Re: In Class of Colorful Freshmen, Meet the Most Contrarian

I dunno, drawing attention to the constitution and the idea of limited 
government is something worth accomplishing.  Especially when juxtaposed with 
what congress has accomplished to date.

Mike F.



________________________________
From: Johne Cook <[email protected]>
To: DADL (off topic) <[email protected]>
Sent: Fri, April 15, 2011 10:51:21 AM
Subject: Re: [DADL-OT] In Class of Colorful Freshmen, Meet the Most Contrarian

I like his style but wonder how effective he'll actually be. It is nice to warm 
yourself with your convictions, but one has to think that the primary success of 
a political gadfly is to draw attention to himself rather than actually 
accomplish anything. (This is where my inner pragmatist wars with my inner 
idealist.)

Johne Cook
| http://raygunrevival.com | http://authorculture.blogspot.com |




On Fri, Apr 15, 2011 at 9:17 AM, Mike Findlay <[email protected]> wrote:

He'd get my vote.
>
>
>Mike F.  
>
>
>
________________________________
From: Bruce Geerdes <[email protected]>
>To: DADL (off topic) <[email protected]>
>Sent: Fri, April 15, 2011 9:11:51 AM
>Subject: [DADL-OT] In Class of Colorful Freshmen, Meet the Most Contrarian
>
>
>http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/15/us/politics/15freshman.html?_r=1&hp
>
>In Class of Colorful Freshmen, Meet the Most Contrarian
>By JENNIFER STEINHAUER
>
>WASHINGTON —Representative Justin Amash does not believe the
>government should subsidize public broadcasting, vehemently opposes
>abortion rights and thinks Democrats are wrong about spending. Yet he
>has voted against every Republican measure that conforms to those
>views.
>
>Through April 12 Mr. Amash, a Republican who represents a swath of
>southwestern Michigan, has not voted with the majority 25 percent of
>the time, the most of any House Republican.
>
>Mr. Amash, 30, the youngest member of the freshman class, stands out
>like a patchwork quilt among 86 other colorful Republican freshmen. He
>has voted against his party on important symbolic measures, like one
>that would strip financing from Planned Parenthood, and those  most
>minor, like a measure to amend the Ronald Reagan Centennial Commission
>Act to extend its termination date.
>
>He has even voted against the routine matter of approving the journal
>of the previous day’s proceedings, because, he says, there is not
>enough time to read it. (This is a bit like not clicking “I Agree” on
>a hotel Wi-Fi agreement because you don’t want to read the fine
>print.)
>
>On Thursday, he said, he will vote against an agreement the leaders of
>his party hatched with Democrats to keep the government open for the
>rest of the year.
>
>Often, when Mr. Amash agrees with the spirit of a measure, but not its
>constitutional basis, he votes “present,” as he did on a bill to take
>money from public broadcasting. If baffled colleagues seek an
>explanation, they can find it on his Facebook page, where he
>assiduously explains every vote.
>
>“I follow a set of principles, I follow the  constitution,” said Mr.
>Amash, who keeps a picture of the seating chart for his Constitutional
>law class from the University of Michigan on his office wall. “And
>that’s what I base my votes on. Limited government, economic freedom
>and individual liberty.”
>
>He said he did not feel his defections had angered Republicans leaders
>in the House.
>
>“I don’t think they’ve been annoyed by the votes,” he said during a
>brief interview as he walked through Capitol Hill on Wednesday. “I
>think they respect my approach, and I respect theirs as well.”
>
>If Mr. Amash has any dreams of rising in his chamber, he will have to
>find a way to mimic the style of lawmakers who run contrariwise to
>their leaders but maintain their respect, like as Representative Jeff
>Flake of Arizona, and not that of those who are stars on Fox News but
>not especially influential in the upper ranks of their own caucus,
>like  Representative Michele Bachmann of Minnesota.
>
>In some ways, Mr. Amash’s voting record reflects his time as a
>Michigan state representative, when he was known as “Mr. No,” for his
>proclivity for voting against the majority of legislation before him.
>In that case, however, Mr. Amash was largely against the policies
>underlying most of the bills, which reflected Democratic control.
>
>His contrarian ways sometimes made for odd alliances in Michigan,
>where he lined up against his Republican colleagues to oppose tax
>breaks for the film industry, and teamed up with a far-left-leaning
>lawmaker from the Detroit area to make sure legal-defense budgets for
>indigent criminal defendants were more uniform.
>
>But here in the 112th Congress, Mr. Amash says most of his no or
>“present” votes generally reflect his lack of constitutional
>convictions about a bill, or the fact there was not time to read it.
>Some of  the constitutional violations in the bills favored by his
>party mates “are pretty apparent,” he said. “We review each piece of
>legislation very carefully,” he said. (In the case of the spending
>bill, he does not believe it cuts spending enough, in keeping with
>other conservatives who plan to vote against the measure.)
>
>Here is what he had to say on Facebook about an amendment to a
>spending bill that would take away federal dollars from Planned
>Parenthood, on which he voted present: “While I oppose abortion
>funding, the language, as drafted, violates my conservative approach
>to legislating.”
>
>He added: “Legislation that names a specific private organization to
>defund (rather than all organizations that engage in a particular
>activity) is improper and arguably unconstitutional. Moreover, the
>legislation is easily thwarted because the organization may simply
>change its name.”
>
>Facebook  is his preferred method of vote explanation over news
>releases, interviews or other forms of traditional political
>expression. “It is something I started doing in the Michigan
>statehouse,” he said. “I use it to explain each and every vote.”
>
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