Oh please. Is she a great mayor or not? She's probably fantastic. I'd say it's another fine examaple of our priorities getting way outta whack.

I hope the 'good folks of Arlington' realize that by recalling the mayor they have made her look good, (well she was already really good looking) and themselves foolish. I hope they are pleased with themselves. There is a good chance she might get a better offer out of this deal.

Thanks ever so much macaroons for demonstrating to the rest of the country why Mississippi schools are rated better than ours.

Wow, this is disappointing. I thought she looked GREAT in the picture, and was a wonderful spokesperson for physical fitness. To me, this is a pretty petty reason to recall someone.

She really added a youthful vital image to rundown town. Too bad they didn't appreciate it.

I went looking -- first for the picture (whoa!) and then for those mysterious differences over golf and water (still a mystery) -- and I read more details. Seems that the story almost died down after the first reaction, but someone made photocopies of the pictures and distributed them throughout the small town.

Can you imagine? She was decently covered and just look good -- it really seems like someone wanted to shame her for daring to enjoy her body for looking good.

It does seem anti-woman, Ben.

But Charlie, oh, that was a good one!

Sheesh! I'd have TONS of pictures like that if was that chiseled!

The following, was a good report on the story:

Bra-baring mayor says uproar is just small town politics

Life in a small town isn't something I've personally experienced, but I've heard enough about it from a personal source to know. What the drama embroiling this small town basically seems to boil down to, is that members of this fiscally strapped town; crummy water, sewer system that backs up in winter, took exception to her closing down the golf course even though it lost $10,000 a month.

They were additionally irked, because apparently she failed to make good on a campaign promise to reduce water rates, and allegedly hampered the city's business climate.

Interesting. This was an unpaid position. She was serving as mayor...for free. I'm inclined to think that if the townspeople of Arlington had played their cards right, Carmen Kontur-Gronquist might have been a great boost for the city's business climate.

A lot of people might have been inclined to drive to Arlington, just to get a glimpse of this curvaceous, buff beauty, and learn some of her secrets for getting into and staying in such top condition out in the relative wilds of nowhere. People sure aren't going to drive out there to see the dump.

"but a relative posted them on MySpace in hopes it would improve the social life of the single mother."

Were I Kontur-Gronquist, I'd be kicking this buttinsky's ass right now...

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Okay - I feel like the only prude in the room, and Charlie that was funny, but she was in her underwear in a city building, on city property, taking provocative photos. What if a man did that? If she was on a beach or bedroom, I don't think it would bother me as much but a fire truck?! Was this a commercial type of photo shoot? If not what kind of fire department allows women to run around in their underwear? Clearly I don't have the full story and she is a cutie - maybe that's the difference?

This is typical for Eastern Oregon - Uptight and irrational people getting thier anal-retentive way over something that just isn't something to get really upset about. Just shows how much of rubes they really are.

And they wonder why the people in the valley tend to be very condesending and irritated by Eastern Oregon politics. This is the clear example as to why that is and why issues in Eastern Oregon don't get the look the issues deserve - all because people like this are just too irrational and bored with thier lives to do anything else. They really have nothing better to do than make mountains out of molehills.

The fact that these rubes even held a vote at all shows how backward they are.

I grew up in Fossil, 50 miles to the south of Arlington. Small towns have a lot of advantages, such as really being a part of a community and getting to know a lot of people, many of who will be life long friends. People work hard to make the communities work, especially keeping the schools afloat, which isn't always easy with the loss of timber revenue and family wage jobs over the years.

It is true, that sometimes petty people who need something to fight about will pick a petty fight. When I was in grade school, some sanctimonious folks in the community wanted to punish, even fire an outstanding teacher for living with a man who she would marry within a year. They were in the minority though, and she survived.

I think that in Arlington, Carmen was treated unfairly and that people made way too much of an issue out of the photos. I heard from a number of people that she had made some residents mad because she questioned the city's continued funding of the local golf course ( which costs a lot) and they used, or misused, the My Space photos to attack her.

Having said that , Eric Parker made quite a broad judgment about Eastern OR folks. Again, sometimes petty people will be petty in small towns, but that could be as true in Cottage Alsea in Benton Co. as in Arlington. That is also true in our communities where we live within the city, communities being our work and other social networks.

I would add that Gilliam County produced two Nobel Prize winners, including two time winner Linus Pauling, Tonight Show band leader and Arlington native Doc Severenson, and former Governor Earl Snell. The late great track coach Bill Bowerman grew up and died in Fossil. Recently retired Gilliam County Judge Laura Pryor is recognized in Salem as a leading voice on rural issues, and she helped launch the wind power explosion in that region. (I can just hear the “environmentalists” screaming NIMBY if we tried to put wind farms in the valley.) There are countless other civic minded and progressive people in Eastern OR , notwithstanding some judgmental nitwits who I think unfairly attacked Carmen.

http://www.gabbybabble.com/2008/01/mayor-carmen-kontur-gronquist-myspace.html

Wow, Kontur-Gronquist is hotter than Breitenbush Springs! I'd let her bench-press me any day.

So who's Arlington going to get for their new mayor now? Probably some fat old white guy. I wish Kontur-Gronquist would move to my area, where she'd be appreciated.

We'd vote for her because of her stances on issues of interest to our people. Really.

Well, although the reason for recall is idiotic, at least it's nice to know that sometimes a vote does count!

The fact that these rubes even held a vote at all shows how backward they are.

Eric,

The fact that it was only a 3 vote margin shows how closely divided the sentiment was. So are the 139 people who voted against recalling her at all 'rubes' for participating in the vote? Your small-minded prejudice against Eastern Oregonians (I grew up out there in cow-country myself) is a perfect example of why the term 'liberal' has become so pejorative.

So you can be condescending and insulting to entire swaths of people? Whoopti-fucking-dooda! Anyone can do that. In fact, wingers are pretty goddamn good at it themselves. Believe it or not, not everyone east of the mountains is a flag-waving Bushie, and even those of us who are progressives learned to live with and love our poor, misguided conservative friends and neighbors. Nuts to you for such shitty generalizations.

btw, where can i find these photos of the hottie ex-mayor? it does pique one's curiosity...

I don't think anybody really has to defend eastern Oregon. It's a beautiful place. Even, the location for the dump before some clever person decided to term it 'wasteland', so that hundreds of thousands of urban dwellers wouldn't feel bad about having their trash dumped there, truly turning it into a wasteland.

With all due respect to eastern Oregon citizens morals and ethics, it's just a little dishonest to say you just can't have a hard working person for mayor that went around posing in lingerie next to city fire trucks in their earlier life, when the real reason you're firing her, is because you don't like the fact that she closed your golf course. Does anybody really think that those crusty whining golfers aren't head over heels in ecstasy over those pictures of Carmen they likely have tucked away under the bed, or in their dusty old golf bags? I'm just joking, of course.

Carmen Kontur-Gronquist must really love that countryside and the town to stay there and put up with this nonsense. She ought to consider going to Hollywood, make some good movies and some big money (since she has that Jennifer Anniston, Sarah Jessica Parker thing going on). With the money she might make, she could possibly come up with an idea that would really, really revitalize the town.

Sounds to me like a good South Park script.

<h2>Come on. We're talking about someone's job. I hope you don't lose your job over something as unimportant as this!!!</h2>