Paige out

Chris Paige has dropped out of the race for the Republican nomination in the 11th CD. That makes Hazleton Mayor Lou Barletta the presumptive nominee to face Paul Kanjorski or Corey O'Brien in the fall.




His statement:

Goodbye & Farewell


Recently, Mayor Lou Barletta decided to transform our primary fight into a legal dispute. Although I am confident that I would prevail, I am equally confident that a protracted legal battle would not advance the causes I believe in, and - ultimately - those issues are more important than my personal political fortunes.

I began this race because I had something important to say about the bailouts and their moral, economic and political costs to our society and because I was alarmed by the dangerous ongoing transformation in our country and its politics, and I sincerely regret that I won't have an opportunity to continue fighting for you and for the ideals we share. Realistically, I knew the forces in favor of plundering our wealth and subverting our democracy were likely to prevail in the end, but I believed that I had been called to try, and I tried with everything I had. Mother Theresa said it best, "God doesn't require that you succeed; He only requires that you try." And, by that standard, we won - we kept the faith, and we fought for what we know is true.

While I was campaigning, I met a great many people in desperate need of help, and I tried my best to represent them and their needs. I am profoundly sorry that I failed them and you, but the fight must go on. The continuing assaults on our liberties and our prosperity has claimed and will claim millions of victims, and those victims and their families deserve our support. Short of illness, nothing inflicts more damage upon a person and his or her family than job loss, so I always remembered that the fight against job-killing big-government policies was a fight to defend people, not economic abstractions. To me, this was not an intellectual debate; it was a fight to save my friends' jobs and my neighbors' homes and our society's freedom, and I only regret that I could not do more.

And to all of my friends and supporters, let me thank you again from the bottom of my heart. I am truly humbled and deeply honored by your friendship, and I profoundly regret that I was unable to justify the faith you placed in me. My wife and I need some time alone to grieve the loss of our child, but when that time has passed, we will organize a small party as a token of our appreciation for your hard work and sacrifice. No man is a failure who has won friends like you!

Again, I thank you all for your support and friendship, and I wish you all the best!

Goodbye and farewell,

Chris Paige