Can we fire Stefanik for not doing her job?

JG3 makes his debut at Clemson; Glens Falls football goes down swinging

By Ken Tingley

If your meal is lousy, you ask to see the restaurant manager.

If the product you ordered online is broken while en transit, you send it back for a refund or a replacement.

If your car is still making that noise after a trip to the mechanic, you bring it back so it runs right.

In all parts of our lives, we demand satisfaction for services rendered, for products purchased.

Except one.

If your congressional representative doesn’t delivery on her promises, if she doesn’t show up for work or delivery good customer service, our only recourse is to vote her out of office.

Every two years, congressional representatives get a performance review from the voters. One year from now, that will happen again and I think Rep. Elise Stefanik should be let go for failure to achieve her stated goals.

She hasn’t led the charge on any meaningful legislation to help us in the North Country.

Her customer service sucks. She never holds town hall meetings to talk about issues with her constituents. When she holds online town halls, the questions are conveniently screened screened. When you complain to her office, you get a form letter. Phone calls are never returned. Many, many people have complained to me about this.

But here is what bothers me the most. She stopped showing up for work a long time ago. She not so much a member of Congress as a member of the Republican Party.

I think not showing up for work is a fireable offense.

If one of my employees at the newspaper had done phone calls, interviewed subjects and regularly promoted what a great story they were working on, but never wrote that story, I would eventually fire them.

We have given Rep. Stefanik 10 years.

What has changed in the North Country?

The small towns are still dying? The populations continues to get older. It’s getting harder and harder to get medical care, volunteer firefighters and emergency services volunteers.

You notice, this is not about any particular position she has taken on any issue. This is about doing the work for the people of this district.

The final straw was last week when Rep. Stefanik sent a five-page letter of complaint against state Supreme Court Justice Arthur Engoron for his treatment for former President Donald Trump during the civil lawsuit filed by the state attorney general.

In her complaint, Rep. Stefanik accused the judge of being partisan because he called Trump “a bad guy” without context during a preliminary proceeding n the case in April.

One of Trump’s attorneys made the argument that Trump was a member of a “protected class” because he was a politician engaged in political speech. Legally, “protected class” usually refers to those being discriminating against because of race, gender or religion; not because they are a politician.

“Donald Trump doesn’t fit that model,” the judge told Trump’s lawyer seven months ago. “He’s not being discriminated against based on race, is he? Or religion, is he? He’s not a protected class. If (Attorney General Letitia) Ms. James has a thing against him, OK, that’s not in my understanding (of) unlawful discrimination. He’s just a bad guy she should go after as the chief law enforcement officer of the state.”

That’s Stefanik’s complaint.

The judge referenced  that the attorney general should go after “bad guys.”

Is this a good use of Rep. Stefanik’s time?

Is this part of her job description?

Does she have a law degree or any other area of expertise which makes her responsible to weigh in on this issue?

Not that I am aware of.

I consider this a conflict of interest and none of her business. When politicians start interfering in the courts, we’re all in trouble.

A young woman was shot to death in Washington County earlier this year for turning around in the wrong driveway. Will she be weighing in on that fatal shooting in January in the name of Second Amendment rights?

I hope not.

Members of Congress and their staffs are not allowed to mix business and politics on our time. But that seems to be what happened here.

I wondered if I could file a complaint.

It turns out there is an Office of Congressional Ethics established as an independent, non-partisan entity to review allegations of misconduct.

I consider not doing your job “misconduct.”

There is an eight-person Board of Directors who must authorized each state of an OCE investigations - and there are a lot of stages. Board members are private citizens, cannot work as lobbyists or be employed by the federal government and must agree not to run for federal office.

The staff consists primarily of lawyers and professionals with expertise in ethics law and investigations. It says it is “impartial in its investigations and collects all relevant evidence whether it proves or disproves an allegation of misconduct.”

I looked up some of their most recent referrals where congressional members were accused of receiving improper gifts, or not filing the right financial paperwork.

None were accused of not doing their job.

Maybe they should be.

Glens Falls football

I’ve been taking in the Friday Night Lights entertainment over at Putt Lamay Field in Glens Falls this year and it has been quite a show.

Two juniors - quarterback Brody Holcomb and wide receiver Kellen Driscoll - have put on an aerial show you don’t often see in high school. It was on full display Saturday.

Unbeaten Glens Falls played unbeaten Ravena in the Class B championship on a blustery day in Guilderland Saturday.  Frankly, Ravena was the better all-around team, but Glens Falls kept making big play after big play with its passing and took the game to the finals seconds when Holcomb’s final pass was picked out of the air by a Ravena defender on the 5 yard line.

The final stats were eye-popping.

Holcomb completed 26 of 47 passes for 392 yards and three touchdowns. Driscoll caught 15 passes for 254 yards and scored three touchdowns.

The 35-27 defeat was a disappointing ending to the season, but the great part is that Holcomb and Driscoll are both back next year.

Correction

It seems like you always get in trouble when you start name-dropping. I mentioned three more long-time employees from The Post-Star last week and naturally got one of the names wrong.

It was Barb Adams who punched the clock at The Post-Star for way more than 40 years.

When she hit the 45-year mark, Gretta Nemcek Stanclift did a story on her - “After 45 years, she is a Post-Star girl - for the newspaper. Barb worked another three years after that story was written.

Another award

It seems like I’m always mentioning retired Post-Star reporter Maury Thompson.

The Warren County Historical Society announced that Maury will be the recipient of the Hon. John D. Austin Jr. Contribution to History Award. He will receive the award at the historical society’s annual meeting on Saturday, Jan. 20 at 11 a.m.

The award honors late Warren County judge John Austin who was also an attorney, historian, genealogist and founding member of the Warren County Historical Society.

Thompson was nominated for demonstrating his dedication to Warren County history through professional work and service.

Congratulations to Maury. He continues to make a difference in retirement.

JG3 is back

Joe Girard III, the Glens Falls product who is still the all-time leading boys basketball scorer in New York, began his fifth and final year of college ball with Clemson this past week.

While Clemson was winning its first two games, Girard managed just one 3-pointer in those two wins.

Clemson won its third straight Sunday afternoon against Davidson and Girard finally found his scoring touch with five 3-pointers and 17 total points to lead the team.

It was strange seeing Girard playing man-to-man defense after so many years at the top of Syracuse’s zone defense.