( Matt Ortega )

Several Republican candidates will meet in Manteca on January 11 to debate their candidacies for the GOP nomination to take on sophomore House Rep. Jerry McNerney.

Candidates Tony Amador, Robert Beadles, Elizabeth Emken, Brad Goehring, Larry Pegram and Jeff Takada are expected to attend. They are running for the seat held by Rep. Jerry McNerney, D-Pleasanton.

Let’s take a look at the candidates:

De facto front-runner Brad Goehring, a self-financier described as a “Pombo-lite,” may have to answer for comments he made boasting his use of undocumented labor in his business. With Jon Del Arroz out of the race due to his son’s health, Goehring dwarfs the competition in the money race.

Perhaps the most interesting aspect to watch for is if Tony Amador, known as the “lazy candidate” of the bunch, even shows up at all. His Twitter account has been dormant for almost two months. The last tweet is regards his announcement to run. The Flickr account’s most recent photos are from September 17. His participation in the debate is news unto itself. Should Amador show up at all, will the settlement of a 1993 sexual harassment suit become an issue?

Robert Beadles, a small businessman from the Central Valley, is a man of many contradictions. Much to his credit, Beadles created a successful small business after a tough life struggling to get by. It is an admirable story and Beadles makes it the backbone of his candidacy. But that’s when the message goes off the rails and he goes Craig T. Nelson. Excerpt from his biography:

I am not your typical candidate.  I don’t have a doctorate degree, my parents did not graduate from some ivy league school, nor were they ever ambassadors to some foreign country.  What I do have, I have built and earned on my own.

My family and I have pulled ourselves up from the bootstraps, and we are now living the American Dream.  I pride myself on doing what is right and just, because at the end of the day, we all have to face our accomplishment and our failures. [emphasis added]

Just a few short paragraphs prior, Beadles notes that he depended on welfare, food stamps and Medi-Cal.

Like many young families, we struggled to make ends meet.  I swallowed my pride and did what was necessary to support my family.  We depended on food stamps, welfare, and Medi-Cal and I worked several jobs. [emphasis added]

To be certain, there is no shame in seeking and accepting government assistance when it is necessary but Beadles wants to fashion himself in the mold of a Tea Party ideal that is not true. Beadles created a successful small business, nobody can take that away from him. But this “bootstraps” is misleading rhetoric used for political reasons. (Update: A reader points to the lone item posted under “welfare” on the Beadles website, which is an article from the Washington Times that decries the “welfare-state” so add “hypocrite” to his list of accomplishments.)

Here’s hoping Elizabeth Emken shows up with something a little more fleshed out than what’s her campaign has done already.

A thing to watch for with Larry Pegram is what, if any, role his involvement in the Values Advocacy Council play in the debate. Pegram strikes me as too much of an evangelical conservative. That read will be tested at the debate. Since Pegram is moving into the district, maybe he’s brushed up on the recent history and learned that McNerney was first elected in 2006, not 2008.

Jeff Takada, a Manteca high school teacher, is a phantom candidate that only exists on paper thus far. He has generated no news other than his involvement in the debate and no known web presence. (Update: A representative with the Takada campaign contacted me over the holidays to say that their website is now up.)

Tags: Brad Goehring, CA-11, Elizabeth Emken, Jeff Takada, Larry Pegram, Robert Beadles, Tony Amador