Hey, back off teddy ted. He's been busy with other important duties of the Governor that don't include the legislative process. Like cutting ribbons, and giving speeches and stuff.

You people who insist that he pay attention to stuff like the budget and the laws that are passed and all that crap are so lame. Come on, let the guy have his fun. After all, YOU didn't get elected by a slim margin after being a lame ass candidate, did you?

Rorovitz, Every time I see a comment from you it's the same stuff. Why is that? You're so quick to be negative.
Every time you make an "argument" I feel compelled to think the opposite.

Time to take a serious look at Sorenson.

Ted Foolongoski is the worse politician in Oregon today -- yep, worse than any GOPer due to his flip-flopping, anti-environment, anti-Dem, smug, insipid, and thoughtless decisions, while all the while pretending to be exactly the opposite. At least with Mannix you know what's going to happen!

Paulie, the only reason you say that is that you have demonstrated time and again on here that you are pretty much a right-winger.

Somewhere on Blue Oregon, I seem to recall Sorenson saying "we need a leader, not a mediator". Exactly what did he mean by that? What issue did he lead on during the 2005 session?

I would suggest re-reading this Blue Oregon column. http://www.blueoregon.com/2005/03/what_it_takes_t.html

The last governor we had who actually accomplished anything progressive for Oregon was Tom McCall. Bob Straub, who followed him, had a brilliant career in public office, but all before he was elected governor. Vic Atiyeh, who was considered a reactionary in the early 80s and a moderate today, did a great Herbert Hoover impression during the state's big recession. Goldshmidt, after being perhaps the best mayor Portland ever had, was a disappointment as governor, and now we know some of the reasons why. Betty Roberts was stymied by the rise of right wing crazies in the legislature and also by some people in her own party. Kitzhaber was too aloof to campaign for anything important, or even for fellow Democrats running for the legislature. And then there's Ted, about whom enough has been said.

McCall actually had the gall to threaten to campaign against Republican office seekers who refused to support his sales tax plan. Both Kitz and Kulongoski were viewed as decent, reasonable guys when elected, but neither had the guts to use that political capital to better their party or the state in general.

About the only prominent politician who could bring us back from the abyss is Peter DeFazio and he's indicated he would run if Ted doesn't. But the person who would make the best governor in these times is former Metro executive Mike Burton

To Albert Kaufman: where have you been on this CA emissions things? He was in support of it all along, and he has made pretty clear that he is going to do a line item veto. And on the increased forest harvesting, the people you should be mad at are the Senate--that provision was totally and entirely their creation. I would like to highlight a comment that Jenni made about Sorenson: "I'd imagine for part of the session he was fairly busy with taking care of the county he was elected to represent." This is why I like the governor: I feel like he took care of the state he was elected to represent. Now I know some of you are going to jump all over me and accuse me of being a Republican, but hear me out: On key issues, he mediated between Republicans and Democrats. Believe it or not, this state is pretty evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats, and any policy that can truly apply to the state should reflect the views of both sides. And in the end, that's what came out of the many negotiations on many bills: a public policy that had a dash of Republican, a dash of Democrat, and a lot of Oregonian. He tried to accomidate the voters. The voters passed that stupid Measure 37 and he realized that something needed to be done to accomidate the existence of that law. So what does he do? He works with Senate leaders to craft a bill that clarifies how that law is to be implemented. What happens in the House? It stalls--just like many other Senate bills. He sees the need to get some structure into law surrounding this measure, the only way he's going to do it is to compromise on transferability, he does it--the bugs can be reattacked next session, but we need this clarification now so that property owners don't get screwed for lack of clarity on the law. I don't agree with that compromise, but I acknowledge that it was done for the public good. Even with that, he helped shepard-through a bill that creates a land-use planning task force to review Oregon's land-use planning policies. More and more Oregonians can't afford college. How does he respond to that? He works to get more money for the community colleges, where more and more people are turning for their post-secondary education. Rural Oregonians, you've got to respect the vetos of the PGE bills, where he refused to take the gamble of entering into the public utility business that serve, essentially, Portland and the Willamette Valley. Now, could he have been more involved? Certainly. But would it have changed anything? I don't think so. In fact, I think Karen Minnis may have dragged her feet even more (if that's possible) if he was in there pushing a Democratic agenda. Look at how she disposed of the Democratic Senate agenda. Dead. Nothing, really. In a nutshell, I feel like the governor has done a good job governing the whole state, rural and metro, Democrat and Republican. People will disagree, I'm sure, but there's some foder for the discussion.

On Kitzhaber, he didn't have much luck fighting the legislature, either. That kind of reinforces my point: if the governor had been more involved, I don't think it would make a blind bit of difference. See what he's like when he has both chambers on his side. I think you'll see great things--maybe even some identifyably Democrat things--for Oregon.

I've not been paying attention to the state legislature, or what the governor has been doing. Where I work, in a Portland hospital, I'm not alone in the lack of awareness. However, I do have ideas about what are issues facing the state. I'd say the Governor would look like a better candidate if he were to focus on a few of the central problems, like the dissolution of public services, the precarious nature of our future economy given higher energy costs, and the ever-present, "what are we going to do here for work?"

The governor can work on brand name recognition. He'll elect more D's if the D's have a program people could support.

Well, I would also like Peter DeFazio to put together a statewide campaign. I think he's a good D.

I say let the fun begin; Teddy K's opening day of session speech stated what the session was going to be like: "Throughout this session, there are going to be differences of opinion between our two parties. Between your two chambers. And between the peoples’ two policymaking branches of government. There’s nothing wrong with that. Debate is healthy and no one in this chamber – starting with me – has a monopoly on being right."

What was wrong from Teddy K was to boxing-in the Senate and House leadership from day one with going along with the Speaker Minnis statement--"NO NEW AND/OR INCREASE TAXES."

Teddy K did not want to remove the $100's of millions of tax credits to the various special interest groups throughout the state. By removing these--it would just be make the tax system more equalible for the citzens of Oregon. But Teddy K sipped the "Minnis"-spiked Kool-Aid and agreed that removing these tax credits would be increasing the taxes in the state.

Betty Roberts was stymied by the rise of right wing crazies in the legislature and also by some people in her own party.

Gil, Betty Roberts was a state senator (as I recall, she gave a major speech on the bottle bill in the 1970s, may even have been the carrier of the bill). She ran, as I recall, against Mark Hatfield after Wayne Morse died in the middle of the election. She was briefly married to Frank Roberts before being married to Keith Skelton (I think that's his name). She was a State Supreme Court Justice, as I recall.

You are talking about Barbara Roberts, who started off as an advocate for an autistic son, became a school board member, then state rep. then majority leader, then Sec. of State, then Governor. There was maybe an hour on election night between when she knew she'd been elected governor and when Measure 5 passed and some people said that actually Measure 5 was elected governor due to the effect on the budget. It was also the year the House went Republican (at least partly due to the antics of House Majority Leader Dave Dix who was as embarrassing to Democrats at the time as I hope Wayne Scott is to serious Republicans). Larry Campbell, the new Speaker, seemed to have a problem dealing with a woman governor. And Barbara's husband Frank Roberts was dying. Many of us still admire Barbara and are proud to have been part of her campaign. What she endured would defeat many people--as a matter of fact, one problem some have with Ted K. is that his lot in life is easier than Barbara's and he doesn't seem to be handling it as well.

Confusing Betty and Barbara is a mistake generally only made by those who have never met them. They are very different personalities. Yes, they have the same last name, as does former elected official Mary Wendy Roberts, the daughter of Frank Roberts and his first wife.

Jenni, I could not find the POST about Sorenson I was looking for--the Sadler column was meant as a generally good column to read.

It is wise not to make decisions about candidates yet. I intend to support the person who seems to have a vision AND the steps to carry it out, not just someone who uses slogans. That applies to all offices, not just Gov.

LT wrote: "one problem some have with Ted K. is that his lot in life is easier than Barbara's and he doesn't seem to be handling it as well."

Just to set the record straight, Ted's parents died when he was a young child; he was raised by nuns in a Catholic orphanage. Please, let's not lower the discussion to remarks about whose life has been tougher.

That aside, Jenni's point is a good one: Kitzhaber had an all-Republican legislature. He had no hope of advancing a proactive agenda. Ted, by contrast, could have set-out a bold vision for the session from the outset (in fact, he could have started lobbying for his agenda the day after Election Day in November -- as Bush did), passed that vision through the Senate in the first two months of session, and spent the rest of session hammering the House (and lobbying its more moderate members). Instead, he sat back and watched session like a spectator sport.

But there is enough blame to go around. Ted didn't step up to the plate with a bold vision, so why didn't the Senate Dems? I still haven't heard anyone ask the question, why did Senate Bill 1000 only pass the Senate in the last month of session? Why did it take until mid-spring for SB 1000 to even be rolled-out?

For the life of me, I still have no idea what the Senate Democratic Caucus's agenda WAS! Sure, individual members had priorities, but did the caucus ever vote on a "top three" list? Did they even have a message beyond "Can't we all just get along?" (Oh, yes, let's not forget to give them credit for the earth-shattering Foi Gras bill.) I mean, for the love of Jebis, I have never seen more squandered potential-leadership than from Ted, Peter Courtney, and Kate Brown. I'm sick of people blaming Karen Minnis for the shortcomings of this session. WE are to blame -- yes, the folks who control every statewide executive office and the Legislature's upper chamber.

THAT'S the problem. Not whether Ted has had enough adversity in his life.

Maybe the rumors persist because an 800 lb gorilla is also contemplating a run for Gov. Has anyone noticed the incredible press that DeFazio and Blumenauer have been getting since they took the lead on the Transportation Bill? What they did for our state is nothing short of amazing.

Just to set the record straight, Ted's parents died when he was a young child; he was raised by nuns in a Catholic orphanage. Please, let's not lower the discussion to remarks about whose life has been tougher.

You missed the point. Having known Ted for a couple decades, I know all that about the orphanage, the Marines, the hard work he's done in his life. But my comparison was life as governor. Ted's wife is healthy and active, the only ballot measures he had to contend with this session (last session was more comparable to what Roberts faced) were Measure 30, 36, 37. And Minnis was not a surprise since he had worked with Minnis last session.

I have an open mind about governor next year.

Yes, Kate Brown was not an effective leader. But I refuse to let Karen Minnis (aka Queen Karen) escape responsibility. Just as I refuse to let those who followed her blindly escape responsibility. Who but Krieger spoke up about the bullying against Roblan over the S. Coast Airport?

Are the 35 comments on the topic about Richardson's N. Korea remark (go back and look under POSTS ) less important than beating up Democrats? That is the famous circular firing squad. Is it OK that no Republican spoke out against that because if only Democrats hadn't been spineless that wouldn't have mattered?

If you didn't read the recent Oregonian's takeoff on Sweet Home Alabama, they talked about spineless politicians not willing to adequately fund education--on the blind belief that if only there were enough tax breaks, employers would move to Oregon.

If you want to attack spinelessness, attack those in any party who think tax cuts are the solution to anything but the common cold.

Jenni--Weird slip on the confusion between Betty and Barbara Roberts. Betty Roberts was also my high school social studies teacher, and one of my most favorite teachers, so maybe her name just poppped up subconciously.

Rorovitz,

I'll second Paul's comment. From what I've heard Wayne Scott stepped into the budget negotiations and set the tone from the beginning. Further, the word I hear is that Big Wayne is basically Oregon's Tom Delay. He bankrolls candidates, wields a big stick and enforces party discipline.

The points above on SB 1000 are dead on, as are the comments about no top 3 mission points.

And yeah, Teddy Ted had it rough as a child, but he seems to be OK now. My point above holds that he was MIA on the budget process, and hey, that seems to be important.

This Kulongoscopy is killing us. Stand down, dude - 2nd terms aren't automatic. You must show your heart is in the fight and that's not gonna happen. Fuhgedabodit. Progressives for condemnation & confiscation want ... Randy Leonard for Governor!