That's how Jim Ramstad summed up his decision today to leave the US House after his 9th term runs up. Ramstad is 'one of the good Republicans' according to frequent keep-Dan-honest poster, Cody, and I can't agree more.While I won't push myself off as a student of his House career, I know that one of his signature issues since coming to the House is health care for those afflicted with mental and addiction disorders. The recovering drinker hopes to make a little more of a dent in this before leaving the Beltway.
He worked on this fervently with the late Senator Paul Wellstone (who I would call one of the 'good Democrats' :-) ) on this issue. Wellstone had a family connection to mental illness.
But to go back to the horse race interpretation, this does not bode well for the GOP, as The Hotline notes, since he's the latest in a line of Republicans to just walk away from Washington, perhaps getting out of the way of a party implosion in November 2008.
1 comment:
I think it is pretty safe to say that there is a lot of anomosity within the party on the direction they are going. One can speculate why, but I would like to investigate this path more.
I will miss Ramstad, he was indeed one of the good republicans. One of those 'common sense' kind of guys that always tried to find the best course of action for a given problem.
He was one of the first republicans to speak out against the war last year, and although he has cloudied the water with his recent statements on it, he seem[ed]s determined to find the best solution to the problem to satisfy everyone. Perhaps that was his downfall, trying to please two masters (the GOP and Minnesotans), but he tried to do it with sincerity and authenticity, just like a Minnesotan.
Thank you for your service Rep. Ramstad.
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