Your Questions For The Candidates

QUESTIONS

1. Do you oppose legislation limiting contributions to political campaigns even though most citizens believe these high dollar contributions buy votes for special interests and subvert the political process? - Philip Waring, Coeur d’Alene

2. Sometimes it seems that our state, and its labor laws, are stacked in favor of the already-wealthy land or business owners. What if you are neither? What will you do to ease the plight of those caught in the low-income/minimum wage-earning bracket? - Mary Denise Taylor, Coeur d’Alene

3. Explain your position concerning greater control and/or ownership of public lands. - Jerry Shriner, Coeur d’Alene

4. What would you do about prescription drugs for Medicare patients? - Ben Newbold, Rathdrum

5. Would you support making U.S. Highway 95 a full, four-lane freeway to connect Canada all the way down to Boise? - Tom Akren, Post Falls

6. What will you do to try to correct the image of North Idaho being a haven for extremists and racists? - James Ramsey, Ponderay

7. Urban development is much more than building new Safeways and McDonald’s restaurants! Are sufficient parks and “green areas” set aside for habitat and recreation? - Doug Toland, Sagle

CANDIDATE ANSWERS Kevin Hambsch Reform

1. I’m a staunch advocate for airtight campaign finance and lobbying reform, and I mean airtight. Because even McCain-Feingold has got some problems with it, and it needs to be tightened up. The Reform party supports a concept called “can’t vote, can’t contribute.” That means if you’re a PAC, you can’t vote, therefore you can’t contribute. If you’re an individual who can vote in the congressional district, you can contribute the limit. We’re for disclosure.

2. I think that a local congressman can do a great deal in leadership with regard to reinvigorating the potential of everyone with regard to their own personal dreams. I mean that sincerely. I believe in democratization of education. Right now education is way too expensive, and it’s because special interests, unions or bureaucracies in the government are controlling it, and not allowing any money to go down to the basic level. This would end under a Reform government. Money would go directly to individuals who wanted an education.

3. I don’t think that the federal government is going to mismanage our “publicly owned” lands. That notwithstanding, Idaho should obviously, through the state Legislature, as the only manifestation of the people as one in Idaho, have a greater say over how they’re managed. There are a lot of Idahoans in the 1st District that do not like this WTO, NAFTA, GATT, U.N. garbage with regard to biodiversity. Educated individuals in Idaho should have more say over public lands than the federal government, no question.

4. For those individuals that cannot afford to pay for them, within the context of the convoluted tax system we have in the U.S. right now, it is appropriate for the federal government to become involved and pay for those individuals who can’t afford it, but not for those who can. We’ve got too much debt to pay off to cover Bill Gates and all of his buddies.

5. Providing the highway is purely for our domestic and national betterment, certainly I would support it. If it is part of the corridor of the NAFTA agreement to create a complete corridor between Mexico and the U.S., I’m opposed to it.

6. Well unfortunately there’s nothing that I could do, because it’s the mainstream media which is propagating and promulgating this whole hate state notion. My sources tell me up there that there are probably 25 to 50 active people in that. My personal experience… any time I’ve seen anybody of any different ethnic background talk to one another here, it’s been done with the utmost respect. It’s a sin against the people of this state who are so big-hearted and so loving and giving and community oriented.

7. I think that’s sort of more a state issue, but the federal government is involved in it. Again, there’s a big difference between environmentalism and ecology. Ecology looks at the ecosystem existing in balance with humanity. I’m ecologically based. There are environmentalists who want all these other areas left alone and off limits and all that. I’m saying no. For areas that aren’t that sensitive, then we have to develop a rational plan. We need to get involved in reforestation. More parks and more habitat need to be created for continual beneficial engagement between nature and Idahoans.

C.L. “Butch” Otter’s Republican

1. I favor enforcing the laws that are already on the books regarding campaign financing and adding language requiring full disclosure for some organizations that slip through loopholes. The vast majority of my campaign contributions have been received from people all over the state of Idaho - because Idaho is my only special interest.

2. We should be proud that Idaho has a business-friendly environment - it has allowed many parts of the state to prosper and provide good jobs with good wages. But, there are other parts of the state that are still suffering. Our natural resource communities have double digit unemployment due in large part because of the heavy hand of federal regulations. We have lost thousands of high paying jobs in the mines and in the forests because of unreasonable federal policies. I support sustainable yield policies that put those people back to work.

3. The federal government has done a poor job of managing the federal lands in Idaho (they control more than 60 percent of our land mass). For example, during this summer’s fire season, forest lands managed by federal authorities were ravaged due in large part to lack of management and abysmal health. State and private lands escaped with only minor damage in comparison. Insect infestations plague federal sections much more than state and private areas. It’s time for the federal government to take some land management direction from the states and private sector.

4. In the short term, I believe that a prescription drug benefit should be offered as a part of Medicare coverage. In the long term, we need to reform Medicare, as a whole, bringing it up to date with the times, making it more responsive to caregivers and beneficiaries, and, perhaps most importantly, financially sound for future generations of retirees and beneficiaries.

5. For safety and commerce reasons, I believe it’s important that we work toward making Highway 95 a four-lane, high-speed north-south route that will connect people in north Idaho not just with Boise, but also provide a trade route from the Canadian border to the Mexican border. In the near term, we should focus on improvements which will make 95 a two-lane, high speed, diminished access corridor. That effort will save lives and jobs.

6. I will do everything in my ability to sell the positive side of Idaho’s image; to drown out the eight or ten voices of hate in what’s left of the Aryan compound (which the national media exacerbate); and to re-direct attention to the unity, understanding, and friendship Idahoans share with people of all races and religions.

7. We are fortunate that Idaho enjoys an economic climate that fosters the growth of businesses, providing jobs and products for our citizens. As a member of Congress, I will work hard to preserve and improve our economic base. At the same time, I intend to diligently oppose efforts by the federal government to impose land-use restrictions on states and local communities. Idaho law and local ordinances already provide for planning and zoning processes which allow citizens and community leaders to make decisions about development, habitat, parks and other recreational opportunities.

Linda Pall Democrat

1. I support campaign contribution limitations, including the banning of soft money. We must have comprehensive campaign finance reform. It is utterly unacceptable to have the First District’s ticket to Congress cost a million dollars. Before I began this campaign, I thought about campaign finance reform as an important but not critical issue, one that would be amenable to incremental adjustments. I now have drastically revised my views.

2. Every member of Congress (and every candidate) should remember people on the lower rungs of the economic ladder and ask themselves how the policies they are adopting will benefit ALL of society. I am concerned that in America the gap between compensation of the rank and file worker and management is widening every year. This is not good for democracy. I would like to see the benefits of the ‘new economy’ and the high tech world that is so productive for some segments of our society extended to reach every corner of this district and every person who needs the help.

3. I do not favor direct state control over federal lands. I do not favor transfer of federal lands to state ownership unless by mutual agreement. The state of Idaho has more on its plate than it can handle right now. I do favor a strong policy of consultation and collaboration where important land use and resource decisions are made concerning federal lands. I believe that our member of Congress should seek and obtain a seat at the table as these decisions are made, representing the multiple interests that make up our diverse district.

4. I support coverage of all senior citizens under Medicare for prescription drugs through a voluntary, dependable, efficient and simple system. Senior citizens will retain their own doctors, pharmacists and other health care providers and have, in addition, catastrophic coverage. This should have been adopted THIS year in Congress. If elected, I would work for its immediate adoption. Senior citizens should not have to choose between food and the lifeline of prescription medication.

5. I favor a divided highway and would like to have it adopted as an interstate but without the large impact footprint of most interstate highways. I would like to have this highway set a new standard for environmental sensitivity combined with commercial effectiveness to link all of our communities along the way. I realize that there are topographic challenges… but I believe that the importance of such a transportation connector would justify its exclusive funding by the federal government.

6. Perhaps the first, most important way of reclaiming Idaho’s reputation would be by speaking out forcefully for inclusion and against bigotry. I have been a long time member of the Latah County Human Rights Task Force and a consistent supporter of human rights from my high school days to the present. If you’re going to talk the talk, you have to walk the walk. So much of ending hatred rests in the home, family and our own hearts and minds. I believe Congress should move immediately to pass the pending hate crimes legislation.

7. Urban development is a lot more than soul-less commercial development. We must have more green space, more trees, more parks and more livable communities. As simple a thing as designing affordable housing with front porches and personal garden space has a huge impact on the ultimate value of the improvement and the kind of neighborhood that is created. I support fully legislation to earmark funds for acquisition of park land and urban open space, as well as conservation of historic resources.

Ron Wittig Libertarian

1. I’m opposed to controls on political contributions because an individual should have the right to give as much as he wants to whoever he wants. Fortunately being a Libertarian, we cannot by our platform and principles support a special interest. We take a pledge. This is why the Libertarians don’t get the funding from special interests. We’ve got nothing to promise.

2. I started out in poverty, one of six children. My father was an alcoholic. We basically depended on the charitable things from other people, church, community. I used to say my piece on Christmas in church to get a new flannel shirt, because that was the only new clothes I was going to get all year. People setting at the bottom crying “woe is me” have got to pick themselves up and improve their life. Nobody owes anybody a living. If you want a better life, you have to work for it, you have to educate yourself.

3. You’ve got federal control of this ground already, and look what it’s done to it. Return it to the states or return it to its rightful owner, the American Indians who we stole it from in the first place. The American Indians have a greater respect for the land than the federal government ever did. Barring that, I’d want it returned to the states.

4. Here again, the cost of drugs, cost of medical services, since the federal government took charge of it, added rules, regulations and controls, has inflated the cost of medicine, prescription drugs, medical care and that. Get the federal government out of the health care business, return it to the private sector where it belongs. The cost of prescription drugs will return to the percentage of income it was back in the ‘30s, ‘40s, ‘50s. The federal government involvement in health care is the reason our health care costs are so high.

5. Turning Highway 95 into a fourlane superhighway would not be economically justifiable at this point. Perhaps five, 10, 20 years down the road that may be a necessity. But at this point, I would like to see Highway 95 widened, straightened and a lot of areas made into a three-lane road with a passing lane in the middle. The volume of traffic on 95 right now I don’t think at this point would justify making it a four-lane interstate.

6. Well you can thank the media for that, because this is the media perception of North Idaho. People that travel north to south, whether Idaho natives or visitors going north, do not see that. This is a media perception and it sells newspapers, and as soon as the media knocks this off, then the perception will go away. Butler makes good headlines.

7. Here again is an individual that wants to use the power of government to get what he wants. If you want parks, if you want green areas and that, then the people themselves should buy, promote it, manage it, whatever. The local government should not have the authority to force Albertson’s, Safeway, McDonald’s to put in a park, because somebody thinks it’d be nice to have a park there. They want the park, they get off their butt, get the revenues. Don’t force your social wishes.