Friend of Pete Sessions appointed to leadership role

No scandal here, no editorial comment, just a note for future reference: Walden Rises Up From Obscurity

Rep. Greg Walden (Ore.) appears to have done all the right things to win him an appointed seat at the GOP leadership table: be a good team player, prove you’ve got political and policy chops, and have friends in high places...

...He may be National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Pete Sessions’ (Texas) closest friend, he had become a regular counsel for leaders on top issues, and he was willing to give up a powerful committee post to make room for the Conference’s newest lawmaker.

“We wanted to put Greg in a position where he is at the leadership table every week,” said Sessions, who last year appointed Walden to serve as his deputy chairman at the committee.

Pete Sessions names Greg Walden as Deputy Chair of NRCC

From Oregon Public Broadcasting:

When NRCC chair Pete Sessions wanted someone to manage the party's regional strategy for 2010, he called on his long-time friend Greg Walden...

...So what about all those rumors that Walden might run for Governor in 2010?

Here's what Walden's spokesman Andrew Whelan says.

Andrew Whelan: "Chairman Sessions is a good friend, and asked Greg if he would be interested in helping him tackle this new responsibility. But as for running for Governor, there's a time and place for that conversation, and we're not there yet."

Like Pete Sessions, Walden is one of these inconsistent bailout voters; Greg Walden voted for the original taxpayer-funded federal bailout, then voted against the auto industry bailout. Now, Greg Walden wants an investigation of AIG's taxpayer-funded spa retreat:

These are exactly the kinds of abuses that drive me up a wall and are infuriating to taxpayers across the country. The Treasury Department needs to get to the bottom of this quickly to find out if taxpayers were taken for a ride. After accepting $85 billion in taxpayer money to keep their company afloat, the AIG executive brain trust was so fatigued they took a luxurious spa vacation on the company dime. With judgment like that, no wonder they needed taxpayers to bail them out. If public funds were used to bankroll this preposterous getaway, taxpayers must be repaid every cent.

Like Sessions, Walden can't complain that voters didn't try to warn him:

A majority of Portland-area residents oppose a government bailout to resolve the financial crisis, and an even larger number say they are “angry and resentful” about Wall Street, according to a new Portland Tribune/Fox 12 News poll.

Forty-one percent of Multnomah, Washington and Clackamas county residents agreed that a bailout or rescue “is necessary to keep the economy from going into what could be a very serious downtown.” But 52 percent agreed that “people on Wall Street got us into this mess, and they should figure out how to get us out without sticking it to the taxpayers...”