Mapes' Mild Digs at Allen Alley

The Oregonian's Jeff Mapes notes that new Oregon Republican chair Allen Alley called Mitch Daniels "my governor" in his recent address to Oregon Republican party leaders.

In a mild dig at Alley's preference for Daniels rather than Kitzhaber, Mapes compares Oregon with Indiana in terms of the central issue in both states: jobs, jobs, jobs.

"Just for fun, I looked at how Oregon and Indiana have done over the last year when it comes to the No. 1 issue: jobs.

"From November, 2009 to November, 2010 (the latest numbers I could find at the Bureau of Labor Statistics), Indiana's unemployment rate has stayed about flat at 9.8 percent. So has Oregon, although at a higher rate of 10.6 percent.

"But Oregon has had a much larger growth in the overall labor force over the last year - whether through in-migration or more people starting to look for jobs.

"And both states have had almost an identical increase in job growth over the last year, of about 1 percent. Turns out, the two states have something in common."

An indirect dig was posting the video of Daniels' 2011 State of the State speech. Content is good, but it's a snoozer. I wonder how many who clicked on it stayed to the finish. This is an area Daniels needs to work on to be a stronger player on the national scene. However, Daniels has the hard part down: policy wisdom.

Just for fun, here's a link to the video of Kitzhaber's inaugural address (starting near the 1:03:00 mark).