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Richard Hanna was among about a half dozen candidates that were at the Lansing Harbor Festival two weeks ago.  Hanna is challenging U.S. Congressman Michael Arcuri for the second time.  Two years ago their race for Congress was reportedly the closest in the country.   Here is what he had to say about the race, issues, and what will be different in this year's campaign.

Lansing Star: Things are starting to heat up.  What's different this year?  How are you going to win it?

Richard Hanna:  Winning is not guaranteed.  But everybody has a strategy.  I'm not a career politician.  Strategy is something that I find an odd word, because it somehow implies almost a trickery.  I'm going to be myself.  I'm going to say what I think and I haven't changed my story. No matter who I'm in front of I want to be somebody that people can understand, can count on, who they can learn to believe in.  I think that the whole idea of politics being a strategic event over time is a perversion of what I would like it to be.  It's cynical.

LS: It does seem as if TV news stresses strategy over issues.

RH: It's as if everything can be managed.  I think as a population we've succumbed to that.  Strategy and messaging is important, but I'd like to think that being honest and straightforward, and being reliably and consistent is equally important.  If it isn't maybe I'll lose.  If it is I have a good chance.  Certainly we had the closest race in the country against an incumbent last time. 

I think people have seen my opponent vote on both sides of a number of issues that were important to a lot of people.  It's a fairly cynical way to vote.  People have a right to know where you stand.  I've been exactly in the same place -- since I started this two and a half years ago -- on all major issues.  It's not that I'm not willing to learn and change my mind and try to be thoughtful.  Like Keynes said, 'Give me more information and I'm happy to change my mind.'  My character is my character.  My wife and I joke that no matter what the outcome of this race, I'm going to live where I live and be the person I've been all my life, and hold my head high.  Winning is important, but it isn't everything.

LS: If you win what do you want to accomplish in your first year? 

RH: I think one of the problems that you see in Washington is that it looks like there are two parties at war with themselves, and that we don't matter any more.  The very single thing that most politicians are paid to do, which is fix our problems for the long term, don't get done.

I've become convinced that it's all about their careers.  It's about winning some battle that they win, but not us.  It's discouraging to watch.  My point is I want to be one of those people that people can say, 'I agree with him or I don't agree with him, but I believe him, and I know he's working for me.'  If I can do that and help create solutions, and have honest, open conversation -- I think that's accomplishing a lot.

I'd also like to be on the Agricultural Committee, because this district is such an agricultural district as is much of upstate New York.  There are a great many things that interest me.  I'm interested in creating an environment that survives over time.

LS: What about bringing money back to the state?  People talk about pork as though it's  bad, but it's not always bad.

RH: No, there's good pork and there's bad pork.  But I think generally it's a bad thing.  In this country it's a zero-sum game.  What I get comes from someplace.  When you look at some of the pork that's been dished out you realize it's not a competitive process.  It's about who's got the most power, who's in the right chairs, and who owes what to whom.  That's not what this country was founded on.

I think it should be competitive.  It should be based on merit.  And it should be limited.  And it should be budgeted.  Some of the earmarks we've seen in this very district -- which some people are going to like because it goes to them -- Mr. Arcuri has had a couple of million dollars that we know of going to not-for-profits that was ultimately funnelled to for-profit companies.  That's why we desperately need earmark transparency.  We don't have that.

We're not a country that's rich any more, in case anybody doesn't know that.  Each of us owes approximately $200,000 or so of unfunded future mandates.  We have squandered our parents' money, our money, and now we're working on our kids'.  It's immoral.

LS: Do you have a solution for that?

RH: Yeah.  It's a silly one because it's so obvious: if we don't learn to live within our means, circumstances will force us to.  It will be so Draconian and unpleasant for people that I think that they willl wonder how it came to that.  It comes from squandering your prosperity over time, taking your tax base for granted.  New York State punishing businesses... watching a place like Ithaca -- my sisters went to Cornell, and I have family here in Cayuga Heights, my sister lives in Groton -- you watch all these wonderful people being educated and the first thing they do when they're educated is leave the state..

We've got 20 universities and colleges in this district.  What a resource!  It's a resource that everybody else in the world would love to have and we haven't found a real good way to use it wisely.

LS: Taxes in this county are high, and taxes in most New York counties are high.

RH: New York State is a good example in a bad way of everything you can do to a once prosperous place.  To unwind that prosperity.  To cause young people to leave.  The economy to decline.  To over-tax and burden at every level: in fees, in regulations, in the cost-benefit of regulation that's not looked at.

It doesn't happen in a month or a year.  It happens because politicians are invested in keeping us happy, rather than telling us the truth.  They're invested in their careers and this silly two-year cycle that we have.  The recidivism rate of New York State politicians is something like 95%, yet everybody's unhappy.

We need more competition in government.  We need better people to step up.  We need people to understand that Thomas Jefferson was right.  You come from some bank of knowledge, some wisdom, some life experience.  You impart it and you go home some day.

This business of people building their entire lives in government doesn't make sense.  If you don't believe it look at the outcomes.


LS: It sounds as if you are saying that government is too big.

RH: Government is absolutely too big.

LS: How do you make it smaller?  Is it self-perpetuating?

RH: It is.  What government has developed is an entitlement attitude toward our money.  That somehow government is more important, more significant, more entitled, than our money.  That's a recipe that doesn't work over time, because ultimately 80% of the jobs created in this country are in small business.  70% of the economy is consumer spending.  So if you take money from one group and you put it into the government, by definition it can't survive over time that way.

Government is not efficient at spending our money.  I am.  I've had 450 employees in my life.  I started with nothing.  I built a great business with a good reputation.  My life's been a real success story.  But I'll tell you this:  I've got two young kids.  They're not going to survive and thrive like I did.  I lived in an opportunity environment.  We're living now in an entitlement environment, in a society that has created a number of things over time that are unsustainable.  We're going to recognize it one way or another.  I would prefer that big people step up and make tough choices, rather than go down that road to disaster because we can't grow our economy fast enough to support the things we want to pay for.

LS: If you get to Washington is that your plan, to cut government?

RH: Every way possible.  I mean, there's an appropriate level, but there are inefficiencies at every level.  It's not just that government is too big.  That's dogma.  I would say that you look at everything as if you were going to build it from scratch.  You think about it in those terms and find out what you really need and what you can afford.  Then you know what you have to build.

I love it up here.  I've done well in my life and I'm fortunate to be in a position to do this.  Incidentally I don't think I'm particularly special for doing this, or particularly well qualified over a lot of people I know.  I think I'm well qualified.  But more people need to get involved or we're going to wind up with more of what we have, and we're going to reach a point of no return.

LS: Are you enjoying the Harbor Festival?

RH: It's great.  Running for Congress has introduced me to my own community in a way that I never could have done before.  I've been down here with my sisters for different things, but now -- there are 11 counties and a hundred towns -- I go to these parades and festivals and you really get a sense of community.  Lansing's a small place, but there's a couple of thousand people here.  That's a big percentage of the population.  It shows you that there are people who want to be here.  They love their community and are looking for things to do on this great lake.  It's pleasant.  It makes me feel good to see.

LS: Are you meeting a lot of people?

RH: Yes. It's tough to walk up to people and say 'I'm Richard Hanna, I'm running for Congress.'  Frankly I wouldn't want someone to do that to me.  (laughs) Politicians are a nuisance!  But a lot of people are receptive.  I try to meet people who want to meet me, and I try to be shown around by somebody I know.  So yeah, it's fine.

LS: Is there anything else we should talk about today?

RH: Yes.  We did very badly in Ithaca last time, and I know why.  The Republican Party has focussed an awful lot on things that a place with Ithaca's reputation for being a socially more moderate place (wouldn't like).  I want people from Ithaca to understand that I'm a fiscal conservative.  I'm a business person.  I'm also a social moderate.

I'm a guy who is against abortion, but I'm also pro-choice.  I'm a guy who is out there on a whole bunch of social issues that make me atypical among some Republicans.  That isn't going to change.  I'm proud of the party I'm in.  We have three lines, three endorsements.  But I'm not a person who people can't vote for across party lines.  I'm a guy who is doing this for the right reasons and I'd like them to give me a fair shot and look at who I am over the guy they've got.

I'm a principled person, and I think there is a lot about my opponent's record that people can look at and be disappointed with.  It's not personal.  It's just that you can't be on both sides of every issue and say you stand for anything.

People can read what I write, and I write it all myself.  I don't take anything from Washington.  I read it and it tends to be angry.  I'm not an angry guy.  I just ask for a fair shot to represent this community, that's all.

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