Bottom Up Politics

What can I say, my mind is overloaded.  My trip to DC had just way too much information for me to process.  I will slowly dribble it out over the next week.

This blog is about what is going on in the “Five Counties” and what I’m up to.

I drove back from where the bus dropped me off in Kalamazoo Sunday nite and got back home at 1am Mon. Woke up at 7am and hitched a ride with Goeff Hansen to meet up with Mike Nofs and Darwin Booher (Candidate for the 35th State Senate Seat) to do some door to door in Marshall just outside of Battle Creek.  Below is a picture of Mike and Goeff and a seperate one of Darwin.

Later we were going to have lunch at a really different Denny’s I had to take a pic of that below; but we made it there late and Goeff had another Dinner to go to back up North at 5:30 so our lunch was on the road.  The other pic was of the group that was leaving who had helped with the door to door.

It was nice to see Steve Sachs again (pictured above) from the Nofs Campaign and Mike himself.  I keep being impressed with Mike and the level of energy he exudes. His Competition is just not a good campaigner.  An inside source told me that they are thinking the Democrat party is in the process of hijacking their own candidates campaign, to try and salvage it.

I don’t know if that is true but it shows just how hard Mike Nofs has been campaigning and for how long.  Representative Hansen told me that he has known Mike for a long time and they served together as state Reps.  Goeff reitterated how hard a worker Mike is.

Well I left with Goeff around 3:30 and got back, I think around 6:00.  I had just enough time to throw on some clothes and head out to Reethes Puffer Highschool in Muskegon to hear Peter Hoekstra give his 4th town hall in the district and the second I had the pleasure of attending.

I am continually impressed with Pete and how well he has handled the townhall format.  His command of the whole Health Care Debate is awesome.  Congressman Hoekstra understands the process and explained it clearly and well to the audience which was between 2 and 300.

Pete is the only politician I have seen who is willing to field unfiltered questions from the audience.  The beauty of the townhall was that Pete spoke briefly and to the point about the mechanics of the legislative process.  He noted that the US House has three Health Care Bills and the Senate also has three.  He then explained that in the next committees they go to these bills can be completely rewritten and then once again after that they can be rewritten again. 

Speaking of unfiltered questions, Pat and Frank Uriarte from the Muskegon County Party attended and below is a pic of Pat asking Pete a question relating to how to keep this bill from becoming law.  Below that is a pic of Marve Engle our 5th Seat County Commissioner and Bill Huizenga, Holly Hughes our National Committee Woman was there also.  Other than that the Muskegon Republicans were sadly under represented. 

The rest of the time was taken up with questions from the audience.  Pete’s ability to manage the crowd started with him quieting down any partisan applause.  A lesser man would of let the partisan applause overcome the opposition: instead he continually shushed down any partisan applause.  It was refreshing to see that and better yet to see an elected politician talk straight not only about his good points but also his not so good points.

Perhaps the biggest “news” was that Representative Hoeskstra said  later this week he and his staff will be releasing alternatives to the Obamacare HR3200.  Pete said they will put out actual bills that will break down the larger bill into more manageable parts.  He intimated 6 or 7 such bills, and that they would be online at his website and other places.  Below I believe is the outline for these bills.

I’ll post them when they come out.

Last Thurs before I left for DC, I went to Muskegon’s Carmen Group Breakfast and we had a nice turnout and talke about what we usually talk about — anything and everything from politics to gun rights.

Below is a pic of the group and also a mystery photo of someones head. Who is that smooth domed  fellow ??

 

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative