DeVore rephrases ballot statement

Alicia Robinson

Anyone who’s been following the 70th Assembly District race might

notice a major change to Chuck DeVore’s ballot designation, courtesy

of Secretary of State Kevin Shelley’s office.

DeVore, a Republican candidate for the 70th Assembly District seat

being vacated by Assemblyman John Campbell, listed himself in

candidate filings as a businessman/Army major. Shelley’s office has

been investigating whether the latter designation can be

appropriately claimed by DeVore, who is a major in the U.S. Army

National Guard.

Since receiving a letter from Shelley’s office about the issue on

Friday, DeVore has been fighting to keep his original designation,

but he said Wednesday that he’ll be listed as businessman/military

officer.

“We finally gave up in our fight with the Secretary of State’s

office because they basically ran the clock out on us,” he said.

He could have tried to continue the battle in court but would have

risked getting no ballot designation at all because of an approaching

deadline for getting the information to county registrars of voters,

he said.

DeVore said he is actively serving in the National Guard, spending

at least two or three days a month in uniform, and he makes more than

$10,000 a year as a military officer.

Earlier this week, DeVore said he understood the reason for the

check-up, which he said was initiated by Shelley’s office as a

routine review rather than by one of his opponents.

“They want to make sure that anyone who’s using it is genuinely

deserving of the title because they believe it is going to move

voters,” he said.

Cox visits abroad

focus on terrorism

Rep. Chris Cox returned last week from a trip to Europe and the

Middle East, where he and members of the Homeland Security Committee

he chairs visited heads of state to discuss efforts to fight

terrorism in the U.S. and abroad.

In Syria, the U.S. envoys stressed to President Bashar al-Assad

their concerns about terrorist groups operating in that country, Cox

said.

The news of Saddam Hussein’s capture broke while Cox was meeting

with the U.S. ambassador to Israel. Another significant event during

the trip was the capture of the bomb maker involved in the November

bombings in Istanbul.

“In Spain, Italy, Israel and Turkey, we had the opportunity to

heartily congratulate our friends and allies for their cooperation in

the war on terror. ... It was an extremely useful trip,” Cox said.

Look to a past election

to see the future

There’s a familiar name in the race for the House of

Representatives seat now held by Rep. Chris Cox: Democrat John

Graham.

The UC Irvine Graduate School of Management professor has tried to

unseat Cox before, and he was among the earliest candidates to set up

a Web site with a comparison between him and his opponent -- he was

on that bandwagon way before America came to know the name Howard

Dean.

Trouble is, Graham’s site still says that he’s running in 2002.

Emphasizing “China and xenophobia” may also be an old issue.

“Once again, the Republican politicians, with Christopher Cox as

the point man, are using Americans’ xenophobia (fear of foreigners)

to create a divisive ‘wedge issue.’ Since the end of the Vietnam War,

America’s bogeymen have been, in order, OPEC and the Arabs, the USSR,

Japan, Mexico and immigration, and now China,” Graham’s site reads.

Possibly Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein could be added to that list

now.