Bringing Up The Rear In Politics Candidates Still Plugging Away Despite Long Odds Of Surviving Primary Election

They may not be winning, but they are certainly trying.

A half-dozen or so longshot candidates for governor are putting their hearts into the last two weeks of the campaign before the Sept. 17 primary, hoping for lightning to strike.

Sen. Pam Roach, R-Auburn, isn’t a frontrunner among the GOP candidates for governor, but she’s definitely the best shot.

Roach, an ardent defender of gun rights, is a regular winner of the legislative shoot-outs held near Olympia by the gun lobby.

She usually brings a sleek little pistol her husband gave her to drill targets with precision.

Her aim is just as good on the podium.

Roach gave one of the best speeches of the day before a crowd about about 12,000 at a GOP picnic on Vashon Island, where she hewed to her theme of putting citizens back in charge of their government.

Roach wants to create citizen review boards to ride herd on the performance of state government. She also promises to replace department heads, and make it easier for citizens to investigate their government by providing quicker access to grand juries.

“The state of Washington has to be more accountable to the people,” she said.

Roach was first elected to the Legislature in 1990 and since then has been a predictable ‘no’ vote on taxes or increased regulation.

She’s a mother of five sons, four of them Eagle Scouts.

Her campaign has yet to catch fire.

A poll by Elway Research Inc. of Seattle reported just one percent of likely primary voters plan to support Roach in the primary.

But then, 4 in 10 primary voters are still undecided, according to the poll.

That’s encouraging to the other candidates.

Nona Brazier, a Maple Valley businesswoman and Republican candidate, saw her campaign stumble badly after press reports that she owes about $500,000 in back taxes.

Her garbage-hauling business is in the last chapter of most business stories, Chapter 11.

But she’s trying to turn her tax and business troubles into an asset, campaigning on a platform of getting government off of people’s backs and simplifying regulations.

She says most politicians don’t really know what it’s like to run a small business.

“They come out every four years and kiss babies then they go back to leave the system like it was.”

She’s the most charismatic of the candidates, and has a no-nonsense platform. She promises to abolish the Growth Management Act, refuse any government pension for herself and push legislation that requires politicians to resign to run for higher office.

She’s not buying TV ads or yard signs. “Thirty seconds brushing a horse? I don’t think so. Yard signs? People can spell Nona,” she snapped.

Brazier will buy half-hour spots on cable instead. She calls it the Nona mini-series.

Bob Tharp, a former Flying Tiger from Vancouver, was a GOP candidate for governor in 1992. A Republican hopeful again this year, he opposes a state income tax, and says property taxes should be slashed.

Mohammad Said, a Democratic candidate for governor and physician from Ephrata, is sanguine about his uphill battle for the governor’s mansion. What he doesn’t have in campaign money or organization he makes up for in sweat equity.

“I have been all over,” he told a Seattle crowd gathered for a candidate forum last week. “I’m not a frontrunner, so I have to be a roadrunner.”

Jeff Powers is the gubernatorial candidate with the working person at heart. But bosses might not like his platform of reducing the work week to 30 hours for 40 hours pay.

A 52-year-old Seattle railroad worker, Powers works railroad switches for Burlington Northern by night, and by day campaigns as the Socialist Worker’s Party candidate for governor.

He has assessed his shot at the governor’s mansion realistically saying, “I’m not going to win or anything.” Powers has also run for the U.S. Senate in Ohio and mayor in Detroit.

Powers sees running for governor as a way to get his ideas out, including his pitch for forming “international workers’ solidarity” and support for the Cuban revolution.

“It’s a lot of fun,” he says. “Everyone should run for office. It’s good for the soul.”

Also in the race are Bryan Zetlen of Seattle, a Democrat; Warren Hanson of Bellingham, a Republican; and Democrat Max Englerius of Seattle.

, DataTimes