Hartline, WA—”Hello Waterville-Mansfield-Almira-Coulee-Hartline Nation!” yelled a hoarse Brinkhater to the North Central Washington Senior Bridge Club convention at Almira-Coulee-Hartline High school.
“You know, when we announced our candidacy last week, I told you that help was on the way.”
“And today, I am here to tell you that it is: We play the University of Washington in four short weeks!”
Despite the duo’s on-going attempts at bringing some levity to their grueling 10 day travel schedule, the jokes were in short supply.
In fact, for the third straight day, both Sedihawk and Brinkhater tried frantically to be heard above the riff-raff.
On this day, calls for “more soup and lobster bisque” seemed to constantly deride the ticket’s message.
WSU Football Blog Campaign manager, Mr. Longball, was not happy with the day’s events:
“I keep trying to tell the guys to keep it simple: Attack, Attack, Attack. But they just don’t listen.”
“I mean, Brinkhater, for example, had ONE stinking job to do today. And that was to accuse Bob Condotta of being bought out by Washington Lobbyists. I mean, how hard is that?”
“And what does he do? He makes playing Washington a good thing in his first stinking line of the day, which completely convoluted our message.”
“I mean, I know that we’re trying, but we’ve got to become more DISCIPLINED if we want to be competitive!”
In the meantime, despite no official word of a formal campaign, officials from the Moore-Yanity and Condotta-Withers camp began an offensive of their own against the WSU Football Blog—which further seemed to unravel the duo’s darkhorse candidacy.
On Monday, officials close to Bob Condotta and Bud Withers released a statement accusing Brinkhater of representing the exact type of “Partisan Politics” that has killed competitive college football in the State of Washington over the past five years. The statement read:
“At this point, when the two Washington teams have one win between them, it is both pointless and juvenile to continue such sour grapes as we have continually seen from Brinkhater and his surrogates.”
“What we need now is the type of post-partisan journalism that can bring people together and keep local talent playing College Football for the Washington schools.”
“The WSU Football Blog does nothing to advance such possibilities.”
Meanwhile, early on Tuesday morning, the Moore-Yanity Campaign issued their own offensive on the WSU Football Blog and Brinkhater by noting that: “Eight short weeks ago, Brinkhater publicly noted that the fundamentals of the WSU Football Program were strong.”
“But given what we know now about the current State of the Program, how can you vote for someone who could be so tragically wrong and misinformed?”
Mr. Longball tried to counter the mounting twin offensives by noting Brinkhater’s perfect record this year on his weekly predictions, noting, “All you can ask for, is for our leaders to make appropriate adjustments as new information becomes available. And Brinkhater has done that as well as anyone.”
But off the record, several associates revealed what has become a mounting concern: Brinkhater’s inclusion on the WSU Football Blog ticket has become an inescapable liability.
“You know, like Jim Moore, Brinkhater is very, very popular with segments of the base,” one source said. “There are a group of devoted followers that really appreciate his early and honest critique of past decisions associated with the Doba era.”
But as another source noted, “His negatives are really, really troubling. You know, if it was just Sedihawk, we might have a really good chance at winning this thing. But Brinkhater brings a really high liability to the ticket that is currently killing us. “
As the day ended, the campaign showed the convention a four minute campaign video of Sedihawk taking care of his cancer stricken Golden Retriever, Barkley.
As the lights came up, several seniors could be overheard saying that they felt like they had “seen a window into Sedihawk’s soul.”
The question remains, however, whether or not such soul searching will be enough to save what once seemed to be a promising campaign.
Time is running short. The polls open in only three short days.
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