I wrote about Scott Brown’s talk at Grokster Mike’s house last Wednesday here and mentioned that there were a number of questions that were asked. Here are the first two questions. I’ll dribble the rest out over the next few days.
Question 1:
The ads they have thrown at you over oil and that’s the oil barrel busted in the water. What can we do?
They’ve spent over $1M even tho I’m not a candidate, trying to distort my record. I’m not sure about that vote, but have you checked your oil bills lately? Your gas bill? It was a buck eighty, buck seventy when the President got in. Three forty four today. That one vote was on changing the tax code policy, deductions and the policies affecting oil and gas revenues, gas was about 5 bucks / gallon. Middle of a recession, middle of the tourist season and they brought up a vote on this issue cause “hey, let’s go after Big Oil”. if you want to talk about tax policy and make it let’s talk. We’ll sit down over pizza and beer, and we’ll hammer out a tax policy. I’m not going to single out an industry that is a job creator, especially with the Keystone pipeline and basically do it for politically purposes. I am not going to be a rubber stamp to raise gas prices up. I’ve already voted to get rid of the ethanol tax, the ethanol subsidy that There are things that we can do to fix these things, way we can do it but let’s not do it politically. And the other one, PolitiFact said it was false, the Wall street thing? When the govt shut down, Harry Reid held mandatory votes on these things, Shaheen was at Wall Street collecting money. Because I was in MA and the financial services industry gave him money too. That’s how it goes.
The thing about NH I love, and I’ve been here since I was a kid, you guys listen and keep an open mind. we may not agree on everything, but keep an open mind and I can come into your home and answer your questions. You can make your own decision, you’re not going to rely on a 30 second ad from a group from East Oshkosh who is basically going to lie about someone. we try to make all our ads factual, we deal in facts. I’m a tri-athelete, big outdoorsman. Nothing more important than the environment and we have to find a way to balance our interests and also develop and you’re struggling here in this town between the over development and the open space and putting a beautiful home up. Got to find that balance so we have the environment that’s sustainable and the ability to enjoy our lives and be, you know, not be driven crazy with all the rules and regulations. EPA is out of control with unaccountable bureaucrats circumventing the will of Congress, that’s what the President is doing right now with the pen now. See that red line. There is a trail of broken promises and Jeanne has been a rubber stamp for each and every decision.
OK, he said that we listen. We do. I do – as an engineer that follows politics, I’m listening to what is said and because I follow politics, what is not said when an open ended question is asked. I also ask myself “did the question get answered“? I’m sorta anal that way – if I’ve taken the time to formulate a question (and yes, at time I can have a long “run up” to the question but I do it to cut off tangents and make sure they know what the area is that I want a person in), to ask the question, I want it answered. Ditto for someone else. While some might not think it was a particularly serious question, it was to the person that asked it.
And it was not answered. And he did not do, as some do, ask “Did I answer your question” nor gave ANYONE a chance to ask a follow up question (just move along fast – another way not to be put on point). While politicians do it all the time, it’s rude and disrespectful, especially when asked by Joe or Jane Sixpack. He could have said “join me, contribute so I can get MY message out, talk to your friends, or any of a number of things that would have brought that person in, made sure that person was part and parcel of the answer. Instead, he disregarded the question and went on with a totally irrelevant tangent to the question.
OK, even with that, review what he said; right from the get go, he changed the subject away from the question to the price of gas in a way that it wasn’t about the ad, wasn’t about him, but how the price of oil and gas was affecting YOU – a deflection (and I have clue none as to why). The vote, the actual vote in his own words, was covered up by his own words. Not a word about the question. Second paragraph, even further astray – except what he wanted to get across: crap, attack on me and oil, must respond to how I LOVE the environment and must find a balance. EPA is evil (yeah, the crowd knew that already).
I listen to see if a specific problem is identified, what’s behind it (or who, or who is benefiting), and how that person is proposing to fix it. I want to know what your policy is, what the tradeoffs are, what is needed, the impact, taxes implications and most importantly:
Is this a problem that this level of government should address and tell me why Constitutionally and according to base principles.
He didn’t answer the question. He did address some problems, but only at the surface level. He did not address a solution – he offered no policy resolutions, offered no promises for legislation, he did not say “and here is how I would go about fixing it”. Only problems were brought up – not solutions, and nothing was brought up with how those problems were within the purview of the Federal government or Constitution (with the possible exception of the “bureaucrats subverting the will of Congress” line – the most important thing he said then and still no remedies mentioned).
Frankly, that was a waste of time for that person who didn’t get their question asked. Answer the question next time.
Oh, for those that are wondering….yes, I do write fast and was writing furiously as he talks real fast; I used up the far better part of the notepad I was using – ask Scott himself if I was – he certainly looked over at me enough times and the notepad was out at the small table I was at in front of me before he started.
