A Day in the Life of Jim Maloney
By Marty Toohey
WASHINGTON, Oct. 20, 2002–At first glance, Jim Maloney seems to be in one heck of a hurry.
Brisk, brusque and burly, Maloney’s usual greeting lasts less than two seconds, with eight words or fewer run together in a booming, continuous string.
“Hi, how are you?” comes out as “Hihowareya?” and he’ll answer that question with “Finehowareyou?”
That’s not unusual for a United States congressman, whose days are a blur of buzzers, beepers and bustle. They’re days crammed with subcommittee hearings and votes and meetings, lots of meetings, formal and casual, planned and spontaneous, Democratic Caucus meetings and staff meetings and every other kind of meeting imaginable.
And that’s only Tuesday through Thursday. The other four days a week Maloney is back in Connecticut campaigning for reelection in one of the country’s most hotly contested districts.
It’s a jam-packed lifestyle, and Maloney certainly packs a lot into a day, hustling from commitment to commitment with a furrowed brow and hunched shoulders.
But then an apologetic follower sets off the Capitol Building’s metal detector four consecutive times, delaying Maloney for several minutes on the way to a vote.
And Maloney, who blows in and out of the office like a huffing hurricane, leans back, smiles broadly at the observer’s ring-around-the-metal-detector and cracks a joke to a security guard.
Turns out he’s not always in such a big hurry after all.
***
On Capitol Hill, Maloney’s mannerisms switch, like a VCR, from fast-forward to play. At first, or when he’s coming off the House floor, he’ll click the two little arrows like he’s trying to speed through the small talk.
It’s not unusual; many congressmen talk at an accelerated pace. They’re busy people.
But give Maloney a minute and he’ll find his spot in the conversation, click the play button and slow to a thoughtful and articulate pace.
A man who taught American history at Newton’s St. Sebastian School while attending law school, Maloney, 54, seems most comfortable in explanation, whether with a dozen George Washington University students or with reporters during his evening press calls.
Talking in his office with the students on the evening of Oct. 9, he reclines in a leather chair, his weight resting on his right arm. His left hand cradles his cheek while listening, and then dots the air to emphasize points of his explanations.
He asks where each student is from, and ticks off the names of the congressional representatives from each hometown.
He tells the students about the three-hour trip from the Capitol to his doorstep in Danbury, and his struggle as a Harvard undergrad to find a suitable major. He elicits warm laughter when he acknowledges that 1994, when he ran a failed House campaign, was “probably the worst possible time” for him to run for office because of nationwide dissatisfaction with Democrats.
It’s not immediately apparent whether it’s the joke or Maloney’s broad grin that the students respond to.
Maloney shakes each student’s hand as they shuffle out, his own meaty paw enveloping theirs. He then begins making his daily press calls; the issue of the day is a set of polls released a day earlier, one of which shows him trailing Republican Rep. Nancy Johnson by 16 percentage points.
Maloney, who settled on an undergraduate degree in history, is well versed in polling nuance and lore. He seems to recall polls dating back to antiquity, and mentions to a reporter a 1936 Literary Digest poll declaring Republican Alf Landon the clear favorite for president.
But the magazine mailed the survey to names taken from telephone and car-ownership lists. Turns out that in 1936, during the middle of a depression, a good number of Americans couldn’t afford cars or phones, and they tended to vote Democrat.
Landon won only two states. Franklin D. Roosevelt became president. The poll was wrong.
Maloney declares the UConn poll wrong. Over and over.
He tells reporters that, because of surveying methods, 5 percent of the time the UConn polls are inaccurate far beyond the built-in margin of error.
“We don’t think there’s anything wrong with the way UConn conducted their poll,” he said to reporters three different times. “We think it’s just a bad sample. It’s like flipping a quarter. The odds say you’ll get heads half the time and tails half the time. But sometimes you get a run of five heads or ten tails.”
Even the George Washington students can’t resist asking about the polls. And Maloney’s response, for at least the fourth time that day, is margin of error, bad sample, heads or tails.
***
On most mornings in his Capitol Hill office, Maloney starts work around 8 a.m., either taking care of morning meetings or heading into the office. At some point, an office buzzer indicating a vote in 15 minutes will interrupt him.
“All members must report to the floor for a vote in 15 minutes,” a voice will crackle from a pager at Maloney’s belt.
“Okay,” he says to anyone unfamiliar with the office’s rhythms. “That means we’ve got 10 minutes” until he has to leave.
After those 10 minutes, he’ll walk briskly from his office to the Capitol building, preferring the sunshine to the short subway ride.
“I get out every chance I get,” he says.
The warm and muggy early fall weather is a little hot for him, though, even with a breeze ruffling his silver, slightly wavy hair.
“I’m a New Englander,” he says. “I like the cool weather.”
***
Much of the time, the result of a vote is certain long before it’s called. The House leadership often calls a vote to “get the sheep into the barn” and out of the office to talk, Maloney says.
“When (members) are in their offices, they’ve got projects going and they’re busy. But here,” he says, motioning through a bronze-gilded double door to the House floor, “you can talk without worrying about interrupting them in the middle of working on something.”
Maloney , for his part, is hoping to catch John P. Murtha (D-Pa.), a member of the House Appropriations Committee, and talk to him about funding for laser detectors manufactured in Connecticut.
Maloney disappears onto the floor for a few minutes, and emerges out a side door.
“Imustamissedhim,” Maloney huffs. “Butthat’sokay. I’llgethimlater.”
Maloney beelines for the elevator that will take him to a meeting of the Financial Services Committee, on which he sits.
The third-term lawmaker’s pleased with his committee assignments-he also sits on the Armed Services Committee–and says his dual role is “where the action is” for a Connecticut congressman.
Armed Services deals heavily with defense contracts, and Financial Services deals heavily with banks. Both are major industries in Connecticut.
“It’s not an accident I’m on these committees,” Maloney says. “If I were from Texas, I’d try to get on the Agriculture and Energy Committees.”
If Maloney is reelected and Democrats gain control of the House, the party leadership will probably name Maloney chairman of the Financial Services Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity. There, he says, he could put to use his experience as a real estate lawyer and director of anti-poverty programs.
“Committee assignments are fluid, but it’s probably a pretty good bet that would be his assignment,” said Kori Bernards, a spokeswoman for Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.).
***
After leaving the floor Maloney clicks his play button, but his pace to the elevator stays swift and his interaction with other members is nearly supersonic. A typical exchange goes like this:
“Hihowyoudoing?”
“Justfinesirhowareyou?”
“Goodthanksgoodtoseeyou.”
Most members seem stuck on permanent fast forward. They tap their shoes impatiently or mutter grumpily while waiting for the elevator. But Maloney doesn’t fidget. He can’t go anywhere, so he’s in no hurry. The wait’s not that bad, he says.
“It’s a good opportunity to catch your breath,” he says. “Besides, it’s just like any other
job–you still have to wait for the elevator.”
Published in The New Britain Herald, in Connecticut.
