Pombo v. McNerney

Could the Tracy Republican go down in flames? Yes indeed, he certainly could. With Election Day fast approaching, challenger Jerry McNerney is giving our least favorite legislator a run for his money. Grist's muckraker-in-residence, Amanda Griscom Little, gives the lowdown on the race. As she reports, it's not just enviros who are rallying behind the newcomer and gunning for the incumbent. The local papers have turned on Pombo too:

The local media is overwhelmingly endorsing the neophyte Democrat and sparing little subtlety in editorials skewering Pombo. Wrote The Modesto Bee, a newspaper that has endorsed Pombo in previous campaigns, "If you prefer the politics of extremes; if you're OK with selling off national parks; if backroom dealmaking and tainted money suit you; if you embrace out-of-balance budgets and the concentration of wealth -- Pombo's your man. But he's no longer ours."

The San Jose Mercury News blasted Pombo as "a national disgrace to the Republican Party," and The Sacramento Bee, which has also supported Pombo in the past, condemned the incumbent's "dubious list of financial supporters -- development interests, Indian gaming tribes, oil companies, foreign mining concerns, and some of the most corrupt people in Washington, D.C. To earn that support, Pombo has embraced potentially disastrous environmental policies."