Congressman Alan Grayson Risking His Seat
Last night, Congressman Alan Grayson stood up on the floor of the House and read out the number of people who died from lack of health insurance in each Congressional district represented by a Republican. It was the latest in a steady stream of very public, sometimes over-the-top statements he's made in an effort to shine the light on Republican obstructionism in order to help get healthcare reform passed.
Grayson's district in Florida is similar to my district in Indiana--about half Democrats and half Republicans. My Congressman, Joe Donnelly, is much smarter than Alan Grayson. Donnelly doesn't make waves. He's never out in front of an issue. He's never on national television. Because he knows that if he advocates for anything slightly controversial, he's risking his seat.Grayson, on the other hand, is all over the place, yelling and screaming and being rude to Republicans. It's kind of dumb for a guy in his first term. Probably, Grayson should be keeping his mouth closed and his ears open. He should be making friends with influential members of Congress who can open up pathways to major Democratic campaign contributors.
Aside from all the juicy corporate donations he's likely losing, it's also sort of stupid to be so out front on an issue before you've convinced everybody in your district that they can't afford to lose your representation. Let's face it, Grayson hasn't had time to bring a lot of pork home or to rise in the committee ranks. He probably doesn't even know the names of his entire staff yet.
I've heard Donnelly repeatedly trying to persuade his liberal supporters about how he has to run to the center because that's where the district is, but that he'll be there when the President really needs his support. In other words, in order to keep his seat, he's going to vote with the Republicans as much as possible but once or twice, when it's really important, he'll be there for us.
I'm going to go out on a limb here and predict that Donnelly is one of Pelosi's 40 Democratic votes to lose on the HCR bill. Don't worry though, because when the President really needs him, he's going to be there.
Alan Grayson doesn't appear smart enough to learn the ins and outs of Congress in time to insulate himself from conservative criticism in the next election. Instead, he appears to think that standing up for what he believes is best for the people in his district, and his country, is enough. Poor guy.
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Snarky post ??? Only a lot.
C
November 5, 2009 1:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
It must be. Since every thing Orlando said what Greyson should be doing as a first-termer is why the public detests Congress critters in the first place. Greyson needs more miserable screw-ups just like him to really show how lame Congress can be if the members really try hard to do the job they were elected to do.
November 6, 2009 7:35 AM | Reply | Permalink
Grayson will be re-elected by a huge margin and will become a folk hero to progressives!
November 5, 2009 2:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think so, too.
(If so, this would further my argument that when you lie down with blue dogs in the middle of the road you get run over)
We shall see...
November 5, 2009 4:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think he's discovered the value of grass roots fund raising with his whole "Money Bomb" thing.
Hopefully he's crazy like a fox.
November 5, 2009 2:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think he realizes the value of an excited liberal base who believes in their candidate. They will donate blood, sweat, and tears... and MONEY...
WAY more effective than an unexcited liberal base who feels they've got a centrist blue dog to vote for.
November 5, 2009 5:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
And Michele Bachmann doesn't make waves?
November 5, 2009 3:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
She's not exactly a role model.
November 6, 2009 6:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
Waves can be ridden to new heights.
Ripples are mere thoughts.
November 6, 2009 7:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
Great Snark! Good blog. :)
November 5, 2009 5:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, because if it weren't for Obama, Grayson, Pelosi, Reid, and the desire to guarantee health care for all Americans we could all sit back and bask in the glory that the bush/cheney cabal left us.
On CNN I heard Andrea Mitchell today asking a Dem how he could say with a straight face that Tuesday's election was a plus for Democrats.
ANDREA: HOW ABOUT ASKING ANY REPUBLICAN THIS QUESTION:
IT WAS YOUR STATED GOAL TO KILL HEALTH CARE REFORM 12 YEARS AGO, WHICH YOU ACCOMPLISHED. YOU NEVER TRIED IN ALL THAT TIME TO IMPROVE HEALTH CARE UNDER YOUR OWN PHILOSOPHICAL BELIEFS. NOW YOU WANT TO KILL IT AGAIN.
IT HAS ONLY GOTTEN WORSE!
WHY DO YOU WANT TO KILL IT AGAIN? WHY SHOULD ANY SANE PERSON BELIEVE THAT YOU WANT TO IMPROVE HEALTH CARE IN YOUR OWN WAY, WHEN YOU DIDN'T DO IT LAST TIME? WHY DO YOU HATE AMERICA?
November 5, 2009 5:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
Cville, I am soooooooooooo glad I am not the only one throwing things at Andrea...hahahaha
Oh its msnbc, but who the frick is counting>
November 6, 2009 1:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
... and her husband was such a big help in letting Wall Street destroy our economy. Andrea was great back in the day in Philadelphia as a local reporter. She's not doing such a great job now in IMHO.
November 6, 2009 6:35 AM | Reply | Permalink
I have to listen to psychos like bachmann and palin and that nazi from Iowa. Every day. Two hundred teabaggers are not getting full coverage today because of twelve dead and thirty one wounded in Texas. Two hundred protesters who would normally get national coverage.
O, I want forty Graysons. Grabbing media time. Getting out the message.
November 5, 2009 5:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
I want Grayson to continue to speak directly to the issues -- to show that it will be rewarded not with attack and abandonment but support.
Then more will find the courage -- the decisiveness -- to do the same.
But reports are -- even in the "liberal" media -- that there were from 3,000 to 5,000 teabaggers at the protest.
And it's said that that's "real dissent".
Only problem with the math is that the other 300,000,000-plus citizens didn't show up for the protest.
November 5, 2009 9:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
40 would be nice:)
November 5, 2009 9:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
hahahaha
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L--cqAI3IUI
November 6, 2009 1:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
He needs to be in the Senate!
November 6, 2009 7:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
Is it possible that Grayson is doing EXACTLY what we hoped all of our representatives would? It's quite obvious that most of our pols are far more fearful of threats to their longevity than the ire and disdain of their constituency. When you've got a King and Grassley stabbing you in the ass, what a breath of fresh air Grayson would be!
November 5, 2009 7:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm ambivalent about Grayson's latest tactics. He achieved a notable success with his first foray into the public eye by using a very brief statement about Republican healthcare reform, "Don't Get Sick", that was effective precisely because it reinforced existing public perceptions about Republican indifference to the wellbeing of ordinary Americans.
He may now be overplaying his hand, with counterproductive results, because his new message may very well backfire rather than resonate with uncommitted members of the public.
I tried to judge this by pretending that I was an uncommitted voter on the subject of, let's say, the Iraq war. I imagined that a war advocate was listing the number of Americans who would die in another Al Qaeda attack on U.S. soil if we did not fight the enemy in Iraq (remember that claim by the Bush/Cheney crowd?). I listened as this hypothetical legislator recited the name of my Congressional representative and the number who would die in my district if I didn't support the war.
Pretending that was hard, but I had the impression that I would have reacted negatively, not to the war, but to the speechmaker indicting my representative. I would have thought him or her somewhat offensive in translating a difference of opinion into an accusation about my representative's respect for life.
Or maybe not. I'm not sure, but I suspect that if I started out uncommitted rather than agreeing with the speaker, I would have been alienated.
My bottom line is this. Alan Grayson has enormous potential to do good, if he uses his intelligence and persuasiveness wisely, but he can do harm if he is injudicious. I'm results oriented. As far as I'm concerned, saying something I already agree with is irrelevant. Getting others to agree who don't yet agree is what counts. I think he should probably tailor his message better to achieve that. Make the main points, yes. Cite numbers, yes. Give a few examples of what that might mean in a Congressional district, yes. Take 20 minutes to list hundreds of districts, no. Name the names of the representatives? No, for the very reason it appeals to the activists - it's personal, confrontational, and the type of in-your-face politics that turns off too many Americans who are looking for reasons and facts rather than assaults on other politicians. The more the partisans cheer, the more I suspect it's probably a bad idea. To personalize it, I cheered, and so I think it was a bad idea.
November 5, 2009 7:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
In my comment above, I started by describing my ambivalence and ended by suggesting that I considered Grayson's current tactic counterproductive. I would temper the latter by describing that view as also characterized by ambivalence. I do think, however, that what he is doing shouldn't be accepted uncritically as valuable simply because it inspires cheers in those who already agree with him. Getting angry has its uses, but only when the anger is employed artfully, not when it is mainly an exercise in emotional venting.
November 5, 2009 8:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
The point is that he's doing something. Because he's believes that he was sent to Washington to serve and because he believes that healthcare reform is important. Donnelly and so many others don't do anything that they deem might put their positions at any risk. They're cowards.
November 5, 2009 8:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
Orlando - I agree he's doing something and that his heart is in the right place. What I said above, though, was that I'm results oriented. I'm not sure that what he's doing is going to be productive in the way his earlier comments were productive. I don't want him to stop doing things, and I don't want him to be less passionate, but I want that passion to be focused in a way that will bring people in rather than drive them away. As an example, I believe that he could have spent less time naming Republican lawmakers and more time telling the stories of individuals who suffered or died because of Republican indifference. Imagine that he had given a dramatic and accurate account of a tragedy of that sort, named the one who suffered, named the Congressional district (by state and number), and then not named the Republican representative from that region, leaving that up to the media. That could have exerted a remarkable impact.
November 5, 2009 8:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
I've heard so many dramatic and accurate accounts of tragedy that I truly think I might barf if I hear another one. The point that Grayson is making over and over is that Republicans don't give a shit about the dramatic and accurate accounts of tragedy. He's right.
November 5, 2009 8:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
Fred,I see your point, however Orlando is correct when he says Greyson is doing something to shine a spotlight on where the logjam is in Congress. Perhaps he's pushing the envelope as you say, but I think he knows just how far to push an issue to make a point that sticks in people's minds. And that may be his reasoning. If the point isn't sharp enough, the public soon forgets the issue and time scrubs the memory of the debate from their minds as if it never happened. He wants people to stop listening, agreeing then forgetting an issue to listen, think and remembering.
November 6, 2009 7:51 AM | Reply | Permalink
...and that's why I said above "We shall see".
I think he will be rewarded with money, blood and sweat from the Base. I think they will rally behind him bigtime and that support will absolutely swing voters his way come next election.
We shall see.
If this does indeed come to pass... then I'll consider it proof positive that my theory is right. Vindication.
If it doesn't come to pass... well... I'll probably grow just a little more cynical. Unhealthy.
However... all of this could be for naught if the guy is dirty. He needs to keep his hands in his own pockets and his dick in his pants... keep a clean nose... If he's caught up in a scandal between now and then, all bets are off.
November 6, 2009 8:08 AM | Reply | Permalink
We may have to end up disagreeing, Orlando, and I certainly can't prove my perspective is better than yours, but I wouldn't be quick to dismiss the impact of true stories on listeners who are open-minded but also sympathetic to the suffering of others. If Grayson added one more of those to the ones you've already heard, realizing that not everyone has been paying as much attention as you, he might have had an impact. Again, I think it would be particularly effective to name the Congressional District but NOT to name the representative. Naming names tends to be seen by uncommitted audiences as a personal attack that they often dislike.
What kind of new anecdote to add? Here's one about a woman who was deprived of coverage because she's an undocumented worker, but the same story could be repeated about any number of individuals uninsured for other reasons. This report, copied from another blog, came from a physician who treated her. See what you think in terms of how Grayson's audiences among the public might react, leaving out the details of this woman's undocmented status.
"Just today, I saw a woman who has not seen a doctor for 8 years. She repeatedly has been told she cannot be seen because she is undocumented. She had stomach pain, I sent her the the emergency room, and they called me just a few hours ago to tell me that she has metastatic ovarian cancer. She's been having symptoms for years. She spent the last 30 years cleaning people's houses and caring for their loved ones as a home attendant.
She deserves respect. She deserved to have the chance to be seen before this turned in to such a large problem. She might have been one of the lucky few to have her ovarian cancer found early enough to actually be cured. But instead, because she doesn't have the right documentation, she's going to have a very painful year or two left to her, all of which will be paid for by us one way or another. In my opinion, we would have gotten a better deal, not so much fiscally as morally, had we taken care of her sooner."
What do you think?
November 5, 2009 9:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think that I already know that story and so does just about everybody else in the country. Who doesn't know somebody who has felt the impact from lack of health insurance?
This summer, at a town hall, I shared my mom's story with my congressman, after he'd spent two hours listening to arguments against the public option. She's one of those lack of insurance casualties. Her death took 15 years, once it started. And without insurance, she and my dad lost everything they worked their whole lives to save. I took less than 60 seconds to say that to my congressman, got a little emotional--since she'd been dead about a month at that point--and took a deep breath to steady myself before telling him why I thought the public option was so important. Do you know what he did while I took a breath? He turned away to talk to somebody else and left me standing in the middle of a room filled with people, with tears rolling down my cheeks.
At that moment, I checked out of the healthcare debate. Why should I waste another second of my time writing a letter or making a phone call? It's not as if my letter convinces an elected official to do the right thing. It's only when they get enough letters to see which side can better protect their seats that they do anything about it.
If only half of our representatives had the courage to speak the truth like Grayson does, we'd be in a much better position. He should have read out the stats for the Democratically-controlled districts too. How many people have died or lost their savings in the last 50 years because of our ridiculous health care system? They are all culpable.
November 5, 2009 9:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
You know something, Orlando? In my opinion, what you just said, and what the physician I quoted just said, have far more power to do good, if widely disseminated, than what Grayson has been saying.
Take a moment to compare Grayson's comments, and their tone, with the comments of that physician describing her patient with incurable cancer, for example, and then answer two questions:
1. Whose description of what is happening to people sounds angrier?
2. Whose description of what is happening to people, would make the public angrier?
See what I mean?
I'm truly sorry to hear of your mom's experience.
November 5, 2009 10:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
We have been offering sweet reason to the Republicans and the electorate for decades and it got us exactly zip.
Obama offered false promises -- I single-handedly will bring about bipartisanship -- and a slogan a little bit better than "It's morning in America" and got elected.
Grayson is throwing truth in people's faces -- it's high time for a wakeup call and it has brought more attention to the true issues than any of the above.
November 5, 2009 11:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
This is a relevant post on Grayson over at Firedoglake. I don't necessarily agree with everything in there but I think the author makes many points that desperately need to be considered in this discussion.
http://seminal.firedoglake.com/diary/12548
November 5, 2009 9:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Also see Grayson's interview on the Ed Show:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/33541678#33541984
November 5, 2009 9:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
From where I sit, it looks like the main reason that Grayson is so popular amongst progressives is because he speaks like they do. Listening to him is like reading the comments on TPM, Dkos, HuffPo, - there's no holding back, no worries about whether his comments may hurt his career or his agenda. He speaks the way they wish Obama would speak, he attacks the Republicans the way they wish Obama would attack them - despite the promise he made over and over to the American people that he would not engage in that type of politics.
I don't care what anyone says, Alan Grayson does not have the luxury to speak as he wishes. We all see how the MSM works, we all see how the opposition works. Grayson is not getting his message across to the rest of the country because most of the reporting on him makes him look - crazy. The only result of his campaign (for lack of a better word) is the hundreads of thousands of dollars he has raised.
We need more votes on HCR and I will not give any medals to anyone in Congress unless they announce that they changed a vote from nay to yea.
And I would think that the Left would be more cautious about who they choose as their hero. I mean, so many of you are always expressing buyer's remorse with Obama who also riled up the base and spoke quite well on the issues that concerned you.
November 6, 2009 2:17 AM | Reply | Permalink
The House is suppose to represent the pulse of the public. Grayson is doing just that. Of course the public sometimes goes to extremes and Congress critters, like Grayson, tend to stray into that territory, but not too far else they start looking like Bachmann who is fully enveloped and can't make any sense. As for not getting his message across, you don't understand the message. The message is aimed at the democrat base who are in search of someone in the Party with guts to stand up and state on the record the fraud of the republicans. It will win him the support of the base, after which he can work for the moderate and independent voters. But he needs solid base support first.
November 6, 2009 9:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
I agree that Grayson can help energize the base, but he needs even more to avoid alienating moderate and independent voters. It's possible to do both, and his first comments on Republican healthcare ("Don't get sick") did just that. His latest efforts worry me as being potentially counterproductive, and so I believe his task is not to refrain from speaking, but to do it in a way that works in his favor rather than against him. I've made some suggestions above, and the link Khin provided is another example of how a properly focused Grayson can be a strong voice for progress:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/33541678#33541984
In contrast, reading the names of Republican Representatives, however emotionally satisfying that might seem to reform advocates, is likely to antagonize audiences who are not committed advocates, and in my view was probably a bad move.
November 6, 2009 10:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
Grayson is already in Congress. The only reason he needs to avoid alienating moderate and independent voters is to win re-election. And at the moment, he's decided to make passing important legislation a priority over consolidating power to keep his seat. Will this choice come back to bite him in the ass? Maybe. Maybe not. Either way, I think he's doing what he was elected to do: govern.
November 6, 2009 10:53 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think that if those "independents" (I'm not even sure what that means, btw) are to be believed, then we must assume they don't know where they stand... and need to be shown.
I think A LOT of them were persuaded to vote for Obama precisely because the LIBERALS worked VERY VERY HARD in for the candidate they believed in.
If Grayson has those very same Liberal Dems working hard for him, I think the Independents will follow (because that's what they do).
I do not think that that Grayson needs to satisfy the Independent voters nearly as much as he needs to satisfy his base.
I think if Grayson were to placate the independent voters he'd almost certainly alienate his liberal base... and THAT would be political suicide to be sure.
Play to your strengths, right?
November 7, 2009 10:31 AM | Reply | Permalink
An addendum regarding the link I posted above. Grayson's remarks there, unlike his (in my view) ill-chosen recitation of Republican names in Congress, are both strong and persuasive. However, as implied by khin earlier, he does exaggerate on the one point of claiming that the proposed reforms would achieve universal coverage. The House version would take a large step in that direction, but would still leave millions uncovered.
As to Orlando's comments, I believe that Grayson is trying to talk to the American public in general, not just to his district. It's important for him and others to consider the impact of his remarks on moderate and independent voters throughout the 50 states, and I'm concerned that he may be hurting the cause with some of his more recent commentary.
November 6, 2009 11:12 AM | Reply | Permalink