SEDONA AZ–“My most important issue is the seizure of the political dialogue by the far right wing that is dominating all of Arizona,” said Randy Parraz, Democratic candidate for the Arizona U.S. Senate seat. “We need a stronger more progressive candidate to take on John McCain and J.D. Hayworth. SB 1070 did not provide any solution to the issues that we are dealing with. This is the time to make change and bring people together. The rhetoric on the far right was dividing people. The cuts in so many areas, like, education, preschool, housing, represent a shift in values that I thought didn’t represent Arizona. Most of the candidates will say or do anything just for their own political interest.”
Parraz thinks the big topic should be job creation. He wants to begin a new conversation with industry and business and to focus efforts on those areas where Arizona is naturally strong, like tourism. He doesn’t agree with just creating temporary jobs that will disappear when the stimulus money is gone, but wants to see real productive jobs grow within the state.
A Senator doesn’t have the power to create those real productive jobs, but he or she does have the power to map out a vision and bring parties to the table, to establish policies that would benefit job growth. But the leadership has to come first and too many politicians are just interested in polls saying what is popular in polls isn’t leadership by Parraz’ definition.
He regards renewable energy as important, an area where Arizona could really excel. The town of Surprise Arizona has plans in development for a solar plant, its construction phase expected to generate about 2,000 jobs and when operational, about 8,500 jobs. Parraz would like to see more thought given to solar such as commercial buildings which tend to have flat roofs, “Why not put solar panels on those roofs rather than in the desert? ” Parraz said, “After all, the commercial buildings are already tied into the energy grid, so it is more efficient.”
The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are a huge issue. “Who are we really fighting? Parraz asked. “If it is Al Queda because some of the people are trained there, does it make sense to go to war with an entire country? After all, the training camps will just move. And Afghanistan is a tribal country, it is not centralized like a modern nation.” He points out that fighting a war over there with tactics designed for nation states just won’t work. After a trillion dollars, it is time to rein it in.
“This doesn’t mean we stop fighting terrorism,” he explained. “It just means that we won’t fight it with the military doing three or five tours of duty and hundreds of thousands of troops on the ground.”
“The most important issue is job creation,” Parraz finished, “What kind of economy do we need to be competitive as a state? And we need to bring civility back to politics. Going after Latinos, minorities, unions, it never ends. Bring it back to civility. All this talk about immigration, it is just fear mongering and diversion from the real issue.”
For more information go to http://parrazforchange.com
Article by Joni Dahlstrom, sedonaeye.com Staff Writer JoniD@eSedona.net Sedona Times Publishing Election Central 2010c
