A tale of 2 precincts: A bastion of Bush supporters

By Erik Lacitis
Seattle Times staff reporter

HARLEY SOLTES / THE SEATTLE TIMES Jane and Harvey Brown of Kennewick's solidly Republican Ellen Precinct both have cancer but don't expect the government to help pay their medical-insurance premiums. He says he's a "firm believer in earning what you get."

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Harvey Brown, 63 and Jane Brown, 61

For three decades, Harvey Brown drove a sales route for a baking company in the Tri-Cities, getting up at 1:30 in the morning to start his rounds but never complaining about it.

Nor did he complain when he was diagnosed with prostate cancer 10 years ago. "You play the cards you're dealt," he said.

He doesn't complain, either, about the annual $7,200 health-insurance payments or the additional $2,500 a year co-payments for himself and his wife, who also has cancer.

"The government doesn't owe me health insurance," said Brown, an Army veteran who works part time at a paint store in Kennewick. "I'm a firm believer in earning what you get."

Nor are there complaints from Jane Brown, who has lymphoma. A part-time office manager, she remembers what her mother said: "The world owes you a living, but you have to work hard to collect it."

Her mother was married six times, sometimes working as a waitress while raising six children. But "she never was on welfare. Nope."

Jane Brown's upbringing in Toppenish, Yakima County, taught her to be self-sufficient. At age 10, she knew how to sew and help care for her brothers. "I believe there are jobs for everybody who wants to work," she said. "Maybe it's not the best-paying job, maybe you baby-sit other people's kids."

The Browns became Mormons a decade ago after missionaries came to their door.

They value frugality. The other day, they sat at the dining-room table of their rambler and Jane Brown would get up to check on a pot of split-pea soup that would last them several days.

"I think people in this area are hard-working people, especially people our age," she said. "They know the value of a dollar. They are pretty good judges of character."

Character is what they like about George Bush. "He's honest and forthright," she said. "My word for Kerry is that he's a gigolo. He's got this suave demeanor like he can look you in the eye and lie."

	HARLEY SOLTES / THE SEATTLE TIMES Television news and her husband's influence have turned Michele Ennis, 37, into a Bush supporter, and she has decided to vote for the first time in her life Tuesday.

Rick Ennis, 48, and Michele Ennis, 37

Three blocks from the Browns, the Ennis family lives on another street of tidy homes — lawns trimmed, leaves raked, pickups in the driveway of two-car garages.

In a Norman Rockwell-like scene the other day, Michele Ennis' teenager played stickball, using a pine cone instead of a ball so he wouldn't accidentally break a window.

At the Ennis home, traditional values mean that Rick Ennis, a millwright at the Hanford nuclear reservation, is head of the household. And this household is voting for George Bush.

"I'm old school, a little bit autocratic. If my daughter gets sick, who is the hospital going to for the final payment? It's going to be me," he said. "I take the responsibility, along with the authority."

This is the second marriage for both Rick and Michele Ennis. She was divorced with two children when they met at Hanford, where she works in a warehouse. One might make the mistake of thinking the Ennises are sympathetic to Democrats.

He belongs to the carpenters union and says Bush is not "labor friendly." When she was a single mother, she got laid off, went through bankruptcy, lost her car and collected unemployment. She'd shop late at night at the supermarket, embarrassed at using food stamps.

Television news and her husband's influence have turned her into a Bush supporter. Rick Ennis is a Kennewick native and his allegiance to the Republican Party is rooted in the small-town values of his childhood.

The Ennises are Christians, regularly attending the Cathedral of Joy, a nondenominational church in nearby Richland. Rick Ennis likes Bush's stands on abortion and gay marriage. He believes in hard work, having no time for people begging on street corners.

In high school, he said, he worked summers running combines at farms. By the time he graduated, he owned a boat, six motorcycles and several cars. In his straightforward philosophy, you stay busy.

"A lot of that stuff we deal with, rashes, stress, all could be alleviated if people go back to the old way of doing things," he said. "You put in a good day's work, you'll sleep just fine."

	HARLEY SOLTES / THE SEATTLE TIMES Tom Brower, who owns USA Brake and Auto Repair shop in Kennewick, thinks Iraq should have been invaded sooner.

Tom Brower, 59

It takes Tom Brower maybe seven minutes to drive from his home a couple of blocks from the Ennises to the USA Brake and Auto Repair shop he owns on a main drag in Kennewick.

There is no traffic to fool with, no stress, and it's easy to stop at the nearby Fred Meyer or Safeway or soon-to-be-built Home Depot.

Kennewick reminds him of Rupert, Idaho, the town where he was raised. He feels safe enough to leave the keys in his car and the doors unlocked at the house he shares with his wife and 87-year-old mother. Three children from a previous marriage are grown.

Brower pays attention to the headlines. He thinks Iraq should have been invaded sooner. He doesn't trust Kerry because "Kerry is going to trust the French, the Germans, everybody who doesn't like us."

He's skeptical of young people — a fact he's sometimes reminded of when teens come into his auto shop.

"Kids today, they don't work for anything. They have $80 shoes, driving new cars, a cellphone, pager, computers," said Brower. "What's a kid doing with that kind of stuff?"

In Idaho, he was one of five children. His dad ran a construction company and his mom stayed home. He was part of a high-school graduating class of 140 students, and in 1963, he was drafted into the Army. He served seven years, including two tours in Vietnam.

"When I got home from school, my mom was there every day," he said. "Do you know what woke me up on Saturday mornings? It was the noise from the vacuum cleaner. I knew I'd have to get up and help clean the house, do the laundry."

Copyright © 2004 The Seattle Times Company

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