The right stuff

Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, a fifth-generation Washingtonian, is a regular person. Even her economics degree from that heady place, Reed College, shows her down-home roots: her thesis was on curbside composting. Marie, husband Dean, and their small son are, like so many of us, just trying to make ends meet. They run an auto mechanics shop and take their son in with them every day because child care is too expensive; they’ve got healthcare insurance for their son, but can’t afford coverage for themselves; they’re hard-working small business people who employ others in their community.

As her website says “Marie’s great-great-grandpa helped build the Washington State Capitol building as the quarry foreman, and her grandmother was born in a logging camp in Sappho, Washington. Her parents met at Western Washington University after her father immigrated from Mexico.” (For more info: marieforcongress.com). In short, she’s got the background I want in someone representing us in Congress. This weekend I spoke to Marie directly and my feeling has been confirmed — she was a pleasure to talk to: friendly, informed, articulate, with values in just the right places.

Rural life

Marie’s a resident of rural Skamania County. As she says, “In the entire history of our Congressional district, I’m only the second candidate who hasn’t lived in Clark County. I get my water from a well; I get my internet from a radio tower.” She continues, “We’re not going to be able to make any changes in America if we keep electing Twitter candidates. We need people who work for a living, who know how to fix things.”

Fixing things is literally her bailiwick. “In college I was fixing bicycles. And now my husband and I fix cars. We need more manufacturing jobs, we need to bring back the honor in that. We need to train people to make things. For decades we’ve told kids they can only succeed if they have a college education — well, there are a lot of ways to succeed. And I think it starts with junior and senior high shop programs. We need to raise salaries for teachers and fund qualified instructors and get more students interested. It’s cheaper in the long run, We can’t keep saying, ‘You’re not right if you’re not going to college.’ I can’t think of anything more toxic than that.”

“I always liked messing around with stuff, like fixing bikes. Though,” she laughs, “bike mechanics always secretly want to be car mechanics! I remember one of the first presents my dad gave me was a carburetor off a weed eater. I loved that. I have so much respect for people who make and fix things — I think mechanics are some of the most brilliant thinkers — you’ve got to be able to solve problems.” (We veer into car talk for a few minutes. I’ve just gotten a new used Volvo XC 90 and she drives a V70!) Then we move on to policy questions.

Governing

It’s no surprise that Marie supports small businesses; it’s what she does. “Small businesses create jobs and drive the economy. We need to do more to support them,” she says. “I’ll never forget the day a fellow from OSHA came into our shop. He had the power to shut us down. Fixing things — it bears saying that those are jobs nobody in China is going to do. They’re not going to fix your car for you — these are jobs, family-wage jobs, you can be proud of.”

“There’s this idea in some places that we’re all going to go into the tourism industry. No. You think that people who’ve been working in the woods are going to want to serve cocktails to people on the golf course? That’s not what people want. I want to return our woods to productivity, to clean them up. There’s this ascendency of plastic packaging, but we could be transitioning the American timber industry. We could be supporting our timber and paper industries by replacing plastic with wood and cardboard as much as possible.”

“There’s a lot of opportunity to optimize what is coming out of the woods, to create family-wage jobs.” I mention that I’ve always thought biochar would be a great product for our area and complementary to the timber industry. (Manufacturing biochar requires an anaerobic furnace and could be used to reduce timber slag to produce a high quality carbon product for soil enrichment; instead of simply burning those slag piles and adding to global warming.) She continues, “But this is not only about jobs, it’s about sustaining our rural communities and our culture. I’m so proud of people fighting for good jobs with good benefits.”

Her campaign

We spend a few moments talking about her opponent and how she has differentiated herself. Joe Kent is a “Big Lie” Trump supporter who during the primaries fed his GOP base red meat: he has promised on several occasions to “drop impeachment papers” on President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris “on day one.” He wants a national abortion ban, with no exceptions. Kent has made noises about cutting Social Security or pushing out the age of eligibility. Post-primary though he has, predictably, attempted to temper his extreme policy stances in order to broaden his appeal. (He can’t fool me.)

Marie is a mother who supports women making their own choices about their bodies. (Check out @MGPforcongress) Also Marie says, “Yes, we have a Social Security insolvency issue because people are living longer. But not all people are living longer.” She points out that people who work in the trades, who may not have the same privileges or health benefits as others, may not be living longer. But is it fair to have those people pay for the longer-lived folks? She feels there are better ways to address this problem, and she’s ready to roll up her sleeves and work across the aisle to solve these, and other, concerns.

In all aspects of my conversation with Marie, I found her to be a thoughtful moderate. Many others agree. In fact, former Mitt Romney financier David Nierenberg, who is financially backing Marie’s campaign, says, “Joe Kent is smoothly articulate, likable, and yet the substantive positions he espouses are so extreme. It can be beguiling to hear someone like that say Anthony Fauci should be fired and tried for murder.”

Nierenberg has backed centrists, including Jeb Bush, Joe Biden, Alaska’s Sen. Lisa Murkowski, independent Utah Senate candidate Evan McMullin and Rep. Liz Cheney. This puts him squarely in Marie’s camp. She says, as “growing support from independents and moderate Republicans demonstrates, my campaign is about putting aside partisanship to find common ground and build bridges.”

I voted for Jaime in the primary, but after my research and conversation with Marie, I know who shares my values and gets my vote come November. BTW: Marie is holding a meet ‘n greet at the Shelburne Inn from 2:00-3:30 p.m. next Sunday. Do your own research. Don’t be fooled by style — look at the candidates carefully to find the kernel of values that best represents who we know we are in this corner of the state.

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A couple not-to-be-missed events are coming up. The Water Music Festival begins Friday at the Chinook School auditorium: opera fun with Kari Burgess, soprano; David Gustafson, tenor; and John Jantzi, pianist. Saturday you’ll find the brilliant guitarist Paul Galbraith at the Oysterville Church. And Sunday, back in Chinook, the flying fingers of classical pianist Tien Hsieh. For more information: watermusicfestival.com.

And save the date for the Vet Lunch this year on Veteran’s Day, Nov. 11, at noon at the Moose Lodge.