6th Congressional District candidates

Joe Kallas (Democrat)

Kallas on the issues (click each link for more):

• Health care
• U.S. Postal Service

Biography:

Joe was born in Green Lake and has spent most of his life in the Princeton area where he still lives on a farm that has been in his family for over 100 years.

He earned a bachelor's degree in political science in 1971 and then a teaching certificate from UW-Green Bay in 1977. Joe has done graduate work in public administration from UW-Oshkosh.

Recently retired from Fox Lake Correctional Institution where he worked teaching several Moraine Park College courses, Joe also taught and guided inmates working toward their GED.

Joe is a member of the Democratic Party of Green Lake County and has served on the Princeton Town Board as well as the Green Lake County Board of Commissioners.

In addition to his farming background and experience, Joe's career includes social service commitments as a VISTA volunteer, coordinator of four group homes in Ripon, production supervisor at Fox Industries in Berlin, and assistant director of Fresh Start in Wautoma. He has also written for the Oshkosh Northwestern and the Princeton Times.

Joe ran against Tom Petri in 2010 and is now back for a 2012 challenge: “Petri cannot go unchallenged. He is not entitled to a free ride. Thirty-three years is long enough – the current problems will not be solved by the same people who created them. It is time for new energy and ideas that will serve everyone in the 6th Congressional District.”

Source: Kallas campaign website

Tom Petri (Republican)

Petri on the issues (click each link for more):

• Tax relief
• Federal spending and the economy
• Transportation
• Education
• Environment/energy choices
• Affordable health care
• Traditional values
• Veterans
• Wisconsin's farmers

Biography:

Tom was born in 1940 in Marinette, Wisconsin, the son of  Navy Lieutenant Commander and Mrs. Thomas Evert. After his father was killed during a World War II mission over the Atlantic, Tom and his infant brother moved with his widowed mother, Marian, into a rented duplex in Fond du Lac, where she found a job teaching in the Fond du Lac public schools. In 1946, Marian married Robert Petri, who adopted the two boys.

Tom attended Fond du Lac public schools from kindergarten through high school, graduating from Goodrich High in 1958. For two years, when Tom was about nine or 10, he earned trips to summer camp by selling several cases of Rosemond soap door to door. When he was older, he took jobs painting houses, delivering the old Fond du Lac Commonwealth-Reporter, working as a golf caddie and as a messenger and bank teller for the First Wisconsin Bank, and selling advertising and hosting the "Teen Time" show for KFIZ radio.

Tom also attended Badger Boys State and Boys Nation. It was through those programs that he met President Eisenhower, Wisconsin Senator Alexander Wiley, and Rep. William K. Van Pelt, who represented the 6th District. He also met General Curtis LeMay.

In 1961 Tom worked in the east African nation of Kenya for three months with Operation Crossroads, a church-supported humanitarian organization which served as one of the early models for President Kennedy's Peace Corps.

In 1962 he graduated from Harvard College. In 1965 Tom earned a law degree from Harvard Law School. Then, in 1965-66, he clerked for James Doyle, the federal judge for Wisconsin's western district.

In 1966-67, Tom served in Somalia, first with the Peace Corps and then with the United States Agency for International Development. In 1968 he was Executive Director of the Ripon Society. In 1969-70 Tom worked in the White House as Director of Crime Studies for President Nixon's Advisory Council on Executive Reorganization (also known as the "Ash Council"). His work focused on anti-drug efforts.

Tom worked as a lawyer in Fond du Lac from 1970 to 1979, and was elected to the Wisconsin State Senate in 1973. Tom was the Republican nominee for the U.S. Senate in 1974 which, in the wake of Watergate, was a very bad year for Republicans. Although he lost, the Senate campaign gave Tom an opportunity to meet with all sorts of people and learn about their lives. And it gave him added visibility which helped when he ran in a special election in 1979 to replace Rep. Bill Steiger, who had died shortly after winning re-election in 1978.

After winning the Republican primary, in which he gave the future Governor Tommy Thompson his one and only electoral defeat, he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives after a hard fought campaign. He was re-elected in 1980 and has been re-elected every two years since.
    

Termed "a notably independent, creative legislator" by prominent Washington Post columnist David Broder, Tom Petri has also been called "conservative," "moderate," and "progressive." In fact, he has been a "compassionate conservative" for decades before that term was first coined.

Tom has won considerable praise for his approach