Try comparing Elise Stefanik with Kamala Harris
Immigration fears beginning to trickle down to North Country residents
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By now, we all know that Elise Stefanik was never a small businesswoman at her parents plywood business in the Adirondacks.
That's the fairy tale.
That's not to say she was not an accomplished young Washington professional after graduating from Harvard.
She landed in George Bush's White House.
She helped prep vice-presidential candidate Paul Ryan for his debates.
But when she dropped into our backyard in 2014, she was characterized as small-businesswoman working in the family plywood business in Willsboro.
It worked and Rep. Stefanik has been our congresswoman for the past 10 years without really improving the North Country quality of life.
This bit of ancient history is useful since Rep. Stefanik has joined a couple hundred other elected Republicans in belittling Vice President Kamala Harris.
More than once in recent years, I've heard people criticize the vice president without any real justification. Many say they don't like her.
Here in the North Country, it is rare for public officials to criticize Rep. Stefanik.
With the rise of Harris as a presidential candidate, it seemed appropriate to review the records of both women.
It is something we all do.
Harris graduated from Howard University, a historically black college in Washington, D.C, and received her law degree from the University of California.
Rep. Stefanik graduated from Harvard but did not get into law school.
Harris began her law career in the Alameda County District Attorney's office (Oakland, Calif) before being recruited to the San Francisco district attorney's office where she became the chief of the Career Criminal Division, supervising five other attorneys while prosecuting homicides, robberies and sexual assault cases for persistent felons.
Stefanik joined the George W. Bush administration as a staff member for the U.S, Domestic Policy Council. She later worked in the office of White House Chief of Staff Joshua Bolton.
In 2000, Harris became the city attorney for the city of San Francisco while running the Family and Children's Services Division representing child abuse and neglect cases.
Stefanik founded a blog promoting the conservative views of women based on British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's views.
In 2003, Harris was elected district attorney in San Francisco. While DA, the San Francisco murder rate dropped, Harris pushed for higher bail for criminals and created a hate crimes unit.
Harris created the San Francisco Reentry Division to get non-violent first-time offenders aged 18 to 20 back on track and steer them away from a life of crime, Over 10 years, the program had a recidivism rate that was less than 10 percent.
In 2006, Harris led an initiative to reduce the truancy rate among elementary school youth, including a promise to prosecute parents who children did not go to school. Truancy dropped by 23 percent over three years. No parents were ever jailed.
Stefanik joined Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty's presidential campaign in 2012 as the director of new media where she learned how to tweet.
In 2010, Harris was elected attorney general of California and initiated some of the largest paybacks for Medicare fraud in state history. She was re-elected in 2014, the same year Elise Stefanik claimed to be a small-town business owner in Willsboro. Her record as AG is voluminous and too broad and far-ranging to recap easily here.
It is unclear what Stefanik did as a small-town businesswoman.
Stefanik helped vice-presidential candidate Paul Ryan with his debate preparation, but Mitt Romney lost the election. In 2014, Stefanik left Washington to work in the family plywood business and run for Congress where much of her funding came from sources outside the district.
There are people in government who have substance and experience.
And there are others who pretend to have substance and experience.
I don't expect anyone to favor of all the things Harris did in California, but it is a long and impressive record of doing, well, something.
Rep. Stefanik has a long and impressive record of attacking the media, saying things that are not true, raising lots of money and being prolific on social media.
Do your due diligence and check out both these women.
See what they have done with their lives.
See what they stand for.
You might be surprised at what you find.
Fear on the border
After President Biden dropped out of the presidential race this weekend, Elise Stefanik pivoted on a dime and immediately made Kamala Harris the scapegoat for the immigration crisis after blaming Biden for months.
No surprise there.
In another post on X, she wrote that illegal immigrants were "flooding" across the northern border in her district.
I suspect that's why so many are fearful in her district.
North County Public Radio reporter Cara Chapman recently reported from along the border in Moorers, N.Y. and found jittery residents buying into Stefanik's invasion fears.
Chapman reported there were more than 6,900 illegal border crossings in the Swanton Sector along the border, but that is a trickle compared to the 427,000 encounters along the southern border in El Paso alone.
Despite the fears of many of the residents, Raymond Bresnahan, the border patrol agent in charge in Champlain told a local television station that most of the people crossing were chasing the American dream.
"The vast majority of the people that we catch are still individuals looking for that American dream, trying to get into the United States." Bresnahan said.
I urge you to read the entire NCPR article.
Summer Bash is Aug. 1
The Chapman Museum has extended the deadline to get tickets to its first big summer fundraiser at the Fort William Henry Hotel Carriage House.
Don't miss this event.
Yeah, it is $125 a ticket, but you get dinner, entertainment and free parking to watch the Thursday night fireworks. This will be the highlight of your summer.
Come support the Chapman Museum and enjoy our greatest treasure in the North County - Lake George.
Almanack comments
It's been great to see the comments on my column on the Adirondack Almanack website the past week or so.
Here are a couple of examples:
"Love the articles from Ken Tingley. So informative and hits the beat of what’s going on in our beloved north country."
- Cindy Barry
And this one on Elise Stefanik:
"I love the North Country. I live near Albany and there's nothing comparable in autumn than the drive through Elizabethtown. What I cannot wrap my head around is why Elise Stefanik was ever elected and continues to serve. What has she done for Elizabethtown and tourism? She's never in her district except a week in the summer and when campaigning. What policies has she sponsored and gotten passed? Why do northerners vote for her? Is it solely because of gun rights? It baffles me."
It baffles many of us.
Climate change is real
For the past 30 years, my wife and I have rarely used the air conditioning in our Queensbury home.
It can get warm on summer days, but it usually cools off in the evening and we delight in the evening breeze. Most years, we turn on the air conditioning for a week or so in August if it gets humid.
This year has been different. The grip of humidity has continued all summer long and we have used our air conditioning for most of July.
I saw this little fact on Heather Cox Richardson's column the other day:
"According to the European climate service Copernicus, last Sunday was the hottest day in recorded history. The MAGA Republicans’ appropriations bill for Interior and the Environment calls for more oil drilling, fewer regulations on pollutants, no new regulations on vehicles, rejecting Biden’s climate change executive orders, and reducing the funding for the Environmental Protection Agency by 20%."
It turned out the record did not last long. Monday was even hotter across the globe.
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.
When Harris was running in the primaries for president, she was not one of my top choices. Neither was Biden, for that matter. Of course I ended up voting for him anyway because the alternative was too awful. I figured he would be boring and competent. I was ready for boring and competent! I also figured he picked her as his running mate to check a few boxes to satisfy various constituencies. She stayed in the background mostly, not making waves, doing whatever it is that vice presidents do. When it became evident that Biden’s bid for reelection was not picking up the necessary steam I thought maybe many people felt, as I did, that his age meant she might become president through his illness or death and I just didn’t know enough about her to be enthusiastic about her. It would have been good if during the four years of his presidency someone had emerged as the standard bearer, ready to take over and lead, and let Biden bow out gracefully having righted the ship, but no matter what I still was going to vote for Biden because I think he’s done a great job, and I figured his experience and ability to have smart people around him would make up for his lack of vigor. (Trump is not far behind in age. He is also at that point in his life where incapacitating illness or sudden death is not totally unexpected. Does ANYONE think JD Vance of all people has anywhere near the qualifications to become president at a moment’s notice? Think about that!)
When Biden made his announcement I was surprised. but not shocked. The scenario that had been taking place has reminded me a lot of what takes place when a family decides an elder should stop driving because they just don’t have the reaction time and eyesight to be safe. It takes some convincing, and there usually is a moment when the elder person comes up against a hard, unmistakable reality. In my neighbor’s case it was hitting the gas instead of the brake and driving into the wall at Stewarts. In my mom’s case it was when she was a passenger in my car and I slammed on my brakes and she yelled “What are you stopping for?” and I answered, “Because there’s a deer in the middle of the road,” which she had not noticed. In Biden’s case I think it was his Covid infection. I imagine at 80 even a mild one takes it out of you. I get weary at 62!
I am thrilled to discover that in the 4 years since 2020, Kamala Harris, like a good back-up quarterback, spent her time listening, watching and learning from a good teacher, and is now ready and able to take over and win the Super Bowl. It’s like when Tom Brady stepped in for Drew Bledsoe. She impressed me with her first speech after being endorsed by Biden. She has continued to impress me and apparently many others as well. The torch has been passed. I’m also impressed by her previous achievements, which I hadn’t known in such detail, so thank you for this comparison. It really shows Stefanik in the proper light.
When Kamala Harris was chosen to run as VP with now President Biden, I read her book, The Truths we Hold, an American Journey. A great book which I recommend. I was def impressed - with her upbringing, her values, her goals , her accomplishments, her determination . Throughout her career, She saw problems and attacked them to accomplish what was in the best interest of the people of California . She stood up to corporations and put them in their place. I was impressed and admit was disappointed that I did not see that energy as VP. But the role of VP has always kinda been “ in the background”. In the short time ( this week) that she has been campaigning to finalize her candidacy for president , I see the energy , drive, and determination that I suspected she possessed. So I am encouraged. We now have a candidate who will work hard to tackle problems and correct for the benefit of ALL AMERICANS, not just the privileged, entitled. If we really care about the future of our country, let’s get behind a candidate who will put country before title and before ego and arrogance