Governor Ted has made it three -- three Republican state legislators, that is, whom he's appointed to jobs in the state bureaucracy, thus removing them from the lawmakers' roll.

The latest is Sen. Lenn Hannon (R-Ashland), whom Gov. Kulongoski has named to the Oregon Board of Parole and Post-Prison Supervision. Since the new job is considered full-time (and anyway I hear it's illegal for a legislator also to have a paying job in the executive branch), Hannon will be leaving the Legislature.

Hannon is perhaps best known to Portlanders as a staunch opponent of state financing of a stadium in Portland for a major league baseball team. He single-handedly stopped state support for the project in 2001, when the financing would have been much easier for baseball proponents than it turns out to be now, after the 2003 session authorized it. In the Bogdanski Influence Index, in which 0 out of 18 indicates a high degree of sway over colleagues in the last legislative session, Hannon scored a 9, tied for the highest score among senators, indicating that he was very much out of the mainstream.

I have it on good authority that he is an honorable man who fights tough but fights fair.

Hannon's appointment to a state desk job follows the similar, recent appointments of (a) Rep. Max Williams (R-Tigard, Bog. score 2) to be the state's corrections director, and (b) Sen. John Minnis (R-Wood Village, Bog. score 6) to be director of public safety standards and training.

Is the governor --

(a) buying off his stronger political nemeses,

(b) showing bi-partisan spirit in an effort to unify Oregonians from all regions and political persuasions,

(c) both of the above,

(d) saying, "I like Republicans in public safety and law enforcement roles," or

(e) none of the above?