First Principles

Today when I got home from work, the following pre-recorded message was on my answering machine:

Hello.  This is a message from Accountable America.

Why is the recession and increased unemployment dragging on?  We need to ask our Congressman Dean Heller.  He voted against spending money to put America back to work.  Congressman Heller voted against extending unemployment benefits and lowering taxes for 95% of working Americans.  However, Congressman Heller did vote for executive bonuses for the same Wall Street firms that took taxpayer bailout money.

Call Congressman Dean Heller and tell him we need to create jobs and end this recession.  Tell him to stop protecting bonuses for the well-treated executives who caused this mess.

Ridiculous, but good for a laugh.  And I know perfect blog fodder when I hear it!

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So I had to look up “Accountable America” first.  The organization started in August 2008 with the mission of “stopping the Swift-boating of Progressives.”  (If by doing that, they mean exposing the truth behind the narrative a politician has based their entire political career upon, I can see where they’d be worried in the age of Obama.)

Their site seemed active for about 3 months, and then went on an 11 month hiatus.  Somehow that, and bad writing, got them donations of hundreds of thousands of dollars.  Man – if they can do it, I really need to put a donation button on this thing…

Their goal is to “expose” conservative donors, so Americans can see that only rich businessmen (I’d add the adjectives “evil” and “corrupt,” but to the hippies those words are superfluous) donate to Republicans.  This, according to a guy (Accountable America founder Tom Matzzie) who used to work for billionaire George Soros’ MoveOn.org, and whose organization keeps their own donors anonymous.

They also “do not seek to elect or defeat candidates or endorse candidates for federal office.”  Hmm.  So THAT’S why they’re badmouthing a sitting federal Congressman in his district on his (actual) constituents’ answering machines…

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The content of the message is pretty amusing, though.  I’m not sure when Dean Heller actually voted for bonuses for private citizens.  I’m not sure what would give him the authority to do it even if he wanted to, honestly.  They might be referring to the bailouts which Heller voted against, which upheld pre-existing contracts for bank executives, which liberal democrats tried to attack after the fact (bills of attainder?) – you know, because they didn’t read the bill they voted for in the first place and now regretted what they voted for.  Heller voted against violating those contracts and punitively taxing and singling out those executives, it’s true.  But that’s not exactly the same as passing out bonus checks, especially when he didn’t vote for their subsidy to begin with.

And you have to wonder – if “spending money to put America back to work” were the answer, shouldn’t the stimulus bill that passed without his vote be working now?  Shouldn’t the recession be ending in spite of Heller’s “no” vote?  How does DIS-incentivizing work by continuing to pay people to not work “put Americans back to work?  (I’m fine with unemployment insurance, but at some point, just like the boor who takes undue advantage of his generous friends, you need to cut things off.)  And in any event, the unemployment extension passed!

So if those things passed, and the recession continues to “drag on”, then don’t they have the correlation backwards?  Shouldn’t they be calling Nevada’s other Congressional districts represented by the folks who voted FOR the status quo?  Why, it’s almost as if partisanship trumps all logic and reasoning!

What’s really odd is that there’s no mention of health insurance “reform”.  It’s like this recording was made about six months ago.  Way to stay on top of the news, guys!

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But all that silliness is to be expected.  The thing that really bothers me – really makes me angry, to be honest with you – is that this Washington, D.C. group refers to Dean Heller as “our” Congressman.   It’s dishonest, and makes it sound like Accountable America is a local organization when it’s not.  And God, how I hate it when some coastal elitist assumes I need their benevolent wisdom to protect me from myself!

Well, I tell you what, guys.  How ’bout you worry about your own elected officials, and I’ll worry about mine.  M’kay?