On paper, the 4th Congressional District shouldn't have a toss-up race this November.

Republicans lead in registration by nearly 15 points. The party's candidate, state Sen. Tom McClintock (R-Thousand Oaks), is one of the best-known conservative voices in the state. And Democrat Charlie Brown took a shot against a scandal-riddled incumbent two years ago and still lost.

Still, toss-up is how two political reports, Cook and Rothenberg, are rating the race these days. Brown, though, takes it a step further, saying the race shouldn't be a toss-up at all.

"I should be up three or four points or more," said Brown, between bites of a burrito at a Roseville taqueria last week. "The reason is, my story has not changed the whole year as I've been doing this."

As in 2006, when he lost to now-retiring U.S. Rep. John Doolittle (R-Roseville), Brown has emphasized veteran's care and nonpartisanship in his bid to win the seat.

But in terms of consistent message, McClintock hasn't wavered either. At a Roseville town hall meeting last week, McClintock laid out a political philosophy that was solidly conservative and even bordered on libertarian, with consistent admonitions that the U.S. Constitution should be the first and last word when crafting public policy.

One of his first moves, he told supporters, would be to push for abolishment of the federal Department of Education.

"Where in the United States Constitution does it say Congress has a role in education?" McClintock said to explain his position.

Speaking after the town hall, McClintock said reports labeling the race a toss-up are ignoring facts, and a poll of his own that shows him with a 9-point lead over Brown.

"I think they've got some gaps in their analysis," said McClintock, noting that the Cook Political Report said he'd be out of money and unable to count on help from the National Republican Congressional Committee.

Instead, his cash-on-hand is solid, and the NRCC is stepping into the race, he said. "I know they didn't call our campaign to ask about the race," he added, also noting that while Brown has paid for polling in recent weeks, he hasn't released the results.

McClintock said he's actually benefitting from the growing perception that Barack Obama will be elected president, putting Democrats in charge of both the legislative and executive branches.

To 4th District independent voters who aren't fond of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco), McClintock said, he appears as a vanguard against liberal extremism.

Indeed, McClintock's campaign commercials have painted Brown as a liberal who'll kowtow to Pelosi if elected to Congress. It's a charge Brown scoffs at.

"Not hardly," he said.

On the campaign trail, Brown said, he's often encountered Republicans, but only once did one refuse, in an ideological basis, to hear him out at all.

"Therein is an example of the problem in this country, we have people not even wanting to talk about the issues," Brown said.

The choice for voters, he said, is whether they want someone with his military background whose aim is at solving issues, or someone with McClintock's background, which has mostly been spent as a Sacramento legislator, and in the last two years, passing no legislation.

McClintock doesn't see it that way. During his tenure as an assemblyman and later a state senator, he's had over 90 bills signed into law, shepherding them through a Democratic-controlled legislature, he said.

But as his term wound down, he said, he decided he wanted to instead push publicly for reforms in state government that might not result in passed legislation, but would propel the debate in a better direction.

His dire predictions about the state's finances, he said in way of giving an example, are coming true now.

And though he acknowledges he's likely to be a minority voice in Congress if elected, he doesn't plan to be a silent one.

"I mean to be as strong a voice as I can possibly be in minority opposition," he said.

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