Tag: Rob Bishop

An Example of Constituent Communication

Post author By David
Post date April 5, 2010
No Comments on An Example of Constituent Communication

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Two months ago I wrote about my newly solidified position on why we should abolish earmarks. As part of that, I criticized Rep. Rob Bishop and his office for failing to even acknowledge two questions on the subject that I sent the congessman now nearly a year ago.

Somehow my post came to his attention and Rep. Bishop felt that he was being unfairly maligned as his staff could find no record of my questions getting to their office. At some point (I suspect recently) Rep. Bishop discovered that they had received my questions and considered them important (or unique) enough to warrant an individual response instead of a stock answer. The questions were given to the congressman himself and then somehow they slipped through the cracks and been buried. When he discovered his mistake Rep. Bishop took it upon himself to track down my phone number (and it’s not an easy task to sort through the many David Miller’s out there) and offer his apologies and a personal response to my questions.

I was quite surprised when I received his call Wednesday evening and I appreciated very much the time he took to speak with me. His was not some simple two minute call to appologize and share his position on earmarks in answer to my questions. I stead he took the time to listen to my thoughts and enegage in a full conversation until I was satisfied that I was being heard. He did not even attempt to change my opinion on those points where we do not share a common perspective but I finished the phone call confident that we share the same overall goal on the subject of earmarks and that he understands the reasons I think earmarks should become a thing of the past.

Thank you Rep. Bishop. You deserve as public an acknowledgement as the criticism I offered before.

Tags Rob Bishop

General

Abolish Earmarks

photo credit: Skrewtape

For some time I have been internally conflicted on the issue of congressional earmarking. Many people, including such diverse characters as President Obama and Congressman Chaffetz, have been vocal about calling for an end to earmarks. Others such as my own Congressman, Rob Bishop, reply that earmarks are not an addition to the total size of our federal expenditures – but simply a direction regarding the spending of money already appropriated. Believers in small government who make that argument say that our focus should be on reducing total expenditures rather than shutting down the earmarking process. Personally, I would like to see an end to earmarking and a significant reduction in total spending. (Earmarks alone are an insignificant portion of our spending.)

Tags earmarks, Elevated, government, Jason Chaffetz, Jim DeMint, money, Obama, reactions, Rob Bishop, thoughts

National

Under-Informed Health Care Debate

Post author By David
Post date October 1, 2009
18 Comments on Under-Informed Health Care Debate

Considering how widely discussed the health care issue is and how long running that discussion has been it is easy for people to think they have all the available and relevant information on the subject. The fact is that despite the appearance of coverage you can only scratch the surface of available information unless you search beyond mainstream news sources. Here’s a letter in the Salt Lake Tribune yesterday as a case in point:

To President Barack Obama and Congress, I say: Negotiate the various health care reform bills — soon. Get the Blue Dog Democrats on board, and pass a bill — soon, before your public becomes so weary of partisan infighting that we oppose anything you pass.

The Republicans, for all their bluster, have not offered any alternative, except our Sen. Bob Bennett with Oregon Democrat Sen. Ron Wyden, and that bill has received only token Republican support. . .

The author is right that the Health Americans Act by Wyden and Bennett has received only token Republican support – largely because it is only fleetingly different from the various Democrat only bills in circulation. On the other hand, he is far from right that Republicans have offered no alternatives – that’s just the line that Congressional leaders and the administration have been feeding to the media. Just browse the sites of Rep. Ron Paul and Sen. Jim DeMint to get an idea of some of the Republican counter-proposals that have been offered. Then consider that for every idea presented by those two members of Congress there must be dozens of ideas that were offered in negotiations before the Republicans left the tables that never received even token consideration by leaders of the various committees.

On the very day the letter was being published Rep. John Shadegg (AZ-03) was talking about one of those non-existent Republican plans that was apparently introduced back in July and cosponsored by Rep. Rob Bishop (UT-01) among others. (h/t Right Truth) As always in the health care debate, each bill should be measured against the findings of David Goldhill to see if it actually addresses the real problems in the health care system. (Shadegg’s bill appears to do better than the bills actually acknowledged by the media from what I’ve seen.)

Although I maintain that being truly informed requires that we look at more information sources than the mainstream media that also means that we have to be discerning about the accuracy of each information source. I think it’s safe to doubt the accuracy of anyone (especially an MD) that believes that our current health care system suffers from a “lack of government regulation.” I’m amazed that someone could seriously argue that the current proposals under consideration represent free market solutions and that solutions based on free market principles would be a good thing while also arguing that the free market is the cause of our health care woes.

Tags Bob Bennett, connections, discourse, health care, Jim DeMint, media, Rob Bishop, Ron Paul, Salt Lake Tribune

Local National State

Tea Party and Town Hall

The real effectiveness of the tea parties is not likely to be known for some time. Two days later various factions are still trying to sort out what actually happened and what it all means. I am encouraged by the prospects that it will turn out to be more than a short-lived release of frustration for political newcomers.

Last night I had the opportunity to attend a town hall meeting with my congressional representative, Rob Bishop. I had heard about these meetings from various sources, but this is the first one to take place since I moved into the district. It was an interesting mix of support for Rep. Bishop and confrontation (speaking about the questions and comments from the audience).

One gentleman, who may well have been a tea party attendee, got up and expressed his frustrations at not having a political home after the supposedly conservative Republican party had forsaken the opportunity to promote conservative government. He asked how he could ever trust the party again. Rep. Bishop gave a very unsatisfactory answer (in my mind) that he would just have to sit back and wait. I later talked to that gentleman and invited him to visit my site – I hope he does so. My answer to the question is that those of us who really believe in conservative principles need to get active in the party and make it answerable to those principles rather than blindly following whoever is incumbent. (P.S. Rob Bishop is far from being the worst Republican Incumbent around these parts.) Sitting back and waiting is a great way to allow the status quo to become ever more entrenched in the party and in society.

I found various statements by Bishop which I agreed with and others that I did not agree with. The subject of earmarks came up multiple times and I found some of his answers insightful. For example, Rep. Bishop recognizes that earmarks are easily used as a distraction that diverts attention while the pile of money being spent continues to grow while the size of the pile is a larger problem than the earmarking process. He explained that earmarks are Congress setting priorities for appropriated money rather than the administration setting those priorities. That left me with two questions that I will demand answers on from my congressman.

If we get rid of earmarks won’t that allow us to focus on the size of the pile of money?
While I might prefer that Congress set the priorities for government appropriations rather than the administration, why should the priorities be set at the federal level at all? (except on truly federal priorities like defense spending) Wouldn’t it be better to just appropriate money to "transportation" and direct that 2% of the money goes to Utah, 5% to California, etc. then let the states and municipalities decide which projects (I-15 expansion, Mountain View Corridor, repaving existing streets, expansion of light rail, to name a few local options) deserve the transportation funding?

Tags change, District 1, money, questions, Rob Bishop

State

Reason To Be Anti-Incumbent

Post author By David
Post date October 16, 2008
4 Comments on Reason To Be Anti-Incumbent

I found this little exchange to be insightful from Congressman Bishop:

. . . the two 1st District candidates snapped at each other, with Bowen accusing Bishop of taking $26,000 in the past four months from the radioactive-waste-storage company.

"I did not take $26,000, I took $28,000," Bishop fired back. "And that’s not company money, I can’t take that. It’s from individuals who work for EnergySolutions. And it’s not my biggest source of revenue."

Only someone who is comfortable in Washington D.C. could swallow the idea that dozens of individuals from EnergySolutions contributing $28,000 to the campaign is not a significant endorsement from the company as a whole or that they would do so without believing that the Congressman was working in the interests of the company that pays them.

I wondered who the biggest source of revenue was for Rep. Bishop and I found this list at OpenSecrets. It has Energy Solutions as the top source of revenue although it lists under $17,000 so it must not be current.

I wish I had all the facts, but I have enough to choose. If Rep. Bishop believes what he said then he’s not the kind of man I want representing me. If he does not believe what he said, then the fact that he said it means he is not the kind of man I want representing me.

I am definitely voting for Morgan Bowen – worst case scenario is that I’ll want to replace him in 2010. I’d say there’s more than a 50% chance that I’ll still want him in 2010.

Tags 2008, change congress, Morgan Bowen, public service, Rob Bishop, Salt Lake Tribune