majority of his votes with the conservative Republicans who control Congress.
Cienna’s going to tell you more about the rather bizarre elements of Reichert’s event inside the Meydenbauer Center this morning, including his rambling and (in one moment) earnestly scatological speech. I want to focus on his message, such as it was.
I was very curious to see how Reichert would present himself at this kickoff, given that the freshman incumbent is facing a tough challenge from Burner, who out-fund-raised him by a ratio of 2 to 1 in the first quarter of this year. And although no one mentioned Burner by name, almost all of the speakers who lined up to introduce Reichert made reference to the fact that they expected this to be a difficult race for him.
“You would think that he would have a very easy reelection,” said conservative talk show host John Carlson. “Unfortunately that’s not going to be the case.” Republican Senate hopeful Mike McGavick bemoaned the fact the Reichert is being targeted by Democrats outside the 8th Congressional District and tried to stoke whatever nativist sentiment there might be in Bellevue, imploring the crowd to cheer so loudly “even people outside the 8th district will hear you.” It wasn’t a very loud cheer. State Republican Party Chair Diane Tebelius then tried to insulate Reichert from the negative opinion most people currently have of the Republican-led Congress and its ethics scandals: “While some of us are very disconcerted by the activity taking place by a few members of Congress today, we can be very proud of this man,” she said.
Then Reichert rose to speak. It’s been said that he’s not a great campaigner, and this speech didn’t do anything to dispel that notion. I’ll leave it to Cienna to highlight some of the wierder moments, but his overall performance was rambling and surprisingly unfocused.
Riechert seemed to be a bit rattled by the protesters outside the Meydenbauer Center, mentioning them at the outset but also taking pains to note that he had gone out and shaken all of their hands before the event. (One of them, he said, asked: “Who are you?”) Like his warm-up acts, Reichert, too, talked about “the party tide that may be running against us,” and warned the crowd that he is a prime target of the Democrats. “The Democratic party, with the state of affairs today, is going to make a tremendous effort in the 8th district,” he said.
Then, for a man trying to distance himself from hard-right Republicans, he did some rather odd things. He channeled President Bush’s shoulder-shrugging, neck-hunching expression of befuddlement at the media’s inability to understand that, as Reichert put it, “the economy is good” and “the Bush tax cuts are working.” He even copied Bush’s staging from the 2004 Republican National Convention, walking, as he was speaking, out onto a raised runway that extended into the audience from the stage—an arrangement that, when used by Bush, was described by Frank Rich of the New York Times as “a giant phallus thrusting him into the nation’s lap.”
Reichert quoted Reagan and the first President Bush to the crowd and said, “Doesn’t that just give you chills?” He talked about a heckler at a parade who once called him a crook, and told the audience he thought to himself at the time, “I’m not a crook”—inadvertently channeling Nixon.
And as far as reasons to send Reichert back to Congress it seemed to be all about “defending freedom,” which, of course, is the Bush line, and one not likely to play well in a district that voted for Kerry in 2004.
“This is our challenge,” he said. “Protect freedom. Protect this country. Don’t give up. Be courageous. The facts are, we’re making progress.”
Doesn’t exactly scream “independent.”
Shaking hands with the protesters was a shrewed move on his part. Sort of reminds me why the 53% of people voted for Sheriff Reichert last time. Problem is, the folksy, hey-howya-doin' type stuff isn't going to work this year. A moderate Republican would have had a chance this year.