Ames Progressive

Selden Spencer is a Democrat and neurologist from Huxley who practices at Ames’ McFarland Clinic. In 2006, he challenged 4th district Republican Representative Tom Latham, receiving 43 percent of the vote. He decided not to run again this year over concerns that he would be unable to run a competitive race.

Spencer first spoke with the Progressive about the 4th district race for the February issue in late January.

On the primary and general election…

My main interest is the general election. I’m not terribly interested in the primary. Obviously the primary is a big hurdle for the candidates to deal with, and I think we’ve got very good candidates that are trying to get that problem solved.

My interest is real local. I want to try to do what I can in the south part of Story County, which I’m interested to see what we can do with better organization and better effort in the general election in November.

On rumors he’s endorsing a candidate for the primary…

I think there was an early effort to have me send out a letter endorsing Becky or endorsing Kurt, and I just let them know that I wasn’t going to do that. Now, I’ve been very happy to visit with any candidate, encourage them and give them my two cents worth, but they’ve been having questions to do that.

But that’s not a role I want to play. I think that that’s something that’s got to work itself out with the electorate.

Becky asked for a contribution and I gave her a contribution. Kurt has asked me for a contribution and I gave him a contribution. I have not really been solicited by Kevin Miskell or William Meyers, but I certainly visited with both of them.

I think that you’re probably right to say gee, it looks like he’s endorsing this candidate or that candidate, but I’m pretty supportive of all candidates right now, and if they ask for help or money I want to try to respond.

Kurt and Becky asked for some feedback as to how they were doing. This was from the 4th district convention, on those speeches and that type of thing, so that’s what I did, gave them my reaction. Then as far as Kevin, I’ve known Kevin for awhile and we just kind of passed comments back and forth. And William likewise, but I haven’t met [with] him as long. But all of them are trying to feel their way along. I try to give them encouragement.

I think they all represent unique characteristics. You’re never going to get one person having everything, so they all have unique skills and features that might be very effective in the November election.

On the Democrats’ prospects against Tom Latham in the fall…

This is based on some experience, which is you never expect anything. My view is that people can give you a lot of verbal, say, oh yeah, this is really an important race, we’re really going to target this, and we’ll see what things look like come September.

I think that there is promise, mainly by virtue of what Culver and Harkin have been able to do in this district in the past. But incumbency is an incredibly powerful feature, and even though we may be facing financial calamity and environmental energy calamity and military exhaustion, people will still rally to the incumbent for some reason or another.

It’s not easy. The only way a congressperson is going to lose is if, first, there is a scandal, or second, they’re just lazy, they don’t care. And at this point Latham, in my observation, has been skillful. He has kind of allied himself with the nurses and shown himself to be a champion of nurses. He has been raising money.

I think that it will be a challenge to overcome, and I think that we are fooling ourselves if we think that we can win in the 4th district just because there seem to be a lot of people registering in the Democratic Party and that things are not going well in the country.

But maybe I’m a pessimist, what can I say.

On voters’ sentiments and “change”…

I just don’t want to overplay that card [change]. I think that just breeds complacency, if you say, oh, well, everybody wants change, we’re going to get change. It’s going to take a ton of work to make a change happen, and I’ve kind of carved out my little part of the world to try and make that happen.

And, you know, it depends on what happens come November. A war with Iran and we’re feeling put upon, people will do strange things. They’ll always vote to support the military, I believe. It takes a great deal to part from that, and rightly so. Your sons and daughters are at war, you want to support them.

So there are a lot of variables, so we’ll see, we’ll just have to see. But on the face of it, the increased numbers of registrations, the problems we are facing in this country economically and towards energy and environment and a lot of these issues, would seem to position our Demcratic candidate in a very good place. I’m hopeful that will be the case, and I certainly will work to make sure that happens.

On his role for the general election…

Tom Harrington and Marsha Thompson are heading up the election organization and I hope to be their lieutenant in south Story County.

I’m still working full time, so it’s one of those things that you do what you can do on the side, and that would entail, hopefully, meeting precinct campaign after precinct captain and trying to spread out a grassroots organization in the towns of south Story County to Cambridge, Slater, Maxwell, Collins, Huxley. Let’s try to do a better job there, because there are a lot of voters there.

It kind of feels like the world revolves around Ames, and I don’t mean to be dismissive about that, but we need to pay attention to Nevada, Story City, south Story County. There are a lot of voters there.

On whether he’s really not endorsing anyone…

Your confusion is same as everybody else. I’m not endorsing anybody. People have asked me directly about what I think, and I’ll tell them about each one of them and try not to say anything negative about any of them and let them make their own decision.

I will vote in the primary, and I will vote for who I think is the best candidate. And that will be between me and the ballot, I think.