Graves Watch: Away with the President
Congressman Garret Graves, who has not been particularly responsive to Louisiana residents as of late, was on television tonight, two states away, hobknobbing with President Trump at the LSU-Alabama game. His interest in national politics is evident. I wish he would distance himself from the president and focus on his constituents.
Labels: Congress, Garret Graves, Louisiana, President Trump
Congressional Candidate Chris Myers and His Horrifying Vision on Iraq
Any philosophy on the Iraq War that doesn't include a set of benchmarks for the Iraqi government and a clear withdrawal plan, with timelines, is the equivalent of political amnesia and destructive in its vision. If American troops are asked to fight a war continuously, then the justification must be extraordinary. In Iraq, there is no such justification for this conflict, one that the U.S. has been in for a longer engagement than the entirety of U.S. engagement in World War 2. Try telling that, though, to right-wing neocon sympathizer Chris Myers, a Republican candidate for congress in New Jersey's third congressional district.
Myers, in a recent
interview, said that "The surge is working and we must complete the job over there to keep us safe at home." Myers philosophy on Iraq is intellectually irresponsible: There are terrorists over there, he says, so we must stay in
perpetual engagement in Iraq -- no timeline, no withdrawal.
Myers, who makes no differentiation between the Shiite majority, Sunni Arabs, and other factions in Iraq, only sees "terrorists" "over there." His
argument, amazingly enough, is that the Iraq War somehow makes the U.S. safe from terrorism, "We have to make sure that evil doesn't come to the United States." The Iraq War, in fact, exacerbates terrorist activity, keeps American troops in the role of moderating a civil war, and lessens America's national security. Chris Myers, who is supported by right-wing neoconservative organizations like "Freedom Watch," just doesn't get it.
Compare that to John Adler's clear,
correct stance on the ill-begotten Iraq War: "We're spending a lot of money in Iraq. I think we should be spending that money in America." Adler favors a phased redeployment of troops out of Iraq, beginning in the next few months, while Myers favors perpetual occupation of Iraq with no end in sight. Adler is absolutely right in his opposition to this war and his call for a timeline and withdrawal; Myers, on the other hand, lives in neocon la-la land.
Labels: Chris Myers, Congress, Iraq War, John Adler
Short Post: Bipartisanship Dead?
For some reason, I've lately been thinking of bipartisan legislation (the original No Child Left Behind on the national level, for example, or environmental legislation here in New Jersey on the state level) and whether the country has become too polarized to make bipartisan legislation a reality. I'm thinking of this partly because the tenor and tone of the presidential contest is not at the high level I think it should be -- and I do, fairly or unfairly, blame conservatives for much of that negative tone.
Surely, the media's "frame narrative" that is told about bipartisanship (more ideological partisanship than ever before) needs unpacking, however accurate such a narrative may partly be. But have the dual poles of progressivism and conservatism become too distinct, too completely different to result in legislation in Washington that is, collectively speaking, for the good of the country? If, for example, comprehensive energy legislation that invested in alternative and renewable energy was also couple with something I vehemently oppose, new oil drilling in environmentally-safe (as safe as possible) sites, came up, I would support it. One reason that one commentator applauded Joe Biden as Obama's vp pick was because of bipartisanship purposes; Biden originally arrived in the senate at the time of less partisanship rankling and polarization.
Legislation must move forward when it meets certain qualitative and quantitative criteria of approval, and I would hope that the new administration and congress, come 2009, invoke a genuine spirit of bipartisanship, though I imagine that's an ideal that may not come to fruition.
Labels: bipartisanship, Congress, Joe Biden, New Jersey
Linda Stender is Right: Leonard Lance Stoops to a New Low
In fundraising and general campaign financial health,Republican congressional candidate Leonard Lance is in trouble, as Huntsu over at
Blue Jersey has noted that Lance has close to $200,000 in debt, including a $100,000 personal loan he made to his own campaign. With no financial help on the way from the NRCC, at least not yet, Lance has decided to use Karl Rove-esque personal attacks on his opponent, Democratic Assemblywoman Linda Stender, rather than mount a substantive campaign. And as I've written
elsewhere on Blue Jersey,, Lance is a dyed-in-the-wool right-winger who sometimes is mistakenly cast as a "moderate."
Thus the Lance campaign sent out press releases supposely concerning
Linda Stender's finances that accused Stender of not paying her federal and state taxes on a family business. The only problem is that, according to records, Stender makes no money off the business, the business in question is owned by her mother and sister, and Stender only has a 5% stake in the business ownership.
Stender has used this opportunity to talk about middle-class economic struggles in the state and country, which is the right course of action to take: "It is shameless that Leonard Lance and the Republican Party are attacking my 80-year-old mother and sister's small business, particularly at a time when small businesses throughout New Jersey are struggling to make ends meet," Stender said.
Why Lance, a somewhat respected, anti-partisan (at least in the state senate) politician would stoop to this low level is clear: His campaign is losing any and all traction after a difficult GOP primary, and Stender is the superior candidate for this seat. Distractions and personal attacks, especially with they are based on questionable merit, are not going to win this campaign for Lance.
Labels: Congress, Leonard Lance, Linda Stender, NJ-07
