We have a meeting this afternoon to talk about rural strategy. I see our (R) legislators manipulating rural voters by saying that the urban areas want to control them, tax them, who knows what else. They're selling fear. All three of our legislators live in the small towns in the 18th: Ridgefield, Woodland and Kalama, so the urban/suburban areas of the 18th have no representation. Meanwhile the legislators complain that the Clark County Commissioners are controlled by Vancouver so there is no rural representation in the county.

I don't understand rural areas -- but this is by design. My mother grew up in a small town in northern Minnesota and couldn't leave fast enough. She even found a way to finish high school in a larger town. Her mother stayed and ended up being a gossip item because in her nineties she was dating a man twenty years younger than she was. (Way to go, Gram!) When my parents were just starting out, my dad managed dam construction projects. But after six or seven years of moving to one gigantic rural construction project after another, they decided that they wanted the benefits of an urban area with a nice climate. I barely remember the long ride across America in the back seat of our Buick, moving to Portland.

I know there's a lot of agriculture in our Legislative District. Clark County has $54 million a year in agricultural products {broilers, raspberries and strawberries}. We're ranked 21st in 39 counties. If you account for area, we're a lot higher, since we're a small county. We also have over $200 million in food processing here, or over 1280 full-time equivalent jobs for a ranking of 8th in 39 counties, so that a very positive inpact from our rural areas around the state.

We're told that rural voters are practical, fiercely independent people who are afraid of how fast the world is changing. The Republicans are offering a vision of "Father Knows Best" 1950's mind-set that helps them feel safer. (Of course, the Republicans are trying to reinforce the fear as well. I remember looking at a poll before the election that showed that people in red states and red counties were the most afraid of terrorists -- and yet it's the people in the urban areas who actually deal with the threat.) The Democrats don't have a vision right now that appeals to rural voters, and if voters can't imagine a good outcome for themselves in a Democratic world, they won't vote for it. So where's our rural vision?