Senate candidate faults major parties

Declaring he refuses to compromise on the Constitution and would legislate by that document and by principle, retired Col. Rob Maness passed through Morgan City Friday in his statewide canvass for votes to send him to Washington as senator.
“We need to make sure the government is doing what it is supposed to do and nothing more … and not wasting our tax dollars,” Maness declared. “I respect both my opponents (U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-New Orleans, and U.S. Rep. Bill Cassidy, R-Baton Rouge) and their service to the voters, but we need a change. Democrats and Republicans have not gotten the job done,” Maness said as he discussed his status as a non-politician.
Maness cited a poll done by his campaign that showed 63 percent of Louisiana’s likely voters want a non-politician, an outsider, as senator. He said he has not run for office before and is beholden to no party establishment or special interest and offers himself as “the option, not a career politician.”
Compromise is not always the way to accomplish things, according to Maness.
“I have made an oath to protect the Constitution,” Maness said of his military career. That same oath would guide him as an elected official, he said. “Sometimes not getting things done is the right thing to do. Our government is organized that way.”
Maness has been a Republican since he was 19 and cast his first vote for Ronald Reagan for President, he said. He claims he is seeking the support of not just Republicans, but Democrats and independents as well.
While running a grassroots campaign, Maness does not consider himself an underdog. He said he has put 50,000 miles on his Ford truck in the past year and has raised about a million dollars.
“I was endorsed by Sarah Palin last week. That is the biggest endorsement a conservative can get,” Maness declared. He said he identifies with the ideas of the tea party groups he has become familiar with.
Maness did not identify any state elected officials who have endorsed him, but said many support him. He said he has built an organization of 300 volunteers in the state over the past year and 1,000 volunteers nationwide. He explained the large segment of out-of-state volunteers is because of a social media following attracted to his message.
Running as a conservative, Maness challenges Cassidy’s voting record and said that record does not look conservative. Most Republicans who meet him and listen to what he says, decide they will support him over Cassidy whose website claims the endorsement of 17 state legislators, he said.
The first thing he would do as senator is “pull up Obamacare by the roots,” he said. He claims the enactment of the Affordable Care Act, most of which took effect in January, “is hurting the 40-hour workweek” and has “broken a system that was working for 85 percent of the people.” Maness said free-market concepts need to be utilized for the 15 percent for whom he said the system was not working.
The No. 1 issue for voters is the economy, Maness said. Figures released last week by the U.S. Department of Labor showed unemployment claims reached the lowest level in nearly seven years. Initial claims for state unemployment benefits dropped 32,000 to a seasonally adjusted 300,000, the lowest level since May 2007, before the 2007-09 recession.
He said he and others “disagree with the numbers.” In any case, “we have a long ways to go.”
On taxes, Maness said the country needs a “flatter and fairer tax reform that will enable us to abolish the IRS.”
After retiring from the military three years ago, Maness, a Madisonville native, went to work in the private sector briefly before deciding on making a run for the senate seat now occupied by Landrieu. He said his wife, who is from Indiana and who he met while in the armed forces, and their five children are all excited about his candidacy.