Political Fun!

Well it’s not every day you get to make your congressman look like an ass in front of 100+ people. And today at Brandeis my congressman, Barney Frank (D-Newton, MA), gave me that chance! He was brought in by the Brandeis Israel Public Affairs Committee (BIPAC) and the Brandeis Democrats to speak about the situation in Iran. After explaining that military force would worsen the situation and that international sanctions were impossible because China and Russia would veto them in the Security Council the following dialogue between me and the esteemed congressman from Newton took place:

Me: so you've ruled out sanctions and military action in Iran. If you're President Frank tomorrow what solution do you propose?

Barney: I try to convince Russia and China to go along with sanctions

Me: In lieu of that what would u do b/c they're never going to go along with them and you know that.

Barney: We make it explicitly clear to Iran that if anything comes out of their nuclear capabilities that harms us or our allies it would have grave consequences for them.

Me: so you're saying we need to sit around till something happens.

Barney: well what's your plan? (Really good dodge there Mr. Congressman!)

Me: I'm not the congressman! (Applause and laughter)

Well at this point Barney looks like a fool so he retorts: Well there's nothing in the constitution that says citizens can't have ideas too.

Of course this isn’t an exact transcript but I believe it is pretty close because I wrote it up soon after. I’m trying to find out if someone recorded the speech so I can get the exact transcript but for now this is what we work with.

What struck me was how petty Barney came off. I called him on the fact that he offered no solutions and rather then fess up he would rather call me out and try to save face. To my defense I’m not the one who is up there criticizing everybody and everything. Unless you’re going to offer a viable solution, get off the damn stage!

The other thing that really struck me was his general tone with me, like I was lower then him. Last I checked you work for me Barney not the other way around! I doubt Barney would have ever taken the same tone with his boss if he ever worked a normal job. I wonder that if he would have known that I was a constituent would he have taken the same tone.

Side Rants

-School trudges on. Just a little over a week of class left and the work is pilling up! Next two weeks should be hell.

-Dani’s Summer Job Watch ’06: Welcome to the 2006 edition of Dani’s Summer Job Watch! Why does it seem that I never have an easy time finding summer work? So far my two big leads are: 1. working at my law TA’s firm downtown 2. selling trolley tour tickets downtown in a nice little colonial era get-up. Send me any leads if you have them!