Search Results for: Reichert

Apparently, I’ve offended the delicate sensibilities of the TNT’s Patrick O’Callahan, who thinks my posts on Dave Reichert’s brain are “vile.”

A rather vile post on the thestranger.com two weeks ago, “What’s wrong with Reichert’s brain?,” speculated that the head injury U.S. Rep. Dave Reichert suffered last February had more or less left the 8th District Republican a confused punch-drunk unfit for Congress.

The author, David Goldstein, cut-and-pasted excerpts from a UCLA medical website into lurid accounts of Reichert’s injury and theorized that the congressman had an atrophied brain – “Which leaves me wondering if the 8th CD is on the verge of re-electing a congressman with an… um… intellectual disability.”

Uh-huh. You know what some people might also find kinda “vile” Patrick, especially coming from the editorial page editor of an almost-major daily newspaper? Completely mischaracterizing somebody else’s words. For example, far from describing Reichert as “a confused punch-drunk unfit for Congress,” I merely quoted Reichert’s own “lurid account” of his injury, cited the medical literature, and then posited this rather measured conclusion:

Thus it is not unreasonable to expect that a brain trauma as severe as that described by Reichert, in a man of his age, and untreated for so long, could very well have resulted in some degree of permanent neurological impairment.

To be honest, Reichert has always struck me as “a confused punch-drunk unfit for Congress,” even before his injury, but those are O’Callahan’s pithy words, not mine.

Of course, it’s not really my words that O’Callahan and others find vile, but rather, the subject matter. What offends O’Callahan is that I would dare speak publicly what his colleagues have been whispering quietly for some time. So in my own defense, I’d like to suggest the following analogy:

Let’s say the Mariners were about to sign a particularly sought after free agent pitcher who, one of the TNT’s sportswriters discovers, had failed to disclose the severity of an injury to the elbow on his throwing arm, suffered during a freak, off-season gardening accident. Would it be vile to report on the details of this injury, and to speculate whether he may have suffered any long term or permanent damage?

No, of course not. We pay pitchers to hurl balls, so an elbow injury would be rather relevant.

Congressmen, on the other hand, we pay to make decisions. To deliberate. To negotiate. To, dare I say, debate.

In other words, we hire our congressmen to use their brains, in the same way we hire pitchers to use their arms.

Dave Reichert, by his own admission, suffered a severe brain trauma — much, much, much more severe than he or his staff at first let on — and while it may be an uncomfortable and sensitive subject to broach, it is completely and utterly relevant to the job he is seeking. And that, I assume, is why both Politico and the Seattle Times eventually picked up the story.

No, if there’s anything “vile” about this incident, it’s the way some local journalists, out of politeness or civility or whatnot, have been complicit in Reichert’s effort to hide his condition from voters.

From: David Goldstein

Subject: Rep. Reichert’s medical records

Date: September 30, 2010 9:27:31 PM PDT

To: Darren LIttell, Dave Reichert for Congress

Darren,

While my recent Slog post, “What’s Wrong With Reichert’s Brain?” was generally well received, some readers wondered if it was fair to Rep. Reichert to speculate about his health, based on such limited information. And so in an effort to maintain the highest level of journalistic integrity, I am writing to formally request that Rep. Reichert release the medical records regarding his recent brain trauma.

Please rest assured that I fully understand the confidential nature of these documents, and as an advocate for the disabled, will treat their content with the utmost respect.

Sincerely,

David Goldstein

http://www.horsesass.org/
“Politics as unusual.”

I remember once in elementary school being absolutely mortified to quickly lose a game of chess to an opponent who… well… let’s just say he wasn’t one of the brightest kids in the school. And that’s how I imagine the League of Conservation Voters should feel after endorsing Rep. Dave Reichert:

The League was aware of the comments Reichert made this summer — revealed on political blog Horsesass.org, in which Reichert can be heard referring to environmental votes as “chess pieces” for re-election — but Palamuso said those comments didn’t stop the group from endorsing him.

And neither apparently did Reichert’s own voting record, forcing the LCV to establish a new low for endorsements, at least in regards to its own widely promoted National Environmental Scorecard. For example, in 2009, Reichert earned a 64% score from the the LCV for his environmental votes (two points up from his lifetime average), the lowest of any of the 42 House and Senate candidates they’ve endorsed this cycle thus far.

To put that in perspective, at 64%, there are actually 351 members of Congress with a higher LCV score than Reichert… 310 of whom did not earn an LCV endorsement.

That’s some curve they’re grading on, at least when it comes to Reichert. And that’s some awfully bad chess those duffers at the LCV must be playing, to get outsmarted by a guy with a fist-sized blood clot in his head.

Dave Reichert says he won’t debate Suzan DelBene because his schedule has “already filled up,” but, he adds, “We’re not ruling out debates.”

Nope… doesn’t sound brain-damaged to me.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gtNxpn6NltU[/youtube]

I’m kinda busy today on a side project, but over on Slog I’ve posted a rather massive piece I’ve been working over the last few days, in which I ask, is Rep. Dave Reichert brain-damaged?

And I’m not asking it in a snarky, mean-spirited, metaphorical sense. I’m asking it literally, based on medical literature and recent events that suggest that Reichert’s brain may actually be damaged.

Now, I’m not suggesting that Reichert’s hand-sized cerebral blood clot is necessarily an indication of prior brain atrophy or wasting, or that such a severe head injury, untreated as it was for two months, would have certainly caused permanent impairment.

[…] But extended or even permanent impairment is far from out of the question … thus it is not unreasonable to expect that a brain trauma as severe as that described by Reichert, in a man of his age, and untreated for so long, could very well have resulted in some degree of permanent neurological impairment.

You’ll need to read the whole thing for the background, but I ask you, if President Obama had suffered a similar injury, and then gave an interview like the one in the clip above, don’t you think this would be the number one story on talk radio and cable news?

I’m just sayin’.

By now it’s a familiar pattern to those who really pay attention. Rep. Reichert (WA-08) equivocates on an issue. He refuses to take a stand on an issue that anyone can really pin to him. And then he votes against the interests of his district—and hopes nobody notices.

This time it is about big oil. Reichert recently voted against the CLEAR Act, that was in response to the BP gulf catostrophy. The act got rid of the $75 million oil spill liability cap and revamped Federal oversight of the offshore oil industry.

And…

…[i]n addition to a number of Gulf Coast restoration and research programs, the bill also fully funds the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) at $900 million, using money generated from oil and gas drilling royalties, and closes a loophole that exempts oil and gas projects from the storm-water runoff regs under the Clean Water Act. Another major onshore reform is the removal of “categorical exclusions” used to exempt some drilling applications from environmental review on public lands.
[…]

“Americans will be asking, ‘Will Senators stand with the people or the polluters?’” Todd Keller, senior manager of Public Lands Campaigns for National Wildlife Federation, said in a release.

We now know where Reichert Stands…with the polluters.

This is precisely the type of vote that Reichert could have used to make a bold statement in favor of his more-environmentally-aware-than-average constituents. Hell…he could have used this vote to do a little damage control following his embarrassing semi-private statement about pandering to the environmentalists. Instead, he voted with the Party of NO!™ (ideas) and against the interests of his constituents. Apparently, Republican obstructionism is more important to Reichert.

Fortunately, Reichert is pretty much impotent as a legislator—the act passed in the House without any acts of courage on Reichert’s part.

There are 178 Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives, but according to the National Republican Congressional Committee only nine of those seats are vulnerable. And once again, one of those vulnerable seats belongs to our very own Rep. Dave Reichert.

That’s quite an accomplishment for Reichert, in a district that has never voted for a Democrat, and that under Jennifer Dunn’s tenure was a consistent cash cow for the NRCC, rather than the bottomless GOP money pit it’s proven in recent years. That’s just gotta be an irritant to NRCC retention chair Mike Rodgers, who is counting on his incumbents to be financially independent as Republicans go on the offensive in 2010.

“Our goal is not just to get every one of them to win… but to get everyone one of them to win with no help from the NRCC,” he said.

Fat chance there, at least when it comes to Reichert.

It is still unclear how much of the electoral mood this year is anti-Democratic, or more generically, anti-incumbent. But if it’s the latter, and the NRCC leaves Reichert to his own devices — and bank account — I wouldn’t rule out a surprise this November.

Looks like Rep. Dave Reichert has drawn himself a teabagger challenger, and he appears to be a doozy.

Ernest Huber, with 21 years of service to his name in the United States Army, Air Force and Navy (what… he couldn’t hack the Marines?) has now officially filed with both the SOS and the FEC, and has some pretty harsh words for the incumbent:

Reichert has sold us out and has disqualified himself for office.

In 1997, King County Executive Ron Sims, a Progressive, appointed his friend Dave Reichert as King County sheriff.  Sims and Reichert endorsed each other in 1997 and 2001.  In 2004, Reichert was elected as a Republican to Congress from the Eastside’s 8th Congressional District.  He has voted against our party in Congress hundreds of times, and has had no bills enacted.  He’s a follower, not a leader.  Reichert has been called a RINO, but he is much worse.  His ideology is “moderate” Progressivism.  Our district is not Progressive.  He does not represent us. Reichert has to go.

Reichert’s sole job is on the corrupt Progressive Charlie Rangel’s House Ways and Means Committee.  It oversees borrowing by the Treasury Department’s Bureau of the Public Debt from the private Federal Reserve bank.  It allocates money, then writes the nation’s tax bills and raises revenue to pay for the debt.  This Committee is a cesspool of pork, earmarks, lobbyists, and bankers.  Reichert is also on its Oversight Subcommittee, which theoretically investigates wrongdoing by Obama’s administration. Remember that as you read the following samples of his voting record, because Reichert is an insider who knows exactly what he’s doing to us, our district, and our nation.  This is cold-blooded betrayal.

And Huber only gets more strident from there, as he launches into a 9,000 word “Conservative Manifesto” that includes such teabagger staples as repealing health care reform, eliminating both the IRS and the Federal Reserve, closing off the Mexican border and deporting all “invaders,” and immediately deposing the “radical communist” Obama:

After his election, Obama and his followers began incrementally overthrowing our government and installing a dictatorship. They must be immediately arrested and jailed by whatever means necessary. Impeachment can come later.

Now that’s the kinda plain spoken patriotism that makes one proud to be an American, and if our local Tea Partiers have any integrity or balls, you’d think they’d rally to Huber’s support, rather than sheepishly collude with a RINO who appeases environmentalists (or “Leninists,” as Huber calls them) and votes Yes on “Soviet-style” cap and trade.

But of course, our Tea Partiers don’t have integrity or balls — they’re just pawns of the usual corporatist suspects — so don’t expect Reichert to spend much time looking over his shoulder to the right this cycle, as he instead tries to patch up his moderate image after the embarrassing leaked audio fiasco.

Apparently, after four years of championing Rep. Dave Reichert for his “conscience-driven independent streak,” the Seattle Times editorial board finally suspects that he might be a little “cynical.”

WHAT was 8th District Congressman Dave Reichert thinking?

Reichert, three-term congressman from Auburn, told a recent gathering of Republican precinct committee officers that to remain in office there are “certain moves, chess pieces, strategies I have to employ.”

He said he toes the party line most of the time but suggested a few select environmental votes keep environmental groups from spending millions of dollars to defeat him. How cynical.

And in tomorrow’s editorial, the Times finally admits that Reichert did not catch the Green River Killer.

Kudos to Jim Brunner at the Seattle Times for finally getting Rep. Dave Reichert on the record about the embarrassing leaked audio in which he brags to room of Republican PCO’s about taking environmental activists “out of the game” in his district with a few well placed, cynical votes.

Reichert tried to laugh it off as “tongue in cheek,” just so you know.

But considering their scoop — I know other reporters have attempted, and failed, to get a comment from Reichert — um… 3PM on a Friday afternoon before a three-day weekend? Could the Times have buried this any further?

Brunner writes that he’s been meaning to get to this sooner, and that he even posted on his day off, and I’ve got no reason to doubt him. But it’s awfully damn frustrating to see Reichert consistently get the benefit of timing, as well as doubt.

I’ll take everybody at their word here (except, of course, Reichert), and just say that the Times owes DelBene a raincheck which, if they’re as fair and balanced as they claim to be, they’ll ultimately deliver.

Reversing a position he took in the heat of his 2006 reelection campaign, U.S. Rep. Dave Reichert joined 170 fellow House Republicans in signing on to a letter to FCC Chair Julius Genachowski, urging him not to proceed with plans to protect Net Neutrality by reclassifying broadband as a “telecommunications service.”

In a 2006 debate with challenger Darcy Burner, Reichert claimed strong support for Net Neutrality in response to a question from the Seattle Times’ Ryan Blethen:

I also support net neutrality. [The Internet] should be an equal place where people to come, equal companies to come. It should be the choice of the people, when they Google, the biggest company doesn’t come up, but the company that the people have chosen as the most important site pops up. That’s why I supported, and voted for, net neutrality.

Yet now that Reichert feels safely ensconced in incumbency, in an arguably Republican-leaning year, he has apparently abandoned his former stance, and joined colleagues Doc Hastings and Cathy McMorris Rodgers in toeing the Republican Party line against the interests of his Internet dependent district.

Not that such an unprincipled reversal should come as much of a surprise from a congressman who, in the absence of reporters, routinely brags about the calculated manner in which he casts his votes. Did Reichert ever really support Net Neutrality? Did he even understand the issue? Or was this merely a position he was advised he had to take when facing off against the net-savvy Burner in his net-savvy district, and in the midst of a blue wave election?

And given the way Reichert proudly claims (behind closed doors) a “90/10” Republican voting record in what he acknowledges to be a “50/50 district,” voters must wonder if there any issues on which he can be trusted to take an unwavering, principled stand. As Josh succinctly explains over at Publicola:

We’re not rubes, we get how politicians work. However, Reichert’s candor belies the credit he’s been given by Seattle Times for being “principled,” a reason they’ve given their hundreds of thousands of readers to vote for him.

More important, if Reichert isn’t an environmentalist at heart, voters should know that because when push comes to shove on future bills (when he’s more confident with his long term incumbency), he may feel comfy voting his real conscience.

That’s assuming Reichert actually has a “real conscience” on anything other than abortion, the one issue he privately admits drove him into the arms of the anti-choice Republican Party.

So much for his “conscience-driven independent streak.”

Add the inside-the-Beltway National Journal to the list of publications that has picked up on the story of Rep. Dave Reichert’s leaked audio.

“Now, first of all, are there any reporters in the room?” Rep. Dave Reichert asks before getting “honest” with Republican PCOs about the way he cynically plays local environmentalists. You’d think that alone would be enough to pique the interest of any reporter, let alone those at the Seattle Times, the newspaper of record in WA-08. But, well, apparently not.

Huh.

The Stranger was quick to pick up the story, as was Publicola. The Seattle P-I and the TNT covered it, if only on their blogs. And this morning it hit the front page of Daily Kos.

But so far we’ve heard nothing but crickets from the Seattle Times in regards to the leaked audio of Rep. Dave Reichert explaining is cynical environmental votes to a roomful of Republican PCOs.

Huh. Feel free to speculate why.

I don’t mean to rub it in too much to my friends in the environmental community, but following up on yesterday’s piece about Rep. Dave Reichert’s embarrassing leaked audio, I just can’t help but post a copy of this invitation to a Reichert fundraiser held this March, hosted by Washington Conservation Voters executive director Kurt Fritts and a bevy of WCV board members.

Reichert is heard on tape bragging to a closed-door gathering of Republican PCOs about how he’s cynically taken the environmental community “out of the game” in his “50/50 district” with a few well placed, pandering votes, but in fact, he’s being all too modest. Far from kneecapping him, like enviros did to Rep. Pombo in California, the WCV actually held Reichert a fundraiser. And for what? A 64 percent rating on the League of Conservation Voters National Scorecard?

64 percent. Last time I checked, 64 percent was a “D” grade.

Now I’m not questioning the intentions of the WCV folks who attended that funder (well, maybe Bruce Agnew’s), but come on… that’s one helluva curve. Reichert does barely enough to get a passing grade, then brags to Republican PCOs about how he’s duped you… and you give him money!

Me, on the other hand, I passionately and genuinely defend your issues, and yet I don’t think I’ve seen a single WCV board member contribute to my fundraiser.

Huh. So how cynical do I have to be in order to earn your financial support?

Rep. Dave Reichert’s “conscience-driven independent streak” was on display once again last week in a closed-door meeting with 8th Congressional District Republican PCO’s, where the three-term congressman attempted to defend the strategy behind his handful of pro-environmental votes. But before speaking frankly, he had to make sure that he was amongst friends:

Now, first of all, are there any reporters in the room? Does anybody recognize … are there any people in here that you recognize as strangers? So we know that all of us in here are family, right?

Well, apparently not, hence the leak of this secretly recorded audio from the meeting, which I now provide to you, totally unedited:

[audio:http://horsesass.org/wp-content/uploads/ReichertEnvironment.mp3]

Aren’t full-featured smart phones wonderful?

Rep. Reichert goes on to explain the “certain moves, chess pieces, strategies” he must employ to hold his “50/50 district,” even if it means breaking with his party, and his conscience, to occasionally cast a vote in favor of the environment.

Uh, I just wanted to be honest with you. You know Jennifer Dunn was an environmentalist, uh, in her votes, too. Uh, she was also pro-choice. I don’t know if most of you remember that now. But, but, if you want to hold on to this district, there are certain, there are certain things that you must, uh, do. This is a 50/50 district.

Notice how Reichert distinguishes between being an environmentalist, and being an environmentalist in one’s votes. That’s kinda the whole theme here.

Now if you look at Senator Brown’s race, uh, he took, in order for him to win that race in Massachusetts, it took 60 percent of the independent votes to win. Now you may not get, if you watch Senator Brown’s votes now over the next six years you might say, “What the heck… why did we vote for him?” you know, Massachusetts people. But he’s going to be maybe 70/30, maybe he’s going to be an 80/20, but at least you don’t have a 99 percent/one. You know 99 D, one percent R. Uh, you have a 70/30, 80/20. You have got to pick your battles.

Hear that? You gotta pick your battles. And while Reichert loves to regale his audiences with tales of being shot at, and staring the Green River Killer straight in the eyes (indeed, at almost six and a half minutes, this may be the longest I’ve ever heard Reichert go without mentioning his stint as sheriff), hell if he’s gonna take on those scary, hemp-wearing, granola-crunching, tree-hugging environmentalists.

Uh, if you look at the Pombo race in California – all of you remember Mr. Pombo? – he was a 20 percent. He had 20 percent victory in California. He was a huge roadblock to the environmentalists. They came in – was it two years ago we lost? – two or four years ago he lost. The environmental groups came in with millions of dollars and flipped that 20 percent, 20 points, they flipped that district. He lost.

And Reichert…?

I only have two to three percent to play with, every two years, and I have to raise three to four million dollars to stay in, to do it. I am a 90/10. 90 to 10, if you look at my votes. All the TARP votes are no, all the stimulus package votes are no, the health care I’ve been no all three times.

Let’s be clear: Reichert is no environmental leader, and he sure as hell doesn’t want to be perceived as one, at least not behind closed Republican doors. He votes 90% with his Republican leadership, and that other 10%…? Well, that’s just what he needs to do in order to keep those big, bad environmentalists from kneecapping him the same way they did poor Rep. Pombo.

Wild Sky was a done deal. It was already in its process. It had been worked on for eight years before I even came to Congress. Jennifer Dunn endorsed Wild Sky, and I followed in her footsteps per her advice.

[…] So, uh, you know, it, it, it, was it was a good vote. It was a good move on my part to do that.  … Because I’ve only, I’ve, supported Wild Sky, I’ve supported Alpine Lakes, because of the reasons that I just laid out to you. They are – what I’ve done is taken out I’ve taken them out of the game in this district. They’re out.

Hear that, Washington Conservation Voters and other environmental groups? Reichert has taken you “out of the game” in his district. You’re out.  So… how’s it feel to be played by Dave Reichert?

And it’s not like we all didn’t have a heads up, for this isn’t the first time Reichert has publicly said a little more than he probably should’ve about his brand of pragmatic politics… for example this 2006 speech before the Mainstream Republicans in which he insists on detailing the obvious:

And so when the leadership comes to me and says, “Dave we need you to take a vote over here, because we want to protect you and keep this majority,” I do it.

Of course, less surprising than Reichert’s repeated admission that he blatantly panders to environmentalists in order to maintain his 90% Republican voting record in his 50/50 district, is that the Seattle Times rewarded him for it by outrageously lauding him as a “conscience-driven independent.”

How embarrassing. And not just for the Times. For while environmental leaders may feel like they’ve scored a strategic victory by strong-arming Reichert into compliance, their narrow focus on their own legislative agenda ends up hurting the broader agenda of the progressive community as a whole. WA-08 is a 50/50 district with a congressman who votes 90/10, at least partially because environmental groups have failed to hold Reichert responsible for his hypocrisy.

Were he representing a more conservative district, that might be acceptable, but we could do much better than that in WA-08… if only environmental voters in his district would take Reichert at his word, rather than his vote.