8/23/2011: Sorry I missed this Janie Har story when it came out last week:
Oregon Rep. Ben Cannon, D-Portland, is resigning from the Legislature to become Gov. John Kitzhaber’s top education adviser.
Cannon,
a Democrat now in his third term in the House, will replace Nancy
Golden, a temporary hire who has returned to her position as
superintendent of the Springfield School District this summer….
Cannon holds graduate degrees in Philosophy, Politics and Economics and
in Comparative and International Education from Oxford University. He received a
bachelor’s degree from Washington University, and is a graduate of West Linn High School.
More on Mr. Cannon here. He writes about his biggest legislative failure, attempting to raise the beer tax, here.
He “holds graduate degrees in Philosophy, Politics and Economics and in Comparative and International Education from Oxford University.”
No wonder he needs to get out of the Legislature!
I hope he likes dealing with OEA, the other unions, the press, the Governor, and of course — the Legislature!
Best of luck to him.
I met him once, at Kitzhaber’s big public election night party. Nice guy. Definitely not a typical politician – I had the feeling that he didn’t want to go to the party at all but got dragged along by his wife. He seemed more like a young academic than a political operator.