More Thoughts on the Utah 3rd District Race

I had originally written this as a reply to my last post, but decided that I would make it a separate post instead of burying it in old news.

At the convention, I glanced over at a PowerPoint printout that one of the delegates next to me had (she was a bitty, BTW, clucking at all the candidates she didn't like - give them at least a modicum of respect here, people!), and I have to say that it did surprise me. It was from Chris Cannon's campaign and it did mention that he had passed more legislation in Congress than anyone else (except for 2 others), and that's an important thing. I think that disproves the "Cannon's just a voter" theory that is one of the legs of David Leavitt's campaign. Another Leavitt contention was that Cannon has a low power ranking (based on Congress.org's rating system). That's true, he's #318. At the same time, I went and looked at their methodology, and a measure of power is earmark getting ability. Quite frankly, I want to have a Congressman with a low ranking if earmarks is a measure of power because earmarks are an abuse of the Congressional budgetary system.
In turn, there are two points that Leavitt does make that I agree with. One is that it's the Republican party's fault that we lost control of Congress and we need to stop blaming Democrats. We did lose it, and we squandered an ability to make the country more fiscally responsible and reform major government programs under a giant mountain of earmark abuse that was so epic that the earmarks from 2000-2006 surpassed every other earmark made in the history of the US. Republicans have nobody to blame but themselves. As a result of things like this, I really think we're going to be in the minority for the next several Congresses, and as a result the second thing I think Leavitt has a point on is that by electing him now we would be building senority for the future when we will become a majority again, whereas Cannon would be close to retired.
I really like both Leavitt and Cannon and that's what makes this so difficult. In prior years, it's been very easy to decide who to choose - the other candidates clearly weren't the same caliber as Chris was, but this time it's a legitimate choice. It makes it hard, but I like it better even though I have to hem and haw and choose one then choose the other then go back and do it all over again. It's a testament to the strength of both of the candidates that it is a difficult decision.
Might I also say that I feel for every member of the House because they are constantly running for their seat - they never have some time off from it. That's more than I would ever want to do because it takes so much time and money that it's hard to fathom.

Utah County Republican Convention

Saturday my wife and I went to the Utah County Republican Party convention, and it was relatively tame. It was her first opportunity to go, and it was nice because I was glad we could do some of my political stuff together, because it can drag. This convention was different though. I've never seen it be more efficient. We were out by 11:30, and some of that was because we didn't have any contested votes at the county level, and some was because we need to get the Convention Chair to permanently chair our convention.
The most important part of it for me was it was another chance to hear from the Congressional candidates. I like David Leavitt and Chris Cannon quite a bit, but Jason Chaffetz rubbed me the wrong way. First, he took some snarky digs at both Leavitt and Cannon, and I certainly didn't appreciate it. Second, he ended his speech with the line "God bless you, and God bless America" like he's the President of the Freaking United States of America. Shut your piehole, Chaffetz, you aren't. Don't patronize me with your crap. I'm still going to hear him out because I haven't had an opportunity yet, but my chances of voting for him are about .05% right now. I really liked what Leavitt had to say (especially when he said "we need to stop blaming everything on the Democrats" then proceeded to say where the Republican Party has failed over the past 6 years) - he's articulate, he's got some charisma, and he's sharp. Cannon...it's tough. I really like Chris Cannon. He's been a good Congressman, but I can see what Leavitt is saying when he says he's a majority style Congressman - he's blustery and loud. That's my biggest problem with him in general. It's why I'm about 50/50 between Leavitt and Cannon, and it's something that really has me stumped. I think I will probably not make my decision until I actually vote. I might be leaning slightly towards Leavitt, but it's really so up in the air that I just don't know what to do.

I'll Curse Us Again, But...

...I have to say something about the Jazz game last night. They didn't deserve to win. D-Will was incredible, but everybody else seemed to be coasting. It's not to say that they didn't do okay (Boozer was okay, AK was okay, Harpring was okay, Memo was okay), but they didn't play well. In order for them to win, they've got to actually go to the boards. I was disgusted with how they rebounded. It seems like someone would hoist up a shot and everybody else would head down to the other end, leaving 5 Rockets fighting for the board. They didn't hit their free throws, and they didn't hustle. If we played like that in Houston, we would have been slaughtered. The one thing that I continue to like though is the way that Williams takes things on his shoulders and tries to make it happen. He doesn't want to lose and he is not satisfied by anything less than a title. That more than anything else is why he's the leader of the team now.
At any rate, the Jazz need to take it up a notch, because even if they beat Houston, an effort like last night's won't get them much against the Lakers.

This Disgusts Me

This is outside my office window. I couldn't be more disgusted with Mother Nature. It was shaping up to be a beautiful day and then we get a late April snow storm. I'm nowhere near prepared, as I am dressed for spring, not winter.

Everyone to Rockets, Rev it up Now

Clearly I have been watching a bit too much Little Einsteins (a show that I could certainly do without, but my daughter just can't), but in between TiVoed repeats of it I have managed to see Games 1 and 2 of the Rockets-Jazz series. It's incredible how much better the Jazz are this year than last. Even when someone is having an off night, they have enough weapons to still do you in. I've heard several people opine that the Jazz are doing so well because the Rockets don't have Yao or Rafer Alston in their lineups, and it's true to a point, but nobody remembers how much Carlos Boozer abused Yao last year and it's just a cold hard fact of life that Deron Williams would hand Alston's head to Rick Adelman on a platter. There's nothing I like more than D-Will with the Eye of the Tiger. He will do anything he can to win the game and he's really become the leader of the team. You could see him coming out last year during the playoffs, but he's taken it up another notch this year.
At any rate, this series is a hair's breadth away from being over, with a sweep a very distinct possibility. The Jazz sweeping the Rockets is something that should send a statement. These Jazz aren't the same team that sleepwalked through December and posted a terrible road record (let the record show that they've actually had a winning record on the road since they traded for Kyle Korver - and let's also mention how they play down to the competition and that there's nobody to play down to anymore), they are a team that is without a doubt the best team they have fielded since the 1997-98 NBA Finals squad. In fact, they might even be better than them unless they're playing in San Antonio.
It will be interesting to see what happens when we play the Lakers...I'm terrified of playing them. There are two teams that seem to own the Jazz and have for a long time: the Lakers and the Spurs. Since Phoenix is putting up token resistance against the Spurs and I don't know if the Hornets and CP3 will be able to knock them off, for the Jazz to get a crack at Boston in the Finals (an eminently winnable series, BTW), they have to exorcise the demons of the past decade. It's possible, and it will be exciting (with the exception of the token "we gave up" game that they always toss in there where [enter opponent here] wins by 80 points), and there's a chance - a chance, that the Jazz could go all the way.

A Big Cup of Crazy

I got this in my email inbox last night from a candidate for Utah State Governor. Tell me I'm not the only one who thinks this plan is straight from the Pescadero State Mental Hospital.

Message from Charles "Chuck" Smith, Candidate for Governor

Stay tuned for a flow chart. It is on its way. Now for economic development.
The basic materials needed to create wealth are finely scattered over the whole earth giving us many places from which we can build. The only thing that keeps us back from multiplying our wealth many times is a step by step example of how to do it. With the powerful tools of technology we can create this example, first in a virtual world. The virtual tools gives us the ability to cheaply trial and error through to perfection a risk free path. Then we can follow that path to great real success and wealth.
Everyone wants to know how we can increase peoples incomes in the State of Utah. So, here is the step by step overview of what I am already building. First we start a club and invite all who want to 4 times their income in the next 4 years to join it. The club is free of charge. In the club each person takes pictures every week of the things they would buy or do if they had 4 times their income. Those pictures are accumulated and made into a high speed movie, one for each week for all to view via the Internet. From this data of what we want and need, we create robotic systems to produce these goods and services in a virtual world setting. As the design for robotic manufacturing starts to develop we use engineering software tools to create the details necessary to build these robots in the real world. As the specifications come from engineering we look for materials to build the robotics. The goal is to acquire all materials through efficient energy and material recycling. Once we have acquired materials we will build robots using the virtual designs and engineering to control the building process. With robots in place we will then start producing the goods and services that we want as per the initial picture collection. Club members will get these products and services as payment for their participation in the club. The value of the goods and services for each club member should exceed 4 times their income in the fourth year of club participation.
This is a simple explanation of the steps; the actual doing of this plan will bring out many unforeseen opportunities to expand and multiply our talents. Every step will be looked at with the idea that what we do should be able to be done by others in other parts of the the world so that eventually all peoples in all nations can follow our step by step process to advance there wealth production abilities.

Crazies in the Office

I meant to write about this on Friday but didn't get around to it, in part because of the incident that I'm about to detail. I was paged in my office that someone was out front who was named Matt (as always with office posts, names have been changed) and was a web designer who had someone from here call him. I wondered if it was Matt Ramone, our accountant, and our secretary was confused. She asked him and he said he was Matt Damon and he was here because someone called him. I knew that Forro had been doing some things with a web design company, so I grabbed Forro and we went out to the receptionist's desk. There was Matt, talking to someone else we do business with and looking rather unkempt. He said he was just talking with his good friend, Edward Norton, and then he talked with us about how they were filiming a movie at some Mexican restaurant in town and he had been there for 4 hours but now they just wanted head shots, and not just any head shots, but those of geeks - with that he pointed at us and said "like you guys." Edward was looking more uncomfortable than he ever did in Rounders, and Forro and I were wondering what was going on. Matt apologized for the remark, then got up and said that he wanted to know if we knew who he was. Forro said he was Matt Damon. He asked if we knew why he was here and Forro said "no, how can we help you." Matt swore loudly and shouted "I'm Matt Damon, a web programmer, and someone from here called me!" With that he smacked Forro's outstretched hand and made a loud enough noise that it could be heard around the office. People started coming up front, wondering what train was wrecking and who was involved. Forro asked him to leave at that point. Matt kept protesting and apologizing and saying that he would talk to him if he called him back and gave him a business card. Matt said he'd stay outside to talk to his good friend Ed, but Ed didn't look like he wanted that. Forro escorted him out of the building and we called the cops who hauled him away. It was rather interesting all said and done.
The sad part of the story as Ed told us later was that he had known Matt quite well but hadn't heard from him in over a decade. They worked together and after Ed had left the set, Matt's son had committed suicide, driving him over the edge. Matt left his wife, got into drugs, and became the deranged semi-hobo we saw before us. It's crazy that that had completely destroyed Matt and very sad. Nevertheless, it was a very interesting day.

With Friends Like These...

While I'm not a ticket holder on the Barack Obama train, I have found him to be a palatable alternative to my preferred candidate, John McCain. There have been some things that have ome out lately that have made me rethink my position, although I think I'd still be okay with his presidency. The major knock I have on Obama at this point is his choice in friends. I think he's still an amazing speaker, despite his unintentional putdown of your average American, so he's definitely got that going for him - he's one of the most inspiring speakers we've had run for president since Ronald Reagan.
At the same time, he links himself to a lot of people who have spouted a lot of anti-American vitriol. There is his famous preacher, Jeremiah Wright. That can be explained away to a large degree - Wright was angry, has been through segregation, etc. I don't think that should absolve him from what he's said, but he is entitled to his opinion. The more troubling connection that Obama has is with The Weatherman - a group that bombed the Pentagon, the US Capitol, and were looking at bombing Fort Dix until their bomb factory blew up. These aren't your Islamic Wahabbist-style terrorrists, but home grown wackos. While they aren't best buddies, it's connections like this that keep coming out that make me think he may not be the best man for the job because this makes being a drunken cheerleader or a philandering governor look like something inconsequential. To top it off, the group was doing this to protest the Vietnam War and Obama (assuming he wins the nomination) is going up against one of the men who fought that war for us and that The Weatherman were fighting. That is pretty incredible. I don't know if I could possibly support him (although if he's CINC, that changes things).

A Little Soft in Your Step

Here's one of the worst parody films that I've seen in a bit. Of course, there's rhyme to Microsoft's reason, as pushing the cheese factor up to 11 really makes it viral video bait for people like me. Take a look:

So I Work With A Crone

I haven't mentioned this in the past, but I will here and now: I work with a crone. Not just your run of the mill battleaxe (although I work with plenty of those too), she is a full-fledged crone. "How is she a crone?" you might ask. Allow me to enumerate the ways:

1. Whenever she hears something she doesn't like, you immediately know it. Bad news for her can span the gamut from "you're not going to this conference because the last time you went to one you managed to skip half the sessions so you could be 'fresh' for the other half and my wife caught you in all your glory at the Starbucks/breakfast lounge in the hotel" to "sorry, drinks are 50 cents and you are not a special exception." This is followed with a tut-tut sound and a disapproving look that conveys the message "do you know who I am?" To the look I would reply that I do know who you are, and that makes it all the sweeter when I can shut your sorry can down.
2. She is the personification of two great human flaws: what have you done for me lately and why don't I get it right now. She'll call up at random times and have random issues with things, typically because she uses all kinds of stuff that is her personal stuff. No, she won't standardize, she has to use her Celeron Toshiba laptop and her Palm Treo instead of the Core 2 Dells and Tungsten E devices that we use for everyone else. At any rate, this technology of hers has frequent problems and if you don't get it sorted out 5 minutes before it happened, you're on her crap list (which let's face it, I've been on since the moment she got here).
   
3. She's an office squatter. This has happened for quite some time, but it still bugs me. So she got hired here and one of our corporate people spent a lot of time up in our other office. She sat down there in his office and went to work. That's fine - if she gave it up when he came down here to work. Instead she used squatter's rights to claim control of the office, and proceeded to take down all of the stuff on his walls, box up his materials, and toss his stuff in the hall over a weekend. When people got in on Monday, she had personalized the office with all of her degrees and whatnot, as people who think they're awesome tend to do. It's great that you got those, but don't sit there and rub it in our faces. She then decided that she preferred the office across the hall from hers because it had windows. This was another corporate officer, even the COO of the company. Same thing happened - Friday it was his, Monday it was hers. Then when Forro and I moved her into a different office, she got all bent out of shape despite the little fact that she doesn't even need an office.
4. She believes that she is God's gift to mankind. This is not an exaggeration. She also believes that she should be part of the management team. She's a nurse. Not a manager. She's seen some of our finances before and as soon as I'm done explaining that, she will go on about how she needs x, y, or z even though what she currently has is more than sufficient for the job.

He Needs A Friend

Here's a great clip of what happens when your team is not really a team. Take a look at poor Andrew Bogut.

Dis-AAdvantage

There are some things that I am very happy about. One is my family, one is my job, one is my life, and one is the fact that I didn't book my travels to this conference on American Airlines. Part of that is by virtue of Delta's hub in Salt Lake and part of it is because they chose not to participate in the "here's free status" program with the American Express Centurion card. Nevertheless, it's not been as crystal clear in ages that I made the right choice. They've canceled close to 3000 flights over the past 3 days (and 600 today) and displaced a ton of travelers. I can only imagine what it would be like to be sweating if my flight would make it so I could get home because half the fleet is down for maintenance. Mark my prediction: AMR (the parent company) will file for bankruptcy within 60 days of the start of this. You don't tick off a million travelers and get away with it.

My (Brief) Run-in with Greenpeace

So I was walking with Forro from the Woodley Park subway station to my conference hotel today and Greenpeace had several people out trying to sign people up to do a variety of things, including donating money or signing up to go spike trees or put sugar in the gas tanks of loggers. I walked past the first person, but the second one got me, while Forro got corralled by the one I walked past. He chatted with her and came away thinking they were a bit militant. The one that got me is the only one that I can attest to chatting with. She asked if I would talk for a second and I said that I was a bad person. I said this because I knew I didn't agree with them and I didn't want to get in it on the street. She went into her pitch about global warming and how the US is the cause of it and this and that and the other and I said "I don't believe in global warming, in that I don't think humans are the cause of it." To my shock and surprise, she said "okay, have a great day" and we were done. Good on you Greenpeace! By not having it out with me on the vagaries of volcanos, CO2, Earth Day, cows, and whatnot, you made me not be annoyed and helped your image out. I really appreciate it!

Colon Blow

I was in my hotel room this morning, just waiting around and I had finished my newspaper and had a few minutes. After skipping over the running 30 second soundbytes festival that is Today, I came across an infomercial that immediately made me stop and take notice. It was two guys around a table, one of whom was a dead ringer for James Lipton. They were plugging (pun intended) a colon cleanse product. As Lipton was acting like he'd never heard about the product, the inventor was going on about how good it was and they had a screen crawl that had an amazing statistic: "Most Americans have between 5 and 22 pounds of impacted fecal matter in their colon." That blew me away, in part because I think there is no way that could be true. I know that things can get more dense in the colon, but that's like having 88 Quarter Pounders with Cheese sitting in your bowel. I just think that's impossible, unless you're dead or dying. Can anybody let me know a bit more about that? Also, they said that there's an old saying: "Death begins in the colon." Maybe it is, maybe it isn't...I tend to think it isn't.
Other random thoughts: I'm listening to Chris Matthews (he's the keynote speaker here at my conference) and he's a windbag [edit: not only is he a windbag, he wasted our time - I think he spoke for 20 minutes and didn't say anything insightful at all]. Also, I love the DC restaurant The Prime Rib. It's worth getting dressed up and paying a lot once in a while when you have what a lot of people consider to be the best Prime Rib anywhere in the world.

Sorro's Apostle Pick

I'm in the airport waiting for my flight to Washington to go tell Congress to give me more money, and as usual it's during General Conference. I don't know why it's the case, but for some reason I've missed something like 50% of General Conferences because of conferences. Nevertheless, I had to get my keno pick in and I am sticking with Elder Kikuchi for my pick. I'll find out if I'm right when I get to Washington!

Snake Oil: The Rebuttal

So my brother (we'll call him Rorro for the sake of keeping things uniform) read my post about the pH water changing machine my mom bought. He decided to send the link to someone who holds himself out as an expert in all waters kangen, or "full of crap" (and from what I understand, has a link to Enagic, the company that made the $4000 water filter), and here is the response he got:

Thanks for your email. (I'll use this response in the next mail out to my list).
For some reason Gmail sent it to the spam folder, so I didn't see it right away.
Here are some basics. Enagic use the term Kangen water and sell one of their machines for $4000. The Japanese use the term kangen sui (water) which means return to original water in much the same way we refer to kleenex. Enagic USA have used it as a marketing term. Whilst I still have the website, [link omitted] I am no longer affiliated with Enagic. I am affiliated however, with IonWays.

Sorro: Cheeth, can I get a confirmation of this?

I found most of the people I met in Southern California involved with Enagic to be all about hyping it up and making false claims. I can't really say I was surprised, but I'll accept a person in Utah with much different sensibilities is likely to be very different in the way they present the machine and it's benefits. Who would you really like to see suffer here? Your Mom or the ultra-materialistic SoCal jerk with the slicked back, greasy hair and trophy wife?

S: What is the point here? I don't want to see either suffer, so why did you bring SoCal people into this? I'm quite confused. One thing is for sure: this guy hates people from California, people who use hair product, and people who have trophy wives.

I do have a machine and would regularly test the pH all the time with drops when I first got it to ensure I was drinking high pH water. I always found it to be accurate and am now at the point where I can taste the difference between 9.5 pH alkaline water and straight tap water.

S: I can taste the difference between the water too. Of course, I can also tell the difference between Dasani, Aquafina, Fiji, and the stuff from my tap. That doesn't mean the pH is different though. I saw the "drop test" and it's a load. Use litmus paper - there's a reason it's the standard. I can have different drops and toss it in the water and have it do stuff too. I never trust the marketing materials somebody is using to scientifically prove how great their stuff is - you have to get it from an impartial source.

Like 98% of the educated, naturally cynical people out there, I did my due diligence before I bought a machine and examined the science by reading such books as Reverse Aging and Alkalize or Die. It was after that -- not the amateur sales pitch from the person involved -- I realized drinking alkaline water and saying no to soda was going to be of benefit to my health.

S: I'm not going to debate the "soda is bad for you" part of this, because I certainly don't think it's a health drink. Subbing any water for any soda is probably a good rule of thumb for getting healthier. On another note, is either of those books peer reviewed, or are they the rantings of madmen passed off as science?

I'm at the point now where I get too many emails from people to really worry if someone isn't interested. I drink it, I know it's good for my health, but if you or Mary in McKinney, TX don't think so, that's quite ok. You can blog about it, email all sundry, shout it from the rooftops and in fact, just the mention of kangen water is bound to get some people interested and when they search, they'll inevitably find my #1 ranked site. And if they don't want they water, they might like to try the stem cells product [he had a link here - I'm not giving him the free press though], which means you're effectively doing me a favor by sending me free traffic, thanks.

S: You're welcome for the traffic, because I will continue to blog and I'm sure Rorro will continue to "email all sundry."

I think life is about choices -- we are free to make them of our own volition and live with whatever consequences arise. I know that disease is a result of diet + lifestyle choices and that most people would be better off health wise if they simply drank more plain tap water, let alone restructured alkaline.
If someone wants to spend thousands of dollars on a water machine, it's their money, so it's their choice. Others spend it gambling on horses, and still others collect Superman figurines. One could argue they are also wasting money, but as the saying goes -- to each his own.

S: I agree with him here, life is about choices and disease can certainly be influenced by diet and lifestyle choices and drinking more water is generally good advice. I also agree that it's their choice to spend $4k on a water machine that acts as a really expensive placebo. (Oh, side tangent - they claim that it changes the absorbability and surface tension of the water by rearranging the molecules. Rob, as the resident scientist here, what's your take? I'm not a surface tension measurer.) Where I disagree is that I think they're idiots for wasting the money. The Superman figurines might have a decent ROI if you hold on to them long enough, whereas the water machine...makes water...and maybe filters stuff out. Gambling can get you a quick score too. Nevertheless, comparing something of "great worth" with two worthless activities doesn't help your cause. Imagine if Churchill compared defending Great Britain against Hitler to getting bread down at the bakery or kicking back and having a pint at your local pub. I think that the British would be sieg heiling all over the place.

Please feel free to use my response at your blog if you like.
Regards,
Matt

S: Done and done, although it's not at his blog, but mine.

There's No Such Thing As A Free Lunch

I am very underwhelmed by Jason Chaffetz' campaign so far. I conducted the semi-weekly cleaning of our mailbox last night and we had some things from him. One was a letter saying that he was running a different kind of campaign. He was only going to spend $80000 or so to campaign and was therefore foregoing the lunches that most legitimate campaigns do when they talk to delegates, and then he goes on to say it's because he's fiscally responsible and the other 2 candidates aren't.
Here's why that annoys me. A free meal, or even a little sandwich buffet spread of stuff from Costco or wherever isn't buying delegate votes, despite Chaffetz' claims. Instead it's an acknowledgment that our time is valuable and that you appreciate us coming to listen to you for 1-2 hours. In my opinion, if he was in it to win it, he'd be lunching us up all over the place. I'll go to quite a few events in the next month and change, but my time is valuable and if he would prefer to pinch pennies rather than spending 5-10 bucks on lunch, then he will get precisely 1.5 hours to convince me to vote for him. Other candidates who actually say "thanks for coming, here's some food" will get additional opportunities (Cannon is at 1 taken and Leavitt 2, but the campaign has just begun).

Text Overload

While I appreciate the work of the media in trying to find this little girl, I have to say the way they did this was completely mental. First thing they did was shoot American Idol into the small box, which was definitely appropriate and not bloggable. What took it into SNL territory was when they then squished that for information that could have been presented in the initial news blurb. It would have been great if they took all of that and put it in a different window to present the same information again, just a little bit differently.

UPDATE: My wife and I were watching the news report on this, and as usual they repeated the same stuff over and over and over again. One of the key things that was mentioned by the reporter was that the brother of the little girl "didn't speak very good English." Might I request that before you remove the sliver in his eye, you take care of the mote in yours first? Proper English would be that he "didn't speak English very well."

Courting the Electorate

One of the best things ever is that my wife just became a state and county delegate in the Republican party. Since I'm one by virtue of my position, it means that we get to go to all the events (specifically the conventions and lunches) together now. On top of that, she's become very interested in the political process thanks to all the different things she's seen and helped me with, so now she can affect it. It's awesome.
Anyway, we were at a David Leavitt campaign event last week, and he continues to impress me. I like that he's running what I'll call an Obamaesque campaign - one that is taking the high road and could very well become a phenomenon among delegates. He's a very impressive speaker and has an impressive resume for a first time candidate. Of course, his Leavitt name (he's the brother of Mike Leavitt, former governor and current Secretary of Health and Human Services) doesn't hurt either. I really didn't think that I was going to change my support for Cannon and I'm still undecided. I probably won't end up making my decision until the convention, but it's now a much more difficult decision than it was. Last go-around we had a political opportunist who would jump at any open seat (Merrill Cook) and someone who, while probably a decent person, was a lousy candidate (John Jacob). Neither of them got me excited in the least. This campaign I actually have a choice to make. Do I keep Chris Cannon, who is a great person and I really like, but who is not very conciliatory and is quite partisan, or do I go to Leavitt, another great person and who is much more conciliatory? Right now it's up in the air, but I think that Leavitt might have won my wife over. We have yet to hear much from Jason Chaffetz, but his immigration stance and Huntsmanesque way of avoiding controversial opinions make me shy away.