Utah’s other idiot pol named Chris, Rep. Cannon of that ilk, shoots his mouth off over his dreams of chairing a committee in Congress and bein’ all ‘portant and stuff. He has a mathematically possible chance and a practically impossible chance: a whole bunch of senior Republicans have decided to retire (or euphemism of choice) off of committees he’s on, but the Democrats would have to lose their majority for him to be anything other than “ranking Republican” on them. Or, “rank Republican” if you prefer.
He paints a rosy picture indeed of how wonderful it would be for him to chair a committee someday, like maybe Oversight/Govt Reform or Natural Resources. Just by sitting like a lump on a log, he automagically gains all kinds of seniority juju this fall…Â that is, if he can get re-elected. And in a heavily Republican state like Utah, an incumbent never faces challengers from within his own party, it’s simply not done.
Okay, almost never.
Salt Lake Tribune – Cannon growing old in D.C.
Before any of this matters, Cannon must secure his seventh term in office.He faces three intra-party challengers, who will try to unseat him at the state Republican convention.
So far, Utah’s other representatives, Republican Rob Bishop and Democrat Jim Matheson, remain unchallenged.
THREE challengers. This is a sign that the electorate is not happy with Cannon, and/or that several different factions of the Utah GOP’s coalition of business/mining/energy/social conservative interests think their guy might do better against whatever Democrat is running.
Utah would probably do better to lose the loose Cannon, IMHO. He doesn’t have a terribly distinguished career, he’s linked to David Safavian, the family lobbying business run by brother Joe is a little too cozy with him, and he was on last year’s CREW watchlist .
If his dreams come true, that’s one Top Ten list he’ll make in the future.