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action.firedoglake.com | Supplemental vs. FINAL VOTE RESULTS FOR ROLL CALL 348
Reps that broke promises and positions from the tally on the “Whip Count Tool” for the Afghanistan War and IMF funding supplemental:
Rep. Yvette Clarke
Rep. Steve Cohen
Rep. Jerry Costello
Rep. Peter DeFazio
Rep. Chaka Fattah
Rep. Luis Gutierrez
Rep. Jay Inslee
Rep. Steve Kagen
Rep. Ed Markey
Rep. Doris Matsui
Rep. James McDermott
Rep. Gwen Moore
Rep. Richard Neal
Rep. James Oberstar
Rep. Jan Schakowsky
Rep. Mike Thompson
Rep. Nydia Velazquez
Rep. Melvin Watt
If your representative is on that list, I hope you support whoever their primary challenger is, and if they don’t have one, I hope you’ll run against them yourself.
We need Netroots candidates. We need them organized, we need them at every level of elected-office, and we need them yesterday. How do we do it?
7 Comments
Wow, Steve Cohen, big disappointment.
Yeah, I like Steve Cohen. {Tears.}
Primary their asses, every last one.
They need to NEVER hear the end of this until they are gone.
You have way too much respect for the system. My representative, Jim Himes, ran in a district that’s been Repub for as long as I can remember. He ran as an anti-war candidate and got votes from all sides. If ever an election demonstrated constituent desire it was this one. We wanted out of the wars. He was for the supplemental from the get go. That’s probably true of many of the turncoats, anti-war candidate and supplemental supporter. I think you must look elsewhere for a solution.
Thanks, I’ll snarl at Costello immediately.
Yvette Clarke is for the most part solidly progressive, and I’m not going to give up on her just because Obama and Pelosi successfully twisted her arm in this instance. When her predecessor, Major Owens, announced his retirement, the suitors for his seat included at least one creepy-assed Chuck Schumer wannabe and other middling lights. I breathed a sigh of relief that someone as progressive as Clarke made it through.
The supplemental fight is a disappointment, but we need to be a little discerning regarding which Reps we try to improve and which we summarily try to toss to the dogs.
I’m skeptical that not dragging them by the short hairs constantly will be effective. If they’re able to be co-opted by the center-right Democratic party despite having made explicit their position on an issue to the contrary… then what’s the point of supporting them? They won’t represent us when push comes to shove, and our positions require a lot of shoving.
I’m very disappointed in DeFazio.