Two great articles on Paul Hackett in Mother Jones

[Awsi Dooger]

"The Ohio Insurgency": http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2005/11/paul_hackett.html

"Friendly Fire": http://www.motherjones.com/news/update/2005/10/hackett.html

Man, I wish I could paste more than 3 paragraphs. Tons of great quotes here. If we reject this guy, masochism reigns. Here's a sampling from the second article, entitled, "Friendly Fire.":

<snip>

Hackett, who says he’s still considering his options, is less sanguine—and less diplomatic. “The Democratic Party is like an addict,” he says. “They’re addicted to failure. I want to help the party. The question is, how do you help someone that doesn’t want help?”

Brown dismisses the controversy his decision has sparked as a “tempest in a teapot.” He insists that “nobody recruited me to run against Paul Hackett.” And though Hackett says Brown told him point-blank that he wasn’t running, Brown maintains that he was simply wrestling with whether to run because of family considerations. “If your readers or others can’t understand that, then so be it, but my family comes first,” the congressman says. “Paul Hackett is a decent man, he served his country,” he adds, “but no one is entitled to a Senate nomination.”

<snip>

Hackett is not so sure, though. Though Brown says he wouldn’t be giving up a safe congressional seat unless he knew he could beat DeWine, the veteran counters, “To me, a race between two professional politicians is a no-brainer win for DeWine. You’re not gonna throw out a sitting senator in a Republican state with a very liberal Democratic longstanding US congressman.” If Democrats want to start winning races, he adds, they might need a dose of boot-camp discipline: “How come this doesn’t happen in the Republican Party? It’s because they sit down guys like Sherrod and put him in a corner and make him wear the dunce cap.”

[fujiyama]

1. This part is fuckin hilarious:

"“That’s low politics, punk!” a heavy-set man sneers as he marches toward the poll.
Hackett wheels around. “Pardon me?”
“You know, that radio ad that says, ‘You don’t know Schmidt.’” He’s talking about one of Hackett’s attack ads against Republican Jean Schmidt. The man spews a stream of epithets, and Hackett lets out a crybaby whimper: “Waaaaaaa!”
“What’s that, punk?” the big man growls.

A TV crew is setting up nearby, but Hackett doesn’t seem to care. “What’s your fuckin’ problem?” the candidate snaps. “You got something to say to me? Bring it on!” Hackett, all 6 feet 2 inches of him, is nose to nose with the heckler. “Problem?” he taunts. The man turns around and storms away."

This guy is great.

[Awsi Dooger]

2. That's what I mean; I wanted to paste more

Thanks, fujiyama. I started to paste those exact paragraphs, but since they were atop the first article I thought they would be more likely to be read, so I chose paragraphs buried deep in the second link.

[xchrom]

3. that's how you treat the right.

you give them the respect they deserve -- none -- and you treat them the same way they treat us -- contemptuously.

the left should never, ever hide what they are -- smarter, quicker, more courageous and a sure bet to be hell on wheels when push comes to shove.

to the leadership: you want less vitriol coming from the right -- then get fired up and spit in their damn face.

[sendero]

4. The more I read about Hackett..

... the more I like him.

He is exactly right. And I hope he runs, politics isn't a like company where you get a promotion for just surviving so many years.