Goat wasn't kidding about politics

US : Not since Caligula made his horse Incitatus consul. Ashley Powers in Anza, California, on a mayor with a difference

US: Not since Caligula made his horse Incitatus consul .Ashley Powers in Anza, California, on a mayor with a difference

Opie the goat charmed his way out of the slaughterhouse, but he wasn't as nimble in the gruff world of desert politics.

The goat was named honorary mayor of this rural town after drumming up more money for charity than anybody else. But like any office-holder, he wasn't without enemies.

Local business leaders, fearing that Opie made the more than 5,000 townspeople look like yokels, decided he had to go. Opie's supporters kicked back, and the ensuing fracas divided the growing town.

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"Opie stands for why so many people moved out here," said Nancy Ross, a stylist at Anza Barber & Beauty. "We don't want some human sitting on a throne."

With his foray into public service, Opie had joined a select number of four-legged mammals ascending to small-town higher office. Voters have elected goats, donkeys and dogs to honorary mayor positions in recent years - almost exclusively in sparsely populated communities where a barnyard politician can reel in dollars from curious tourists.

Outside Colorado Springs, Colorado, the town of Florissant elected a donkey named Birdie in a charity ballot that benefited the Pikes Peak Historical Society.

"We decided to have a little truth in politics - we'd only have jackasses run," said society president Celinda Kaelin.

Paco Bell, the current mayor, won a second term in 2004 after one opponent got sick, another didn't show and a third, a llama with pasted-on ears, was disqualified because it didn't meet the jackass standard.

Some people in Rabbit Hash, Kentucky, blanched at the election of a dog named Goofy in 1998, wondering if this speck of a town near the Ohio border would look foolish.

But the mixed-breed dog's victory raised at least $9,000 - one vote, one dollar - leading a filmmaker to record a documentary called Rabbit Hash: The Center of the Universe, which screened at a Pennsylvania film festival. Rabbit Hash, whose official population fluctuates between three and five people, revived the race during the last presidential election after Goofy was put down, choosing a labrador named Junior.

Like Florissant and Rabbit Hash, Anza is an off-the-main-road town, dozens of miles from a Costco or a movie theatre with stadium seating.

In a way, Opie was Anza's comeback kid, the right goat at the right time. Dan Hurtado, who raises goats for their meat, rescued Opie three years ago after Opie's mother abandoned him in the snow. Hurtado's wife warmed the three-pound baby with a blow dryer and fed him from a bottle.

Meanwhile, some residents were rolling their eyes at the annual honorary mayor contest. For nearly three decades, the unincorporated town has awarded the title to the candidate who raised the most money for charity. But some of the human politicians started to act - well, too political. One mayor printed mayoral stationery. Another attended a breakfast for Riverside County mayors.

Then Smith heard about Clay Henry III, the third generation of goats to preside over the tiny Texas town of Lajitas near Big Bend National Park. Tourists loved to see the Henrys down Lone Star long-neck beers.

A few years ago, Clay Henry III was castrated after he guzzled the wrong man's cerveza. The trial of accused goat attacker Jim Bob Hargrave ended with a hung jury after his attorneys argued that he was framed.

The goat recently out-manoeuvred Bo the Dog and the Cigar Store Indian to win re-election, though opponent David Tinsley - "You Can Own Me For A Beer Too!" - vilified the mayor as having "no cojones".

Clay Henry's story stoked Hurtado's and Smith's ambitions for their 200lb goat. They took Opie on the fundraising circuit - the feed shop, the bar and the casino - netting more than $2,000 to fund a college scholarship.

The goat beat three men - including the incumbent mayor, Carl Long, who did not return calls seeking comment. "The people that lost to him were not happy campers," Hurtado said.

Robyn Garrison, president of the Anza Valley Chamber of Commerce and owner of the local Dairy Queen, fretted that business owners wouldn't locate in Anza. "If you've got a mayor who's a goat, do you take the place seriously?" she asked. "I want people to take us seriously. We're just as legitimate as Los Angeles."

The chamber let the 2004 election pass without a ballot, but Opie kept mugging for features in the local paper, the High Country Journal. Sporting a red visor, the goat anchored this year's Fourth of July parade, peering from the seat of a Chevy Blazer. The next month, the community had to grapple with a new reality: since the chamber hadn't sponsored another election, Opie was out of office.

"Mayor Resigns" is how the Journal headlined its account, which quoted Garrison as saying the goat had ceased to be mayor last December.

Opie seemed to take the news in his stride, retiring among chicken coops, horses and fellow goats Georgia and Firecracker.

LA Times-Washington Post service