We feature many contributors on Breaking Gov. It’s not everyday, however, that one of our contributors ops to take a leave in order to run for Congress.

James Windle, who has written passionately about the fine points of federal spending for Breaking Gov since its launch nearly a year ago, is doing just that.

Windle called us in recent days while driving across country to advise us that he had decided to throw his hat in the ring to run for Congress as an independent candidate for Washington State’s 8^th District.

Windle left a national security job after a decade in Washington, D.C., having worked at at the Department of Energy, the National Nuclear Security Administration, the Executive Office of the President, in Congress, and most recently at National Defense University where he agreed to share his perspective on the inner workings of federal government with Breaking Gov.

“My writing for Breaking Gov reinforced my belief that for many of the inefficiencies in the federal government the solutions are neither Democrat nor Republican. They are just solutions,” he told us in a recent email.

“My decision to run as an Independent” he added, “even though my experience is with the establishment, is because it provides me more flexibility to assume common-sense positions on how to improve the federal government and increase public confidence in it.”

While we don’t takes sides in partisan politics, we wish Windle well. And we fully expect that he’ll continue to share his perspective from time to time.

You can read more about his plans at his new website at http://www.windleforcongress.com.