{"id":6180,"date":"2010-01-15T22:46:21","date_gmt":"2010-01-16T03:46:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/?p=6180"},"modified":"2010-01-15T22:46:21","modified_gmt":"2010-01-16T03:46:21","slug":"mcpadden-steps-out-of-the-clown-car-and-into-contention","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2010\/01\/15\/mcpadden-steps-out-of-the-clown-car-and-into-contention\/","title":{"rendered":"McPadden steps out of the clown car and into contention"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mike McPadden (Republican candidate for the 5th District nomination) was in Danville on Friday night. Gotta admit, I was pleasantly surprised at his professionalism and knowledge.<\/p>\n

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I’ve used the phrase “clown car candidates” to describe the challengers for the Republican nomination because only one or two have done anything to stand out and get any sort of name recognition. Mike McPadden was in that group until I listened to him talk about his ideas and his positions on issues.<\/p>\n

When I attempt to personally elevate candidates out of the quagmire that is the current candidate field, I ask one question… “Is this person someone who I could vote for in the general election?”. After listening to McPadden tonight, my answer is “Yes.” Just to make it clear, this is not an endorsement of McPadden over the other candidates, just an opinion piece saying that my impression of him has taken a significant uptick.<\/p>\n

McPadden’s support for the FairTax is quite refreshing, as was his honest admission that “there’s no way to educate everybody about the FairTax” (meaning that people will have to learn about it for themselves). McPadden sees nuclear power as an important piece of the energy independence pie and that makes a lot of sense. I found his concept of “If a company has already built a nuclear power plant on a site, why does the government need to do a 2 to 3 year study if they want to build another one right beside it?”<\/p>\n

You can look at Mike McPadden’s website<\/a> and see his stand on these and other issues.<\/p>\n

Other thoughts on tonight’s event…<\/p>\n