His name is Raj Peter Bhatka and he's running to represent Pennsylvania's 13th district in the House of Representatives.
He is also a reality TV star, appearing on the second season of The Apprentice. As far as I know, this is the first reality TV star to run for a major political office. How his antics on television (he was constantly hitting on woman and ended running around a tennis stadium in his underwear after he lost a dare to Anna Kournikova...who he also asked out) will play with voters is beyond me.
Anyway, I was prompted to post about Mr. Bhatka after his campaign manager (Raymond Smalley) sent me some emails and then asked if he could call me to talk about the campaign.
He seems like an interesting candidate. Not as conservative as I'd like, though.
On education, for instance, he talks about making sure that schools get enough funding to comply with No Child Left Behind. Frankly, I think "the schools need more money" is a load of bunk. America leads the world in education spending, yet our students still struggle even to remain in the middle of the pack compared to international students. Clearly, even more money is not the solution. I'd rather see Bhatka supporting something like school vouchers.
His enviromentalism is also a bit troublesome. I have no problems with a desire to protect the environment, but neither do I want to see a politician who puts saving some swamp ahead of jobs for Americans. Bhatka's campaign manager assured me that he isn't that type of candidate, though, so there is that.
Bhatka also opposes any changes to Social Security, something that I absolutely cannot agree with. Social Security, in it's present form, is an unsustainable ponzi scheme that will only end in millions of younger Americans who have paid into the program getting screwed over when it comes time for them to collect.
As you can see, from a staunch conservative's perspective Bhatka is not the ideal candidate...but he may well be a better alternative than his very liberal competition.