So What Does TOPM Think?

Time to check in on The Odious Patrick McHenry (NC-10, Douchebag), especially since he sits on the House Financial Services Committee that will be hearing testimony from Helicopter Ben and King En-Er-Eee de Eighth I Yam I Yam today. What does he think of UberBailout?

While the Bush administration and congressional leaders on Capitol Hill sweat out the details of a $700-billion rescue package for failing financial institutions, the debate over the bailout is heating up in North Carolina's 10th District.

U.S. Rep. Patrick McHenry of Cherryville sits on the House Financial Services Committee that on Wednesday will listen to and question Secretary of the Treasury Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke.

"I hope to hear in much greater detail the specifics of their proposal," McHenry told television news reporters, "and I look forward to the opportunity to question them on my concerns."
Many congressmen on both sides of the aisle, including presidential candidate Sen. John McCain, want close congressional oversight of any bailout proposal.

"Ultimately," McHenry said, "my responsibility is to the American taxpayer, who will be the underwriter of this dramatic proposal."

Ahh, but this means there's a big fat opening here for his Democratic challenger Daniel Johnson to attack.

But his opponent, Democrat Daniel Johnson of Hickory, faulted McHenry for already siding with the financial institutions against the interests of home owners and families.

"Time and time again, McHenry, who has accepted campaign contributions from subprime mortgage lenders like Countrywide, has taken the side of big Wall Street banks over the families of Western North Carolina," Johnson told political blogger Howie Klein on The Huffington Post. "(He) not only didn't lift a finger to take action before problems in the mortgage industry rose to crisis level, for years he advocated for subprime lenders ... and argued against 'burdensome regulations' on such lenders."

Johnson pointed out McHenry voted against "a comprehensive, bipartisan response to the current mortgage crisis that would have empowered more families to stay in their homes and prevent further disclosures (American Housing Rescue and Foreclosure Prevention Act, HR 3221). McHenry and 13 other House Financial Services committee members also urged President Bush to veto the bill designed to strengthen regulation of Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae and the Federal Home Loan Banks.

"One of the reasons that I am running for Congress is because the economic trends of the past 10 to 15 years — from unfair trade deals to the rising cost of food and fuel to the increasing unavailability of healthcare — has stacked up against the working families of Western North Carolina," Johnson told Klein. "The implosion of big banks like this will make it even more difficult for the people of our district to get the funding to expand their small businesses or buy their first homes.

"The financial meltdown ... shows the great damage done by politicians like Congressman McHenry who abdicated their responsibility to crackdown on abuses in the housing market. While the subprime crisis was caused by the actions of irresponsible lenders and irresponsible borrowers, failure to act to stabilize the housing market affects all homeowners and drags down the entire economy."

Now more than ever we need to get lobbyist-controlled scumbags like Patrick McDouchebag out of office for good. If the Dems can win NC-10, they can win any district in America.

Check out more info on Daniel Johnson and make a donation. Lord knows the folks back home in Hickory need a better Congressman than Odious.

Checking On Patty Boy

It's time once again to check in on The Odious Patrick McHenry. Last week's town hall meeting didn't go over as well as he's hoping, looks like.

On Aug. 14, U.S. Rep. Patrick T. McHenry held one of his annual town hall meetings here in Burke County. I attended this event, hoping to come away with a basic idea of his goals and accomplishments for the 10th Congressional District. Without a doubt, Rep. McHenry's town hall meeting was an eye-opening experience for me.

The meeting focussed on America's energy crisis and McHenry's "solutions."
He began with alternative renewable energy – points I strongly agreed with until things took a turn for the worse. He began talking about the marvels of oil shale (a highly polluting and uneconomical idea) and nuclear energy and a host of other "solutions" for the short term.

Unfortunately, in no way are these viable solutions to the problems we face today.

Nuclear energy, I think, could be a great source of energy, but there are great risks involved. As I pointed out at the town hall meeting, had the 9/11 hijackers directed one jet into the nuclear energy center 24 miles north of New York City, massive amounts of nuclear waste would have been unleashed. The results would have catastrophic, resulting in thousands of immediate deaths and many more in future generations.

When I pointed this out to our representative, he said protections are in place to prevent this and that I was "not factually correct" about this issue. He seems to have forgotten that it is not just the nuclear reactor that must be protected, but also the dry-cask storage facilities and the spent-fuel pools. Many experts know the security measures around these storage areas can be foiled, which is why many congressmen came together in the wake of 9/11 to join in increasing security measures for such nuclear sites.

Folks, if even the Morganton paper is taking Patty Boy apart over this, he's in trouble. If there is any district in the country that needs a serious rescue from a mindless GOP automaton, it's NC-10. Luckily we've got a contender this year in Democrat Daniel Johnson, a brilliant young Navy veteran who lost both his legs in an accident saving a fellow crewman's life. He's done work for Max Cleland and he's a strong example of the new breed of Democrats we're going to need to make some serious changes in Washington, here's his ActBlue page.

It's a tough road. This is a district that has never elected a Democrat. Cass Ballenger ran the place for years before The Odious Patrick McHenry. But now's a perfect time to start.