For the last few months, Calitics has been part of the Ruckus Blog on Newsweek. This week we’re starting a question feature. The question this week asks who would be a bold pick for John McCain and Barack Obama as VP candidates. This being a California blog, I have some answers for that question.  I’m not going to say these would be good picks, but they will be bold.  McCain: Duncan “wildebeest” Hunter.  Barack Obama: Barbara Boxer.

Duncan Hunter: Let’s look at Duncan Hunter first. He’s a longtime congressman and first time presidential candidate this cycle.  The man is clearly insane, so much so that he wants to feed the Darfur refugees with wildebeest that he shoots himself.  And that’s not all. He wants to turn Santa Rosa Island into a hunting park for, well, anybody that carries enough political clout for him to get through. He tried veterans, then moved to disabled veterans. I’m pretty sure he’ll next say that Santa Rosa Island should be a wildebeest hunting refuge for the Darfur refugees next. Or something like that.

Hunter is a conservative’s conservative. He won’t help you carry California, but he will bring the NRA and a whole slew of gun enthusiasts to your side. He won’t bring the votes of military families that have been torn apart by the foolish war in Iraq, but he will bring you Pentagon contractors.  He’s real tight with them.  This is a certainly a bold pick.

Duncan Hunter: Conservative, Gun-toting, and Completely Insane. Now, that’s Bold.

Barbara Boxer: On the more serious side, Barbara Boxer would be a phenomenal choice to take the lower line of the Democratic ticket. She is enormously popular with the Democratic Wing of the Democratic Party (meaning us liberals), and would create an historic ticket. While I’m not sure that Boxer would make up for a Clinton loss, the Obama/Boxer ticket would break boundaries that should have been broken long ago.

Boxer has been fighting for California in the Senate since 1990 and has truly done a phenomenal job. Her leadership regarding climate change has been overshadowed by Al Gore, but has been critical to whatever movement there has been on the issue. She opposed the Iraq War, reinforcing Obama’s position.

She’s not on the short list, likely because she would be seen as “too liberal” or due to the fact that she’s from California, a state where Obama leads by 24 points.  That’s a shame. Yet, Boxer would be a truly visionary selection to usher in a new governance that could build a progressive majority for years to come.

Back in December, we wanted to know why Representative Duncan Hunter (CA-52) wanted to steal a national park and turn in back over to a private trophy hunting concession? Under intense pressure from Democrats and environmental groups, Hunter dropped his proposal to steal California’s Santa Rosa Island (part of the Channel Islands National Park) from the American people. This December raid was his second attempt to allow the private hunting concession to remain in charge of the island and exclude the public from the park.

Well, Hunter, who heads the Armed Services Committee, is back with a new proposal to insure that the public is excluded from the park that our tax dollars paid for, while hunting activities continue on the island. This time he is attaching the proposal to the Department of Defense authorization bill. A bit of an earmark for the trophy hunting concession on the island.

Last year, Hunter wanted to annex the island completely and turn its operation over to the Department of the Navy. The commercial hunting business would be allowed to remain, but provisions would be made for the military and disabled veterans to use the island’s facilities for hunting. Why the military and disabled veterans couldn’t be allowed to use any of the millions of acres of public land already under government management is unclear. Or, why these same military hunters couldn’t be accommodated on the other millions of acres of land under the control of the Department of Defense was equally unclear.

Hunter wants Santa Rosa Island and he wants the commercial business on that island to continue. His latest proposal leaves the island under the control of the Department of the Interior, but it abrogates the original agreement between the island’s previous owners and commercial hunting concessionaire that would end the hunting operation in 2011.

In effect, Hunter’s new proposal turns the island into a private hunting preserve under government sponsorship. In this case the general public would be excluded from the island for safety reasons, while trophy hunters would be free to use the facilities. Military hunters, disabled veterans and members of congress would also have access to the hunter facilities.

Once again, Democrats, enviromentalist and the National Park Service are trying to stop Hunter’s land grab.

Hunter’s proposal angered Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Rep. Lois Capps (D-Santa Barbara), whose district includes Santa Rosa Island. Capps’ aides distributed the bill language to reporters Monday.

  “This is Chairman Hunter’s third attempt in less than a year to exclude the public from accessing the national park that they paid $30 million for. The issue of Santa Rosa Island has no place in the defense authorization bill,” Capps said.

  “I am firmly opposed to this unilateral effort and will join hands with Republicans, Democrats and environmentalists to ensure the island is not turned into a private reserve,” Feinstein said.

  […]

  “Saying it is more important to have an opportunity to hunt a trophy animal that doesn’t even belong on the island than to protect the other species in the park, to me that’s what’s fairly disturbing about this,” said Russell Galipeau, the park superintendent.

Why is Hunter obsessed with this project? With so many other alternatives, why does Hunter persist in trying to steal a national park from U.S. taxpayers and give to back to a commercial trophy hunting operation?