If we were a betting Editorial Board, we could have profited handsomely from the more than dozen major Oregon newspapers, including The Oregonian, that placed their bets on Republican Gubernatorial Candidate Ron Saxton.
Incumbent Ted Kulongoski won with 51 percent compared to Saxton’s nearly 43 percent, and while this was not as close as pre-election polls indicated, Kulongoski’s victory was far from dominant.
After winning, Kulongoski said that “Oregonians gave us a vote of confidence that I will never forget and I will never take for granted,” and we hope that he will stay true to this promise.
During his first term as Governor, Kulongoski’s popularity steadily declined, with critics claiming that he was ineffectual, citing Oregon’s major shortcomings – its quality of education and health care, and its lack of a “rainy-day” fund.
Currently, Oregon’s school funding is 5 percent below the national average. Kulongoski’s Education Enterprise plans to increase this to 10 percent more than the national average. The plan also intends to restructure the Oregon Opportunity Grant to nearly double the current $78 million investment, increasing access to higher education.
In addition to these lofty education goals, Kulongoski is also planning on improving access to health care, with both short and long-term strategies.
The short-term plan is to enact his Healthy Kids Plan to ensure affordable health insurance to the more than 117,000 Oregon children with no coverage. He has also advocated expanding coverage to Oregon’s lowest-income residents by asking the Oregon Health Plan to reevaluate its approach to health care through the more cost-effective method of applying resources to preventative measures.
Kulongoski has further pushed for prevention by restoring funding to Oregon’s tobacco-prevention programs and by increasing taxes on tobacco in addition to plans for combating childhood obesity.
With labor costs representing almost 80 percent of health care costs, Kulongoski has also pledged to work on ways to train and retain skilled health workers through the Governor’s Health Care Workforce Initiative.
Oregon’s lack of a rainy-day fund was high on many people’s list of complaints. Kulongoski has advocated reforming the corporate “kicker” law to invest in such a fund, a stance we applaud. According to the Oregon Center for Public Policy, the current law is projected to cost the state $205.4 million in tax credits for 2007, with 86 percent of that going to multistate firms.
The goals are certainly admirable, as most politicians’ are, and it remains to be seen how much Kulongoski actually accomplishes in his second term. When he took the helm for his first term, Oregon was in a deep recession and Kulongoski has led Oregon out.
However, for a Republican candidate who was so inexperienced in the political arena to put up such a good fight further confirms Kulongoski’s relatively low approval among Oregonians. Kulongoski must stay true to his promise of not taking his second term for granted and follow through with his extremely optimistic plans.
It took a slew of Republican scandals for the Democrats to regain control in the country and our newly-elected leaders must all work diligently to ensure that this victory is not short-lived. And despite the fact that Kulongoski won as an incumbent, he must work just as hard, if not harder, to prove to Oregon that 51 percent of its voters made the correct choice in giving him another term.
Kulongoski must prove he deserved to be elected
Daily Emerald
November 8, 2006
0
More to Discover