Stefanik seethes, choosing self-service over public service.
Springsteen talks about America, then Trump threatens `The Boss.'
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Rep. Elise Stefanik is once again choosing self-service over public service.
In front of the television cameras, Rep. Stefanik shows a frozen smile and says she is a team player, but inside she is seething and looking for someone to blame.
After 10 years of humping it across the sprawling 21st Congressional District - Watertown to Potsdam to Plattsburgh - she had finally reached political Broadway when President Donald Trump chose her to represent the United States on the world stage at the United Nations.
Admission to the elite circle of power brokers in the president's cabinet and a luxury penthouse apartment in Manhattan awaited until it was abruptly and unceremoniously taken away by the president.
Someone had to be held accountable, just not Donald Trump.
In an extraordinary piece of reporting by Lucy Hodgman at the Albany Times Union Friday, it revealed Stefanik took exception to the county Republican chairmen choosing her replacement while she awaited permission to resign.
While constituents wondered who local Republicans would choose to succeed Stefanik, Democrats quickly rallied around farmer Blake Gendebien as their candidate.
Would loyal Republican Dan Stec finally get the nod he coveted?
Assemblyman Chris Tague said he had interest.
Liz Joy, who had twice lost to Paul Tonko, was possibility as MAGA-extreme.
And there was Amsterdam sign guy and Trump worshiper - he had a statue made of the president of his club in Florida after all - Anthony Constantino.
Because this was a special election, the rules specified that local Republican Party county chairmen would choose the candidate, if you believed the rules would be followed.
So while Gendebien was out on the campaign trail and raising money, Stefanik's confirmation and resignation dragged into weeks and then months with concern her vote might be critical in passing key legislation in the House of Representatives.
Meanwhile, county chairman around the district were getting antsy.
They began vetting candidates when it became clear Stefanik had one foot already in the United Nations job.
The Times Union reported there was confusion - and silence - from the Stefanik camp about when she would officially resign, and then some desperation among the county chairs.
Sources told the Times Union unofficial meetings were held between chairs in neighboring counties and a coalition emerged supporting Liz Joy, even though state law said there had to be an official vacancy before voting on a candidate.
There was concern among the national GOP that Joy would alienate moderate voters in the district because she been outspoken in her opposition to abortion, opposed support for LGBTQ protections and admitted to being at the rally at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6.
Despite the pushback, the chairs believed the decision remained in their hands. But as Stefanik's departure got closer, national Republican leadership got involved.
"This is the process: the chairs will pick the next congresswoman, congressman," one local county chair told the Times Union. "So the chairs went out and did that. Then, at the end, it wasn't the way they thought it was to go, whoever `they' are, so at that point it all fell through."
Several GOP sources close to the Republican selection process told the Times Union that Joy's candidacy was rejected by Stefanik, her advisors and Trump's transition team.
That's when Stefanik's nomination was pulled.
And she needed someone to blame.
The Times Union reported, "Tensions have since run high between Stefanik's staff and the chairs who pushed for Joy during the selection process. One chair told the T-U Stefanik personally called him after her nomination was withdrawn to demand that he resign. He said he "saw a different side" of Stefanik during the call and felt she blamed the chairs for losing the U.N. job.
"I'm not resigning," he told the Times Union. "I didn't do anything wrong."
The Times Union also reported that Oneida County Republican chairman Ken Roser said he heard other chairmen were getting blowback from Stefanik and her staff.
It's not as if the GOP chairmen went rogue. They spent months vetting candidates as Stefanik remained in limbo. The Republican chairmen worried Gendebien's campaign was gaining momentum while Casertino began making noise about a third-party run that could divide Republicans.
Up in St. Lawrence County, Nancy Martin was elected to lead the St. Lawrence County Republican committee last month, replacing outgoing chair David LeBeau. The Times Union reported "Stefanik celebrated the turn on social media, praising Martin as a `loyal supporter' and promising `more to come.'"
It was reminiscent of her attacks on university presidents where she took great pleasure in getting people fired.
Stefanik's spokesman sent a warning shot to all the Republican county chairs that independence of its local committees would not be tolerated.
"When a county chair chooses to oppose President Trump and ignore the will of voters on their committee and in their county, there should be new leadership that is respectful to the voters," the spokesman told the T-U.
That means even local Republicans have no say in who to endorse for Congress.
It means something else in Queensbury where Town Board member Tim McNulty also serves as chairman of the Warren County Republican Committee.
I've argued repeatedly that is a conflict of interest.
The Town Board's Ethics Committee also ruled it is a conflict of interest the Town Board needs to address.
I've addressed Town Board twice about the conflict and asked it to address it without action.
These latest revelations about Stefanik's control of the county Republican chairmen - McNulty included - adds another layer of conflict to McNulty's role as a Town Board member.
That is unacceptable.
For instance, the Town Board has repeatedly taken environmentally friendly actions with various green energy projects. What if Rep. Stefanik were to object - that is not what the Trump administration finds acceptable after all - and told McNulty to reverse course in Queensbury?
I don't believe this is a far-fetched scenario.
Would McNulty even have the freedom to back native son Dan Stec for Congress? Apparently, not without the blessing of Stefanik?
Stefanik's latest tantrum comes as no surprise.
She once sulked after a debate and refused to talk to reporters. More than once she went over my head to my publisher about an editorial that was critical of her and demanded it be retracted.
It wasn't.
On another occasion she called a publisher of a local newspaper and demanded that its editor be fired because he felt there was more important stories to cover in his community that Stefanik.
She took offense,
The T-U reporting also said sources among the county chairs had differing viewpoints over how much of a role the the confusion among the county chairs played in the the nominating process, but some said it was "part" or even "a majority" of the reason Stefanik's nomination was pulled.
So Stefanik seethes while making the rounds of the 21st Congressional District hoping for another chance to land a job in Trump cabinet while county Republican chairs try to stay out of her way.
Springsteen goes political
Bruce Springsteen, who has not mused about politics during his recent world tour, took the gloves off in England this week.
Before opening his concert in Manchester with his song "Land of Hope and Dreams," he addressed the crowd:
"The mighty E Street Band is here tonight to call upon the righteous power of art, of music, of rock and roll in dangerous times. In my home, the America I love, the America I've written about that has been a beacon of hope and liberty for 250 years, is currently in the hands of a corrupt, incompetent, and treasonous administration. Tonight, we ask all who believe in democracy and the best of our American experience to rise with us. Raise your voices against authoritarianism and let freedom ring."
Then, later in the show, he said:
In America, they are persecuting people for using their right to free speech and voicing their dissent. This is happening now.
In America, the richest men are taking satisfaction in abandoning the world's poorest children to sickness and death. This is happening now.
In my country, they're taking sadistic pleasure in the pain that they inflict on loyal American workers, they're rolling back historic Civil Rights legislation that led to a more just and plural society, they're abandoning our great allies and siding with dictators against those struggling for their freedom.
They're defunding American universities that won't bow down to their ideological demands. They're removing residents off American streets and, without due process of law, are deporting them to foreign detention centers and prisons. This is all happening now.
A majority of our elected representatives have failed to protect the American people from the abuses of an unfit president and a rogue government.
They have no concern or idea of what it means to be deeply American. The America that I've sung to you about for 50 years is real, and regardless of its faults, is a great country with a great people. So we'll survive this moment.
Now, I have hope because I believe in the truth of what the great American writer James Baldwin said. He said, in this world, there isn't as much humanity as one would like. But there's enough.
Springsteen then sang, "My City of Ruins."
Trump responded quickly on social media with what appeared to be a threat.
“This dried out ‘prune’ of a rocker (his skin is all atrophied!) ought to KEEP HIS MOUTH SHUT until he gets back into the Country, that’s just ‘standard fare.’ Then we’ll all see how it goes for him!”
I hope everyone is paying attention.
Credit rating
I don't pretend to understand something as complicated as credit ratings for countries, but the fact that the United States credit rating was downgraded one notch below the highest triple-A rating seems like it should be of some concern.
The New York Times reported that this was a "repudiation" of what is going on in Washington and the proposed budget that would add trillions of dollars of debt over the next decade, but still mostly a symbolic gesture.
As a fiscal conservative, I think the debt is something we should worry about, but giving tax breaks to corporations and the wealthy is not the way to address it.
The credit downgrade means that each of the three major credit rating agencies no longer give the U.S. its highest rating.
Ken Tingley spent more than four decades working in small community newspapers in upstate New York. Since retirement in 2020 he has written three books and is currently adapting his second book "The Last American Newspaper" into a play. He currently lives in Queensbury, N.Y.
I used to get somewhat despondent when I thought of what the conservative side of our political equation has prevented. Universal health care and a decent place to live ought to be the birthright of all Americans and we have more than enough wealth to do it. By scaring folks that their children will have their sex changed at school and the farm workers might eat Fluffy the cat, among the rest of the lies that their political action require, we take no steps to "create a more perfect union." Springsteen taped a vein of gold in his writing and celebration of the everyday folks and made that life a rightous pursuit. Trump embodies the antithesis of the notion of hard work, honesty, pick ones self up from hardship and make something of yourself. Watching all of this unfold I find cold comfort in Springsteen's words, as I do when PM Stammer refers to the USA today as "Trumps America". I hope the world knows the difference between what once was and what we will become once more. The cancer that is this administration will be eradicated, but just as every cancer cell need to be removed, so it is with Republicans who allowed this felon to go on a rampage to destroy what took 250 years to build. One question I have for Elise, How's the view from under the bus? Get used too it. Trumps sees you as a loser, and he made it so, but that's just how it goes with this crowd.
Bruce Springsteen should have added 2/3 of our SCOTUS are corrupt by taking bribes, and ignoring precedent rulings for women and executive powers. However just as James Baldwin stated, “He said enough” to be meaningful! If our democracy is diminished, Mitch McConnell, Merrick Garland and our spineless legislators are also to blame.