In The 48Th: A `Mr. Cool' Vs. A Fast Talker -- Seldom Is The Voter Faced With Such Polar Opposites As Republican Steve Van Luven And Democrat Stu Jacobson In The 48Th District - They Could Be Candidates From Different Nations.

Their personal styles are as different as their political philosophies.

State Rep. Steve Van Luven of the 48th District is cool. His speech is as carefully put together as his haircut and conservative business suit.

Nothing is out of place in his tidy office. The former Eagle Scout's walls are covered with pictures of eagles and of Van Luven posing with Barry Goldwater, Dan Quayle, Bob Dole and Booth Gardner.

His words bespeak moderation. He's never been "a radical, right-wing" sort of Republican, even though he recalls being one of only two Olympia High School students who supported Goldwater in 1964.

Stu Jacobson, by contrast, is hot.

His study, cluttered with knickknacks and stacks of file folders, borders on chaos. He pops up and down, looking for misplaced files, wryly reminding his campaign aide that he asked her to organize a folder, not hide it.

The Democrat's voice rises with indignation as he speaks about the homeless families of Bellevue, the tragedy of child sexual abuse, the urgency of banning assault rifles and "hypocritical" Republicans who talk about social problems but won't raise taxes to correct them.

Jacobson's disheveled appearance and his passionate, fast-talking defense of liberalism suggest a Mike Lowry on amphetamines.

You can take Jacobson out of New York, it seems, but you can't take New York out of Jacobson.

Voters in the 48th District in portions of Kirkland, Bellevue and Redmond have a clear choice in the Position 2 state House race.

But Jacobson, in his first bid for elective office, has no illusions that he will unseat Van Luven, who is running for a sixth term in the Legislature.

The 48th is the only district that has never sent a Democrat to Olympia. Jacobson trailed Van Luven by 30 percentage points in the September primary.

The district is so solidly Republican that Sen. Dan McDonald and Position 1 Rep. Bill Reams are running unopposed for re-election.

"I'm not running here to win an election," Jacobson says. "It's known I'm against overwhelming odds."

He's running, he says - and spending some $30,000 of his own money - to put forth his more activist vision of state government.

Van Luven bases his campaign less on any specific legislative accomplishments than on his accessibility to constituents. He is one of the few to maintain a legislative office in his district between sessions.

He touts a University of Puget Sound legislative survey that listed him among the top five legislators for responding to constituents.

"I've never, ever passed a bill in Olympia that was my idea," he says. "Everything I've ever done was an idea of some constituent of mine."

But Van Luven is viewed by some as an ineffective legislator who doesn't spend enough time at the job.

A Seattle Times survey of Olympia insiders this year listed 142 of the state's 147 legislators as more effective than Van Luven. He dismisses The Times' "secret poll" as meaningless.

Van Luven, 46, doesn't work on legislation between sessions because, he says, he's a citizen legislator who makes his living as a businessman. He and his wife, Sandy, have operated Exchange Enterprises, a trade-brokerage firm, for 19 years.

He lists as his major legislative accomplishments creation of the University of Washington's branch campuses and passage of the "Pasado" animal-cruelty law, crafted in memory of the well-publicized beating death of the Kelsey Creek Park petting-zoo donkey.

Jacobson, 40, has become involved in public affairs as president of Eastside Parents for Safe Daycare, a group calling for better oversight of day-care centers by the state Department of Social and Health Services. He founded the group after a run-in with a day-care center over its treatment of one of his two children.

Jacobson says he has given up his work as a manufacturer's sales representative for a California apparel firm to work full time on the day-care issue. But he rejects claims that he is a one-issue candidate.

His broad theme, which he concedes won't sit will with many Eastside voters, is the need for adequate funding of social services.

"We have this outpouring of legislators on the Eastside," Jacobson says, "who say we don't need any taxes. I don't like to pay taxes, but I would rather pay for the intervention now than pay for the $35,000-a-year cost to keep a child incarcerated."

Jacobson's in-your-face style of politicking comes through in a campaign brochure that, under the headline "Leadership for our changing community," shows him talking to a homeless man.

Among endorsements is one from Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates. Gates lent his name - but no money - to the Democrat during an e-mail exchange with Jacobson's wife, Sandra, a Microsoft manager.

Jacobson's campaign remains an uphill battle.

"I'm not liked," he says. "As a human being it bothers me. I would hope people would stop pointing at my style and start addressing the issues I'm speaking about."