Political notebook: Mitchell airs TV commercial despite lack of opposition

Although Democrat U.S. Rep. Harry Mitchell has no opposition in the primary election Tuesday, he began airing the first television commercial of his re-election campaign last week.

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The timing wasn’t exactly haphazard.

The Democratic National Convention got plenty of TV coverage last week and the Republican National Convention will get just as much this week.

“I think people’s attention now is focused on politics, because of the conventions. So it’s just a good time to do it, because of the political atmosphere,” Mitchell said.

The 30-second commercial titled “War Doesn’t Leave You” spotlights Mitchell’s work on veterans’ issues during his first term in office.

The spot is intended to play across party lines. Careful observers will note that it doesn’t mention Mitchell’s party affiliation. Arizona’s 5th Congressional District leans Republican, but it also has 65,000 veterans among its 327,000 voters.

The district takes in Scottsdale, Tempe, Ahwatukee Foothills, Fountain Hills and west Mesa.

OGSBURY RECOUNTS STORIES

U.S. House candidate Jim Ogsbury said he’s knocked on the doors of 26,000 Republican voters in the 5th Congressional District since entering the six-way GOP primary.

During that time, he’s had enough memorable moments to fill a book, he said. Here’s one…

On a particular day in Scottsdale, he was having an awful time of it. It was hot. Most voters weren’t home. Others weren’t answering the door. A few gave him a rough time.

Finally, an older resident invited him to step inside and out of the heat. After a few minutes, the old man told Ogsbury that he reminded him of a politician from his home state of Massachusetts.

“Just like you, he was going door to door, talking to voters,” Ogsbury recounted the old man telling him.

“He had been around the block a time or two. He went to this one house and started to introduce himself and this lady says, ‘Yeah, I know who you are, you SOB! You get off my property right now or I’ll sic the dog on you! If my husband were here, he’d punch you in the nose!’” Ogsbury remembered the man telling him.

“So that old pol goes back to his car and turns to his aide and says, ‘Put her down as undecided.’”

That old pol was neither the Scottsdale resident who told the story nor anybody famous; just somebody trying to get into office. Still, Ogsbury likes the story so much, he’s worked it into his stump speeches.

Here’s another story from the campaign trail…

In Ahwatukee Foothills, Ogsbury knocked on another door.

“I could hear this little girl, the pitter-patter of little feet,” Ogsbury said. “I hear her call out from the other side of the closed door, ‘Oh no Mommy! It’s just an old bald man in a suit!’”

Ogsbury laughed at the memory. “You learn how humbling retail politics is,” he said.

That door-to-door business also is somewhat dangerous.

Presidential candidate John McCain, who often jokes that he has more scars than Frankenstein’s monster, attributes his bouts with skin cancer in part to his first couple of campaigns in Arizona, going door to door in some of the same areas that are now a part of the 5th District.

Ogsbury usually has worn long pants and polo shirts – rather than suits – for campaigning, but he hasn’t worn hats to cover his old bald head.

“I am a little concerned about that. I use my clipboard and my brochures to try to shield my head as I go door to door, and I just slather on the sunscreen,” he said.

In any event, the campaign will end for five of the Republican challengers Tuesday. The winner will advance to the Nov. 4 general election against Mitchell.

ARIZONA DEMOCRATS TOUT SEATS

Initially, members of Arizona’s contingent at the Democratic National Convention were miffed with their seating at the Pepsi Center in Denver last week, according to conventioneer Kit Filbey, a Mesa business owner.

The Arizonans didn’t get choice floor seats and instead found themselves in the stands at the furthest point from the stage.

As they soon discovered though, their seats were just below and in front of the luxury suits that had been assigned to presidential candidate Barack Obama and vice presidential candidate Joe Biden and their families.

“It’s really exciting,” Filbey said. “This has been for the Arizona delegation, I think, one of the most – and for me, I would say, the most – exciting part of the convention. We feel like really part of it.”

The Arizona Dems were able to watch the comings and goings of political VIPs such as former President Jimmy Carter, and even chatted up some of them.

Filbey, for instance, offered her congratulations to Michelle Obama just after her speech early in the week. Others spoke to Biden.

“This is the most exciting part of the whole arena there, because that’s where all the dignitaries come,” Filbey said. “It is so much fun to feel that we are right with the Obamas and Bidens.”

The lone drawback was that news photographers also discovered the advantages of the location, crowding the walkways, she said.

PHOENIX FOLKS SPY BIDEN

Phoenix residents and Democratic delegates Howard and Lisa Bell also spotted a number of political VIPs while in Denver. The most surprising, though, came during a bus ride.

“We were on the bus going to our next event and we saw this big throng of people outside of a little pulled-pork barbeque stand, which is in the middle of this little park,” Howard Bell said.

About 400 or more convention attendees, reporters and other people clustered around someone in the center of the crowd, he said.

“We were thinking, ‘Who’s that over there?’ As we were passing, we just saw the top of his head, but there was no mistaking the top of Joe Biden’s head,” Bell said. “We said, ‘Stop the tram!’ and everybody jumped off.”

Secret Service agents kept well-wishers at a distance, but the white-and-wispy haired vice presidential candidate worked the crowd, so Bell was able to snap a few photos of him.

“That was an interesting day for us,” Bell said