Republican candidate for congress Rick Bart has been putting himself in the news lately, although not by holding large campaign rallies or by creating any scandals. Instead he is doing it the old fashioned way, by creating policy proposals and taking vocal stands on the issues important to 2nd District constituents.

Bart said he plans to release a new statement every week or so where he tries to differentiate himself from incumbent Rick Larsen on a wide range of issues that do not necessarily follow the traditional Republican-Democrat narrative.

This week Bart spoke out on Paine Field, the Snohomish County airport. Recently, Snohomish County Executive Aaron Reardon and the mayors of Mukilteo and Edmonds have come out against expanding the airport to bring in commercial traffic, preferring to keep it focused on small private and Boeing airplane travel. Bart disagrees. He believes that an expanded Paine Field would help local businesses and ease the financial burden on local airline customers.

"I think that it should be a regional hub, somewhat like Bellingham," Bart told PolitickerWA.com. "It would alleviate traffic congestion and make it more convenient for people of 2nd District to get in and out of town. It just makes perfect sense to me that we start to develop that airport.

"If I plan to fly out of town, I have to plan a 2 hour window to get to SeaTac go to get on a plane," continued Bart, who lives in Arlington and pays $5 a gallon to fill his diesel pickup truck. "If I could get a flight out of Paine, it would save money for my family, and make it more convenient."

Bart also thinks that the airport will help spur the local economy, especially if combined with the development of adjacent land, and he is willing to take a stand on the issue and be a vocal supporter.

"We could attract a lot of new business to Snohomish County if we could develop the land around it, and fly goods in and out of there. There are myriad things, benefits, not being talked about, and as congressman I could start those conversations," Bart said.

Another of Bart's proposals was on giving amnesty to people with outstanding student loans so that they would not have to pay any more than they originally borrowed.

"I went through college on the GI bill," he recollected, "and there is no way I could have afforded to go there if I didn't have that student loan. I think it's time, if you want to really help people, let's help them. Let's not play games."

The Republican said that he has received a lot of positive feedback on that idea, especially from people who are struggling to repay the loans they took out in order to improve their lot in life. He says the reason that congress hasn't done anything about the issue so far is because of the role of banking special interests, and he claims that Rep. Larsen opposes reform because of the amount of campaign contributions he has received from them.

Bart's next plan is to outline a policy proposal on immigration policy, and that the topics after that would be on a wide range of things that affect his would-be constituents.

"We are trying to show the diff between myself and Rick," Bart said. "It may not be a traditionally Republican issue, but we're going to take a stand on it."