Earlier in the week I tossed up a diary about the final reading vote (which is, procedurally, the really BIG vote before final passage) on health care reform in the House. It lead with one of those throwaway musing bits noting the low vote count and wondering why so many legislators missed it. From my perspective, those votes would be the very ones that would make being a legislator fun, after all. The diary then went into a specific critique of Rep. McFaun’s vote on the bill, which was the part I was most interested in writing.
So today – several days after the fact – I received an irate email from a legislator about the piece. Now, I only hear from legislators for two reasons; either an follow-up or engagement on a specific issue (which is cool), or a complaint. This was definitely the latter. I’ve decided to reprint the complaint here for community consideration. Although I seriously doubt an email to a member of the media like myself has an expectation of privacy, I went ahead and removed identifying comments so as not to prejudice the reading and discussion in any way, pro or con.
Dear John,
I read Green Mountain Daily regularly and generally appreciate your political analysis and commentary.
However, I just read your blog post from last week about the “so-called AWOL votes on the health care bill”, cannot get it out of my mind, and just have to respond … [Sentence removed, as it could give away the identity of the legislator].
Legislators are people first, and, regardless of our political differences, we actually care about each other and each other’s well being. This is one of the treasures of being in the Vermont legislature. I understand that everyone applauded, despite the rules of the House, amidst the recent roll call vote when “Clark of Vergennes” name was read, and he was there to answer with his vote. He had been gone for many, many days from his heart attack.
To just attribute political motives to missing even a critical vote is uncalled for, without first actually doing some inquiry. And, yes, on the really CRITICAL votes, we do show up. Note how (now deceased) Rep. Ira Trombley came in from his sick bed, with assistance from EMT folks, to help override the governor’s veto of marriage.
Just a few instances of what I know, and you could have learned: Reps. Winters and Clark, are both recovering from serious heart attacks; [sentence removed to protect legislator’s anonymity] I prioritized my family first, as I was encouraged to by leadership. Rep. Aswad sometimes struggles, at age 90+, to join us for very late night votes.
In the future, please do some research before just posting snarky comments that later others never hear the full story about. You are better than this.
Unfortunately, the legislator pushed the rhetoric to 11, here, when he/she castigated me for “attribut(ing) political motives to missing even a critical vote” – I can’t see where that came from, and it made me mad. The only guaranteed way of getting an angry response from me is to accuse me of writing something I didn’t. Drives me freakin’ bananas and happens all the time.
But let’s put the pulled-out-of-thin-air accusation aside and look at the rest of the complaint. Here, again, is what I wrote:
AWOLs? It’s a historic vote, arguably the most important vote of the 2011 session… so why was it 89-47? That equals 14 representatives of the people who did not represent the people in voting on the 3rd reading of this landmark legislation. Take one off for the Speaker, who often doesn’t vote unless it’s a close one, and you’ve got 13 reps with something else to do. I don’t know about you, but aren’t votes on potential laws like this the very reason one would want to be a lawmaker, whether you’re pro or con?
The list of missing includes 9 Dems and 4 Repubs. Yeah it was a done deal, so the Dems hardly needed to be whipped, and yeah, there were no doubt some good reasons (I see both St. J reps, the D and the R, were out – that suggests something may have been up in the district), but it makes you wonder. The absentees represent quite an ideological range, and were: Aswad (D-Burlington), Christie (D-Hartford), Clark (R-Vergennes), Condon (D-Colchester), Howard (R-Cambridge), Howrigan (D-Fairfield), Keenan (D-Albans City), Masland (D-Thetford), Mitchell (D-Barnard), Mook (D-Bennington), Reis (R-St. Johnsbury), South (D-St. Johnsbury), Winters (R-Williamstown).
I wrote it as largely throwaway, and was more interested in the follow up sentences taking Topper McFaun to task for his vote on the bill. Still, when I was at the Statehouse the next day, I did hear about the “missed vote” piece from a couple legislators, both in a nudge-poke-wink way, though, and not the anger hurled at me by he/she-who-will-remain-nameless.
So, the GMD community is my reality check in such things (which shows how far removed we are from the days of firebombing trolls in the comments, thank god). So what do you all think? Was the diary merely a throwaway musing, as I intended it, or out of line? If out of line, was it mildly tacky, or the gross personal violation the legislator suggests? I’m all ears, and will stay out of this…
Critique unecessarily harsh. If he/she read the story, commenters had already removed some from the list of awol.
Story was not an unreasonable inquiry & for a historic vote & appropriate. Question had been answered long before letter got to you, but unsure of when he/she wrote it.
A rather selfrighteous & thin-skinned rant from a legislator. Simply stating the reasons he/she listed would have been sufficient w/o getting all huffed up.
Not necessary to use a blowtorch to get rid of dandruff.
With all due respect to the letter-writer, we appreciate the esprit de corp she/he is expressing, but as our elected representatives, House members should expect a certain amount of discussion around their service from the blogosphere. It’s one of the things we are able to do in order to engage and and hold our reps accountable beyond the constraints of conventional news reporting. I saw nothing targeted or mean-spirited in the post.
And I think there is no way around it.
I didn’t think anything of it when I read it the first time, I thought momentarily about glancing through my numbers to see if there was any rhyme or reason on either side of the aisle for missing votes, but it seemed like there was a wide array of reasons as to why legislators missed the vote, and so it wasn’t a great way to spend my time.
Looking at it from the legislator’s perspective, I can see why they take personal offense. It would be a shame if legislators who have to miss a vote for one reason or another have to live in the mindset of believing their political motivations are going to be questioned if they do.
I did not see anything mean-spirited in the post, but I suppose I can see the concern the legislator had with it. Maybe just going forward it would be better to try and find out all the reasons different legislators missed the vote, AND THEN put the spotlight on folks who might have missed for seemingly political purposes. I took your post to simply be crowd-sourcing information about where all those legislators could have been, but I can understand when a legislator is not there for perfectly legitimate reasons being frustrated when it becomes a public question.
When it comes down to it, the internet offers greater opportunities for transparency, but that sometimes means that innocent actions that wouldn’t have received attention in the past now are in the public domain.
but I don’t think the legislator who wrote you the letter was really over the top in any way– I think the legislator simply misunderstood your intent.
When an employee in any other field misses work, they at least are queried about it by their boss, if not yelled at. It’s not over the top to ask why some people missed a big vote, even if their reasons are perfectly reasonable in the end.
Speaking as a sometime lobbyist/activist (albeit one who has been absent during this year’s session), I’m not sure that the Honorable Gentle(wo)man’s absence rises to the level of an “AWOL” tag.
On votes such as this one, we can be sure that the heavy lifting occurred in committee, through intra-legislative advocacy and due to the leadership’s ability to move the bill to the floor and win majority support.
I’m not (too) worried about the absent voting members. I am obsessed, however, with knowing whether that the Dem/Prog majority will move an effective health care bill to the floors of the House and Senate.
Report on where the absent members stand on the issue. Are they committed to sending the Governor a genuine reform bill and NOT a watered-down-kick-the-can-down-road bill?
The first two paragraphs shined a light on the absent members, several of whom I suspect will be in our corner on the final passage vote. The AWOL issue became the unburied lede when Rep. McFaun should have topped the post.
Our dear readers did not see the meat of the story until they were halfway through. The analytically and politically significant point, regarding Representative Flip-Top, only appeared two paragraphs of AWOL observations.
Remember the days of:
Now that’s the story!
…”So what do you all think? Was the diary merely a throwaway musing, as I intended it
…?” — No.
This was not a “throwaway” diary (although the AWOL paragraphs could have been in another context).
Shining the light on what appears to be a major Top-Flip is serious. This is the biggest issue facing Vermont’s tax & medical bill payers. It’s the most critical domestic policy issue facing almost everyone in the U.S. These do not read as throwaway musings in this context. This is important stuff and I’m glad to see GMD’s spotlight go to Topper McFaun, albeit two paragraphs after the AWOL stuff.
No reason isolated AWOL “musings” can’t be appropriate fodder for a “throwaway” post. However, in the context of raising the serious issue of Rep. McFaun’s vote against health care reform, the AWOL “musings” take on much more gravity. I can see why the Honorable Gentle(wo)man was not happy. I do however, sense s/he was throwing a brushback pitch at our Dear Publisher on what could easily have been a throwaway complaint.
I don’t see much snarkitude, if any, in odum’s post. His point is, why were there 14 legislators who didn’t vote on such a major piece of legislation? John made his point without being sarcastic about it, or casting aspersions on any particular lawmakers.
So the anonymous lawmaker provides good reasons for three, and odum excused the Speaker. That leaves 10. And no, I’m not interested in getting doctor’s excuses or parents’ notes from those 10.
It’s quite possible that this was a perfectly normal turnout for a vote that was clearly not expected to be close. But odum poses a reasonable question, and doesn’t make too much of it. Methinks the [redacted] legislator is a bit too thin-skinned.
Also, you’ve gotta admit, it’s a sign that GMD has some stature in VT politics. Which is, I think, a good thing.
I read the diary fairly quickly the day I first read it. During my quick scan, I was anticipating it heading in the political direction, and was surprised that it didn’t, when I finally got down to the McFaun part.
With 20/20 hindsight, it might have made some sense to include the time of night the vote occurred… I certainly appreciated the comments made later that both pointed out the health issues of some legislators and that the vote did end up taking place quite late at night.
I feel that the “throwaway musing” part of the piece definitely overshadowed the message about McFaun — if you had asked me a couple hours later what the piece was about, the missing legislator part predominated in my memory. Since I read this blog to stay informed about pieces of VT politics I was pretty unaware of previously, this might be more of a statement about me than the piece as a whole, but I might not be the only one…
Regardless, it certainly wasn’t over the top. At worst, it might have been slightly tacky. The people critiqued, however, were certainly entitled to their reaction, and I can see them feeling a bit miffed. I thought the letter sent to you started out with a reasonable tone and raised some reasonable complaints. However, my sympathy substantially evaporated when my ears were pinned back by the last paragraph….I did not consider that justified at all.
Keep on writing. I continue to enjoy your writing and the writing and comments of the rest of the community!
It is an interesting piece. I was there in the upper gallery, on that late night in question and do remember the roll caller calling several times for various missing legislators. Yet, that was the second reading. It began all over again on Thursday, for another all day show. I sat in the bleachers again, though just for the final couple hours before it went to the final vote — 92-49. It should be noted that Rep. Vicki Strong, R-Albany, who is on the health committee, missed that vote for whatever reason, though she had been there for the all-nighter. As odum listed, she was not the only one. Topper voted no on the bill.
And it would be far more relevant to hear explanations from legislators about their absence than a silly rant like the one you ended up receiving. Not sure why (s)he couldn’t just have said, “hey, I had a legit reason to be AWOL, here’s why” and left it at that.
The finger-wagging “don’t you dare question our actions” is frankly unbecoming for an elected official; indeed, this may be one of those instances where the unwarranted reaction to the reaction ends up leaving a much greater negative impression than the original issue at hand could ever have done.
“– Religion is like sodomy: both can be harmless when practiced between consenting adults but neither should be imposed upon children.”
Sorry to even bring this up.
Sodomy is not harmless even between consenting adults.
Neither is religion.
Consenting to slavery doesn’t make it harmless.
—————-
Fair questions?
No question is fair.
Not if you have something to hide.
I think this Rep. should understand that it is the job of the media to report to the people, not only how Reps. voted, but who abstained and who didn’t show up. This was a very important bill. So, when 13 Reps. are out, it is perfectly acceptable to take note of that as part of the ‘story’ surrounding the bill.
The people who elect the Reps. do so, in part, because they expect them to stand for the issues they were elected on, and because when there are major votes on said issues, the people want to know how the roll call went. This is basic news reporting, not snarky commentary.
FOX News is snarky commentary. It is not justifiable for an elected official to tell a reporter who’s reporting the facts that he doesn’t know all the facts, so, therefore, shouldn’t report any. That’s a danger to democracy–like saying everything should be done behind closed doors, don’t worry about it, don’t bother us, we know what we’re doing, and if you tell those goddamned people about what we’re doing (or not doing), well, you’re on our shit list.
So, keep doing it, John.
one thing that distinguishes vt. politics from much of the rest of the nation is a kind of presumption that people are in it for good reasons, that they’re acting honorably, etc.
clearly that’s not always the case. but when we’re going to imply that it might not be, i think we should do the reporting in advance, not just toss out speculation. otherwise, eventually, we’ll erode some of that neighborliness that makes this place a little different.
all for investigative reporting, and all for odum’s generally good and fair work.