My Congressman, Maurice Hinchey, NY on C-SPAN now

[Tactical Progressive]

He is directly accusing the Bush administration of lying to start the Iraq war, live on the House floor.

I don't know if he's the first, but he's the first I've heard and he's doing a great job of it. Says even if we do still find some weapons in Iraq it doesn't make a difference because the Bush administration still lied about the certainty and the severity of any threat that Iraq may have posed.

[ithacan]

1. hey, another constituent of Hinchey here!

where are you? I'm in Ithaca, at the very western tip of Hinchey's new district.

Glad to hear he's calling them out like that!

[Tactical Progressive]

5. I've only seen Hinchey a few times on C-SPAN

but he seemed pretty good. It's the first I've seen him doing anything this high-profile.

What's this about Hinchey's 'new district'?

[ithacan]

6. what I mean is

the newly reconfigured district.

Ithaca's been in his district for a while, but the redistricting in 2000 in NY reduced the number of districts in NY State, by 2 I think. Originally Cheney's redistricting plan for NYS had Ithaca taken out of Hinchey's district and stuck into a large majority republican district. (Ithaca is overwhelmingly Dem; in 2000 it went largely for Gore; Nader beat Bush)

The assembly managed to keep Ithaca in Hinchey's district, now the 22nd, but if you look at the map, they configured it in a weird way:



Hey, I'm not complaining though, I love Hinchey and feel lucky to have him as a congressman.

[Tactical Progressive]

9. It looks like Tom Delay style redistricting

I didn't realize that Cheney was involved in redistricting New York.

[ithacan]

10. well, things did not work out the way he planned...

They had plans they thought they'd be able to ram down NY's throats that would be like Texas's, that is, redistricting in a way to eliminate as many dems as possible. You're right, it was a Tom Delay type plan.

Things did not work out for them though, and Cheney's plan was not accepted. Rather, there was the typical compromise, where one Republican seat and one Dem seat were cut. But to do that they really had to gerrymander like crazy, and the 22nd is one result (as is the fact that Monroe County, where Rochester is, is divided between 4 districts!).

[Tactical Progressive]

13. interesting

I had no idea what had happened. You'd think Cheney might have other stuff to take care of besides redistricting New York State. Everybody that has come out of that administration, from Diulio to O'Neil, has said that every single thing they do is a political calculation. Glad NYS stood up to it.

[never cry wolf]

2. He is kicking ASS!!

This is wonderful to hear, all the deceptions!!

[Lindsay]

3. Yes, DU'ers, the Dems DO speak out.

Ya just have to work so darn hard to find out where and when to hear them. Absent C-Span, you'd think they'd all disappeared.

[never cry wolf]

4. This guy is hitting ALL the points

A few of which I didn't even know. Please, everybody write to thank him.

[Tactical Progressive]

8. Marcy Kaptur, D of Ohio was on right afterward

talking about how jobs leaving the country is an epidemic. Gave some good stats and this line: "... free-market fundamentalists like the Washington Post ...". Her main point was that their ideology is now a proven failure.

The Republican after her, Tom Tancredo R-Colo, started off by saying he was going to address Hinchey's long presentation before he gets to his own stuff. He's talking really, really slowly. He's taking a long, long time. He's not saying much of anything in rebuttal, going off into space much of the time. 'What if we waited instead of fighting World War II? Fifty million people died!'. I'm not kidding, that's his response to Hinchey calling for House investigations into the entire Iraq War, from Administration lies about intelligence beforehand, to dismissive war planning negligence during, to no-bid contract fraud afterward. Where is the money going in Iraq and what are our plans? Tancredo: "Who argues that we should not have rebuilt Western Europe? And Japan?" By letting no-bid contractors triple-charge for gas?

And yet, dropped in the middle of all that he still agrees that Hinchey's requests are valid concerns. Hmmm. Maurice might have something going.

[Lone_Wolf]

7. He used to be my Congressman...

but now I'm "represented" by Sherwood "Blowhard" Boehlert. I live 8 miles from Binghamton, but NYS insists through its assinine redistricting that I identify with Utica which is 3 hours away from me.

[ithacan]

11. Boehlert is relatively moderate, but unfortunately

is part of the axis of evil in the House...

[Lone_Wolf]

12. I just wish that they kept me in the same...

I just wish that they kept me in the same district that Binghamton is in. If I want to join any Dem groups of significance in my district, I have to travel quite a ways.

That being said, I am hoping Brian Goodell beats Boehlert. I think Goodell is from Ithaca.