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Holding Them Accountable – Richard Shelby Edition

Even In a One-Party State, You Don’t Need To Lie Down And Take It

By: Repair_Man_Jack (Diary)  |  February 26th, 2013 at 10:53 AM  | 

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Voters In AL Hold AN Incumbent Senator Accountable

Voters In AL Hold An Incumbent Senator Accountable

In many states and many places people believe that elections are the only time participation is required in a Democracy. You show up, you vote, you wash your hands of it until they bother you again. Many citizens vote the way many loosely-affiliated Christians trek over to the local church once on Christmas and again on Easter. Check the block. Move on with life. Never mind that you are being robbed blind and governed dishonestly as soon as your back is turned.

Fortunately for us, regrettably for Republican Senator Richard Shelby of Alabama, not all Americans have degenerated into Amerikans. Quite a few people in Alabama found the time and volition to turn away from another riveting episode of SpongeBob. It seems they are engaged in behavior hostile to the continued cavorting of our disingenuous politicians. Fortunately, the GOP rank and file in Alabama did not take kindly to Senator Shelby’s having announced his support of Secretary of Defense nominee and former Republican Senator Chuck Hagel.

You see, according to Senator Shelby,

“He was a pretty good Senator,” Shelby said. “I don’t like a lot of things he’s said, but you’ve got to think who would come after him.”

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Bad nominee sucks less than whoever Obama would nominate next. Senator Shelby is voting for Chuck Hagel because the alternative is probably Meatwad* from The Aqua-Teen Hunger Force. Give it up, Jake. It’s Obamatown.

But Republican constituents are not accepting Senator Shelby’s capitulation. The State steering committee has apparently gotten quite the earful. It apparently hasn’t been a joyful noise. They’ve even taken the rare step of passing a resolution asking Shelby to retract his position before it hangs out there in public and embarrasses other Republicans.

Sen. Richard Shelby to “reconsider and reverse his decision to support Senator [Chuck] Hagel to be Secretary of Defense.” The resolution, passed early this afternoon, blasts Hagel for statements “favorable toward” countries “that we believe to be enemies of the United States of America,” and also criticizes him for “not being a supporter of Israel, the only dependable ally the United States of America has in that part of the world.” It notes, too, that “many Alabama citizens have expressed outrage at Senator Shelby’s decision.”

The citizens are awake. It’s not quite bedtime for democracy down here.

“It has been an outpouring from people across the state,” State Republican Chairman Bill Armistead told me. “There have been phone calls from a lot of people, plus we’ve all been approached by people we know at churches and in our communities. I haven’t seen anything this strong in opposition to something done by one of our representatives in Congress in a long time.”

Oh, and remember how dead The Tea Party was? They apparently were struck by lightning and revived by the recent nominations of Chuck Hagel and Jack Lew.

This is not totally surprising; given the dependence many people in Alabama have on Redstone Arsenal and Ft. Rucker. Yet it still ranks as one of the better pieces of news I’ve read in a few days. People are motivated. People are participating. We can still try. That means Senator Shelby doesn’t get a free six-year Hall Pass just because he wins perpetual reelection in a one party Republican State. This means American voters are doing their jobs. Fight on, Americans! Keep them accountable.

*-That’s nerd humor. It in no way implicates Congressman Nadler from New York.

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  • Finrod

    We need more of this. I’m tired of RINOs being re-elected in solid red states. Shelby isn’t a RINO, but it’s taking positions like this that turn conservatives into RINOs with time.

  • Melody Warbington

    Tea partiers and GOP women’s groups have led the charge on this. We’ve been making calls for weeks. It’s about time the AL-GOP got on board. They would do well to listen to grassroots activists.

    For those in Alabama (or elsewhere), even if you don’t want to join a tea party, we have a great site (linked below) with calls to action for anyone just looking for information on what needs attention. For example, we’ve started the Alabama Legislative Watchdog group which focuses on state/local issues through various means, including sending folks to Montgomery to sit in on committee meetings and legislative sessions wearing our bright yellow buttons to identify our groups. We also have an adopt a legislator program by which we track votes, bill sponsorship, etc. and share that information with our members, families, friends, etc. Legislators are starting to take notice.

    http://rainydaypatriots.ning.com/main/

    RMJ, not to threadjack, but the most pressing matter facing Alabama citizens at the state/local level is the need to repeal/defund Common Core. Next couple of days are critical. More info is http://www.redstate.com/rightwingmom52/2013/02/21/top-down-education-rotten-to-the-core/ to move the discussion to the proper thread.

  • BA Cyclone

    Agreed. And capitulation like this demoralizes both the base and particularly those voters who sympathize with Republicans but are disgusted with the brand name and have no will to fight for recapturing the brand.

  • sta46

    I read this article yesterday and it is VERY powerful. Every single person at this site should read it and forward it to everyone you ever knew.

  • http://www.TerriersOfTheRight.blogspot.com Flagstaff

    I know it’s fashionable to dismiss Repubs who step off the line, but I won’t do it today. Instead, I’ll say that I thought Shelby’s line about Hagel, “He’s about as good of a nominee as Republicans can expect from this administration,” is one of the funniest I’ve heard in politics. He managed to insult both Hagel and Obama at the same time.

    Beyond that, he was probably right. Obama has no friends except on the far left. Who knows who we might get. Although Hagel has always seemed to me to be a dolt, I haven’t heard that he isn’t a patriot.

    I wish there had been as much pushback on Geithner.

  • stewco

    The final vote was 58-41. Will Senator Shelby face a primary?

  • stewco

    Senators Shelby and Paul voted for Hagel’s confirmation. What does this say about Senator Paul?

  • gmat

    He will be 80 then. My guess is he will retire.

  • stewco

    Senator Paul’s aye vote will likely be a surprise to many here, but I’m not too surprised. On some level Senator Paul is a pragmatist, from what I’ve seen, and he thinks this fight wasn’t worth the political capital and investment for a solid outcome. It ultimately gains him more capital to have voted aye here so he can discuss his non-partisanship when it comes to more serious issues. A pretty sophisticated calculation.

  • gmat

    I’m glad to someone besides me citing Codevilla on this site. I started reading him when my son had him for a class at BU. More good stuff here:

    http://www.claremont.org/scholars/id.25/scholar.asp

  • Melody Warbington

    Shelby was asked recently if he was going to retire. His response was to ask what would he do. He has no current plans to retire, but we can hope.

  • Melody Warbington

    gmat & stewco, the problem is that they refused to listen to their constituents. Y’all can call it pragmatic, stubborn, not worth the fight, or whatever else you want, but grassroots activists here in Alabama are calling it a deaf ear. It’s not something we’re going to forget, and ultimately, it’s going to cost Shelby plenty at home. “Non-partisanship” isn’t going to go over well.

  • Melody Warbington

    I’ll dismiss Shelby, Flagstaff. We sent a message to Shelby and Sessions, and they flat out ignored us. We’re sick of it. The Shelby vote was expected, but word on the street among activists is that Sessions caved, and folks are angrier about him than Shelby at the moment. Sessions has lost a lot of goodwill by refusing to listen to his constituents at home, even among those of us who like him.

  • gmat

    Good question . Voted against cloture twice, most recently this morning, then voted for Hagel this afternoon?

  • stumpy

    As an Alabamian, we need to send Shelby to the house. He has been in Washington too long. He is too much a part of the good ole boy and elitist attitude that resides there. While generally pretty good on most issues, Shelby is not the rock solid conservative a state like Alabama could send to DC. We need a Demint/Cruz/Lee type Senator. Leave the get alongs for purple states. Sessions is less entrenched and generally more conservative, so I would rather get rid of Shelby, then work on Sessions.

    I believe a lot of these votes are designed to scam the voters. Each “conservative” Senator gets a few issues to rail on and make the Sunday and radio talk show circuit. This publicity gives the low info voter the impression that Senator X is a solid conservative. Then they betray us on countless other votes which aren’t publicized. They always then appear to be solid, but really are squishy. Hopefully conservative Alabamians are catching on.

  • rabun1016

    I think it says you have to pick your battles. If everything is important, then nothing is important.

  • Repair_Man_Jack

    I coming around to that view. He and Spender Bacchus both. We’d do much better against the whold DC machine if we had reps and Senators that truly practiced what crazy Movement Conservatives like myself preach. Moe Brooks could be ready…He seems like the best of our House Delegation. Gov. Bentley would be choice #2, but I’m not as sold on him.

  • stewco

    I don’t think it’s going to hurt Senator Shelby in the long term, honestly. He’s an astute and seasoned politician. He’s managed to make it as a Democrat and a Republican for the long haul. You don’t have that staying power without knowing when to allow a President someone he’s selected and when to draw hard lines for conservative principles on financial issues. I think he’s wise in how he chose here.

  • Melody Warbington

    Are you kidding, RMJ? Downright idiotic. Does the mayor have any evidence to support the need for this? That is, was this a problem after the tornadoes hit? If so, it certainly wasn’t publicized. What I do recall, however, is that when the flood hit Nashville, what prevented the looting were the homeowners letting the criminal element know they would shoot those intent on doing harm.

    I’ll send this along to some tea party folks I know.

  • Melody Warbington

    Oh, tell me, stewco. When did Shelby ever draw a hard line for conservative principles on anything?

    We’ll see if his vote hurts him, but I know without a doubt that folks are getting fed up with the lack of spine. Anyone who steps up to primary him will get support on the ground which will at least cost him money.

  • http://www.TerriersOfTheRight.blogspot.com Flagstaff

    I understand that. We have the same problem already with our new Senator, Jeff Flake. He has signed on with McCain and the others on the Immig. Reefer package. Lots of bad will.

    The excuse by all of them is that “border security must come first,” but of course it will be only a fig leaf. You would think they would know it, but they keep making the mistake of trusting Democrats.

    Maybe that’ll be Obama’s gift to Republicans. They may finally realize Democrats can’t be trusted.

  • http://www.TerriersOfTheRight.blogspot.com Flagstaff

    Good link.

  • stewco

    Voted against violence against women act.

  • Melody Warbington

    Wrong, stewco. Shelby voted for VAWA. Try again.

    http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=113&session=1&vote=00019#position

  • stewco

    You’re right! Do you think he will be pirated?

  • stewco

    Primaried?

  • Finrod

    I would say the cloture vote is the more important of the two. Rand voted against cloture and for the nomination; McCain voted for cloture and against the nomination. I’d defend Rand’s position before I’d try to defend McCain’s.

  • Melody Warbington

    Both, I hope. Pirated (as in I’d like to pirate him out of the Senate) & primaried (same thing). LOL.

    So I’ve answered your question. You didn’t answer mine.

  • stewco

    Hr8, treaty act 112-7 for starters.

  • Melody Warbington

    Hr8? You meant the bill dealing with the fiscal cliff by allowing
    income-tax rates on affluent Americans to rise and delaying the
    sequester for two months? Some would argue it’s not a conservative principle to raise taxes.

    I give on the Treaty Act. Good for Shelby, but one vote doesn’t make him a stalwart of conservatism.

  • rangermom3624

    It is time for Senator Shelby to go. We need to find a new truly conservative candidate in 2016 ( the next time he is up for re-election. It is time for term limits. Shelby must go!!!