In their recent televised debates for Northern Nevada's vacant congressional seat, former state Sen. Mark Amodei and state Treasurer Kate Marshall looked and sounded like candidates for eighth-grade class president at Carson Middle School.
I think Amodei "won" the debates - if that's what they were - because he came across as a likeable kid whose mommy loves him, while Marshall sounded like the prissy class scold, attacking Amodei incessantly in a shrill and frequently irritating tone of voice. Both of them stuck to their pre-scripted talking points, but Amodei was much more comfortable in front of the cameras.
Amodei's handlers evidently told him to sound moderate and reasonable, as he did, while Marshall's apparently advised her to attack her opponent at every opportunity, ending each verbal blast with a tight little smile and an oddly inappropriate "thank you." Since no Democrat has ever been elected to Congress from Northern Nevada, it's no surprise that she entered this race as the underdog. If better-qualified candidates like Spike Wilson and Jill Derby couldn't win this seat, Marshall faces even longer odds against the popular Amodei, a Carson City Republican.
Like all GOP candidates, Amodei must navigate a politically tricky course between moderate Republicans and radical right Tea Partiers. That's why he criticized the recent congressional debt deal while promising to protect costly federal entitlement programs like Medicare and Social Security, which pleased his mommy and other senior voters.
For her part, Marshall argued that Amodei voted for a big tax increase when he was in the Legislature, and that he wants to do away with Medicare and Social Security.
I don't think most independent voters (myself included) will be buying the "Republicans want to starve Grandma and Grandpa" argument in next year's national election, so Democrats should draft a new playbook if they want to retain the presidency in 2012.
I was pleased when Amodei disavowed the dreary TV ads being run by the Republican Congressional Committee, which treat Nevada voters like complete fools. The Washington-based "experts" should be ignored, however, because most of them can't even pronounce the name of our state. The ads repeat ad nauseum the provable fact that Marshall is "in charge of our money." So what? She's managed our money - state funds, that is - quite well, and last year she sent me some of those mysterious unclaimed-property funds, so I think she's a pretty good money manager.
As for the other two candidates in the congressional race - Independent American Tim Fasano and independent Helm Lehmann - the less said, the better. They didn't belong on the same stage with Amodei and Marshall, and I felt sorry for the long-winded Lehmann, who was cut off repeatedly by debate moderators for exceeding the time limit. If Amodei and Marshall were running for eighth-grade class president, Fasano and Lehmann were still in grade school.
Mercifully, the campaign is almost over, as early voting is already under way. I'll see you at the polls.
• Guy W. Farmer has been a Carson City voter since 1962.
