Category: Kendra Gilbert
Is Britain a Role Model for U.S. in Fight Against Terrorism?
Counterterrorism
New Hampshire Union Leader
Kendra Gilbert
Boston University Washington News Service
12-14-06
WASHINGTON, Dec. 14 – New Hampshire Republican Sen. Judd Gregg is looking to the British for some answers on how to catch terrorists.
A month after British officials foiled a terrorist plot to attack U.S. airliners bound for the states from London’s Heathrow Airport, Gregg chaired a hearing to examine what the United States could learn from Britain’s counterterrorism methods. What he heard at the hearing prompted him to include $1 million in the 2007 Department of Homeland Security appropriations bill for a study to be conducted next year on the feasibility of adopting some of the United Kingdom’s methods.
In a phone interview, Gregg said the United States could learn a lot from the British and that their methods were “worth looking at.”
Sen. John Sununu, R-N.H., supports his colleague’s interest in improving counterterrorism methods, saying that the hearing Gregg chaired “brings attention to the importance of constantly evaluating our laws and regulations to make sure they continue to provide government officials the tools they need to prevent future terrorist attacks.”
Despite a shared cultural heritage, Britain, unlike the United States, has no written constitution that sets forth basic principles of law governing the country. Britain also lacks a counterpart to the U.S. Bill of Rights, which grants protections and freedoms to individuals. Instead, protections are established through legislation, which, in Britain, has evolved over the years and now includes several laws defining terrorism and regulating counterterrorism procedures.
At the top of the list in any discussion of revamping U.S. counterterrorism methods to be more like those of the British is the comparison between the FBI in the United States and the Security Service (commonly known as MI5) in Britain.
MI5 is a domestic security agency that gathers intelligence with a view toward countering terrorism and other threats to British security. It has no arrest powers and works closely with local police in Britain to prevent terrorist attacks.
“There was a lot of discussion after 9/11 about whether the United States needed a domestic intelligence agency like MI5,” said Ian Cuthbertson, director of the Counterterrorism Project at the World Policy Institute, a university-affiliated think tank in New York City.
The Department of Homeland Security was created following 9/11 as an umbrella agency to oversee security issues involving ports, immigration, transportation and emergency response but does not have authority over the nation’s intelligence gathering agencies.
At the FBI, Cuthbertson said, “Counterintelligence and counterterrorism have always played second fiddle in the FBI to crime fighting.”
The FBI has tried to reorganize in the wake of 9/11 but, “you still have a bureau that is culturally attuned to not prevention but investigation post event,” said Roger Cressey, a former National Security Council staff member in the Clinton and current Bush Administrations.
The question of the FBI’s role split witnesses at the hearing of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security that Gregg chaired in September. John Yoo, a professor of law at the University of California at Berkeley and a former Justice Department official in the Bush administration, argued for reorganizing the FBI to isolate its crime-fighting responsibilities from its counterterrorism functions.
U.S. Court of Appeals Judge and University of Chicago Law School senior lecturer Richard Posner, however, countered that a separate agency similar to MI5 is needed.
“I don’t see any reason why we couldn’t have a counterpart” to MI5, Posner said in an interview. “I think we need a new organization.”
However, Posner said, he realizes that should a similar agency be established in the United States, adjustments would have to be made to satisfy the constitutional constraints of the U.S. legal system.
In Britain, MI5 agents and police officers are given greater freedom than American counterintelligence officers in the methods they employ to gather intelligence and question suspects.
“Things like profiling aren’t illegal in Britain,” said Cuthbertson, who is Scottish and has lived in London. “They profile the airports and on the subway and in train stations and that kind of thing.”
He added that “the British police and intelligence services routinely tap telephones without any problem in Britain.”
Phone tapping is more controversial in the United States, as witnessed by the criticism of President Bush’s authorizing wiretaps on citizens after 9/11.
But at Sen. Gregg’s September hearing, witnesses and subcommittee members focused specifically on the U.S. policy of holding terrorism suspects who are U.S. citizens without charges for no more than 48 hours. The witnesses agreed that U.S. officials should consider following the British model, which has a 28-day limit.
In his written statement to the committee, Posner concluded that one of the primary lessons the United States could take from the British is “the need for detention of terrorism suspects beyond the conventional 48-hour limit.”
When asked whether the longer time limit was crucial to Britain’s success, Cressey replied, “I think it gives them time, and whenever you’re doing counterterrorism work, it’s a race against time.”
But Cressey said he didn’t see the United States ever adopting a detention time similar to Britain’s 28 days.
That’s a flexibility that you’re never going to see in the U.S. system,” Cressey said. “I think it would immediately provoke a court challenge, and I would be very surprised if the Supreme Court upheld it.”
While Britain’s methods are seen as more intrusive by people in the United States, Cuthbertson said “people [in Britain] are much more tolerant of government interference in their lives” because it is seen as necessary.
“People don’t have the knee-jerk suspicion of government and counterintelligence and counterterrorism that you have here,” Cuthbertson said.
Cuthbertson attributed this to Britain’s “longer history of dealing with terrorism,” and he recalled his experiences living in London during an Irish Republican Army bombing attack.
In the United States, terrorism was not considered a threat until the mid-1980s, Posner said, and “there wasn’t widespread recognition of this threat until 9/11.”
Cressey stressed that the British success hinges on “their intelligence collection that they have on the ground: penetration of suspect locales, the ability to go into mosques and identify individuals who are gathering outside of mosques and a network of, not just informants, but relationships that generate information for them.”
“There is recruitment of individuals there [Britain] that if we don’t figure out a better way to get a handle on it, we’re going to miss opportunities to disrupt potential terrorist cells,” Cressey said.
Good communication between U.S. intelligence gathering agencies and the estimated 800,000 local police is another lesson to be learned from the British, some witnesses said.
Local police officers “ought to be the eyes and ears of the intelligence community,” Posner said. They should, he said, be “the major gatherers of domestic intelligence.”
In his written statement, Tom Parker, a witness at the September hearing and a former member of MI5, said “the greatest single strength of the British approach to counterterrorism is the high degree of coordination that now extends throughout the national security hierarchy.”
Similarly, Gregg praised MI5’s “focused approach to anti-terrorism,” calling the agency “one shop committed to coordinating counterterrorism efforts.”
The answer to America’s counterterrorism problems may ultimately lie within the country’s boarders. Both Cuthbertson and Cressey praised the intelligence-gathering methods of the New York Police Department.
Of local police forces in the United States, Cressey said, “the NYPD is the best of the best when it comes to intelligence collection on the ground and counterterrorism capability.”
Compared to the British, “the NYPD is a better example because their approach already factors in the civil liberty concerns that are unique to the U.S. and certainly different from Britain,” Cressey said. “It’s already demonstrated that it can work within the requirements of the U.S. legal system.”
We need to be constantly looking at our intelligence gathering methods and looking for areas of improvement, Gregg said.
“I just want to find out if there’s a better way to do things.”
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Sen. Gregg Part of Bipartisan Trip to South America
Machu Picchu
New Hampshire Union Leader
Kendra Gilbert
Boston University Washington News Service
12-13-06
WASHINGTON, Dec. 13 – New Hampshire Republican Senator Judd Gregg will get a chance to bond with the incoming Democratic Senate leadership on a bipartisan trip to South America at the end of the year.
The bipartisan convoy – which includes Gregg and five other senators – will make stops in Bolivia, Ecuador and Peru, meeting with leaders in each country along the way, according to a statement issued by Gregg’s office.
Gregg was unavailable for comment.
Joining Gregg on the military-chartered journey are incoming Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and soon-to-be Assistant Senate Majority Leader Dick Durbin, D-Ill.
Sen. Ken Salazar, D-Colo. will also make the trip. And The Washington Post reported that Sens. Kent Conrad, D-N.D. and Robert Bennett, R-Utah will round out the six-man group of senators.
Gregg’s wife Kathleen also will accompany her husband on the trip, according to Gregg’s office. Some of the other senators also will be joined by their spouses, along with aides and military personnel, The Post reported.
According to the statement from Gregg’s office, the six-day trip is “worthwhile substantively as these nations are important to the U.S., especially with the rising anti-Americanism being fed to the region by Hugo Chavez.”
Key issues to be addressed by the senators include trade, narcotics, economics and developing governments, the statement said.
Business aside, the group will make a stop in the Lost City of the Incas, better known as Machu Picchu, in Peru.
Gregg and his fellow travelers will have a chance to explore the ancient city, which sits nearly 8,000 feet above the Urubamba Valley on the side of a mountain ridge.
The isolated location should give Gregg a chance to get to better know his Democratic colleagues, which could prove important in the next Congress. According to the statement from Gregg’s office, bipartisanship “is going to be critical in Congress next year, which most people have signaled they want to see developed.”
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New Hampshire Country Home Ornaments Decorate Washington Tree
NHPeace
New Hampshire Union Leader
Kendra Gilbert
Boston University Washington News Service
12-7-06
WASHINGTON, Dec. 7 – As President Bush lit the National Christmas Tree Thursday night, a little piece of New Hampshire hung nearby on the state’s Christmas tree as part of the 2006 Pageant of Peace.
Make that 50 little pieces.
Every year one organization from each of the 56 states, territories and the District of Columbia is asked to decorate a tree to represent that jurisdiction at the Pageant of Peace.
Since 1983, Hampshire Pewter of Wolfeboro has donated 50 ornaments each year to decorate New Hampshire’s tree in the nation’s capital.
“It’s always been a nice tradition for the last 24 years,” said Abe Neudorf, co-owner and president of Hampshire Pewter.
This year’s ornament, made from the company’s “secret formula” pewter, depicts a country home nestled deep in a New Hampshire forest, with a cardinal in the foreground.
“It’s fitting,” Katie Roberts said of the ornament’s country home theme.
Roberts and friend Jill Laroe, both of Hudson, were visiting Washington on the night of the tree lighting and stopped to look at their home state’s tree.
“It’s a wonderful idea having every state represented,” Roberts said.
After lengthy discussion that started in January and requests from customers for something homey, the theme for this year’s ornament was set, Neudorf said.
“Basically, we never stop thinking about the ornament for the tree,” Neudorf said, “because every year we know we have to come up with another humdinger.”
The company, founded in 1974, always sees a high demand for the special ornament in its four retail stores located throughout New Hampshire, Neudorf said.
Included with the 50 ornaments that were shipped to Washington in November was this note Neudorf wrote explaining the significance of this year’s design:
“Out past the skyscrapers and billboards, beyond the crowded streets and traffic lights, down the long driveway and through the trees lies a beautiful place we call our country home. The New Hampshire mountains, lakes and forests provide many quiet places to call home. Whether your home is quietly nestled in the New Hampshire countryside, neatly placed in a suburb or standing tall in a city, our hope for you is that your heart will never have far to go to find home.”
After all, there’s no place like home for the holidays.
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Wilderness Sidebar
NE Wilderness
New Hampshire Union Leader
Kendra Gilbert
Boston University Washington News Service
11-15-06
WASHINGTON, Nov. 15 – Outgoing New Hampshire Reps. Charles Bass and Jeb Bradley praised the collaborative effort behind the passage of the New England Wilderness Act of 2006.
Bass in a statement thanked legislators and environmental groups involved with the bill for “working together to craft this recommended addition to the Granite State’s crown jewel of the outdoors.”
His colleague Bradley said on the floor of the House the compromise reached between the New Hampshire delegation and Independent Vermont Rep. Bernie Sanders was “in true New England fashion” and that the passage of the bill “makes sense for New Hampshire.”
Bradley said in a statement that he had hiked many of the areas that will be protected under the bill and knows “that they are truly deserving of this wilderness designation.”
He joked on the floor that he will now have more time to explore the White Mountain National Forest more thoroughly.
Bass said on the floor the implication of the bill “will be felt forever,” long after he leaves office in January, and said that it was the “most important bill I’ve ever had.”
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New Hampshire Native Is Outstanding Fellow
- Photos by Jill Connor
NH Fellow Eggers: Navy Lt. Commander Jeffery Eggers, a white house fellow from Exeter New Hampshire stands in front of the south side entrance of the white house. He works across the street in the Eisenhower Executive Office building.
Eggers
New Hampshire Union Leader
Kendra Gilbert
Boston University Washington News Service
11-14-06
WASHINGTON, Nov. 14 – There isn’t much New Hampshire native Jeffrey Eggers can’t accomplish once he sets his mind to it. Degree in aerospace engineering from the United States Naval Academy? Check. Masters degree in mathematics and philosophy from Oxford? Check. Lieutenant Commander in the Navy with a tour of duty in Iraq? Check. One of only 14 selected nationally to a prestigious White House Fellowship? Check.
Sewing machine repair expert? Maybe not.
Eggers’ mother, Barbara, still laughs about the time her mechanically curious three-year-old son dismantled her sewing machine.
“He wanted to see how things work,” Barbara Eggers said, recalling the incident.
“She doesn’t let that one go,” Jeff, now 35 and just as curious, said. “She still accuses me of being the reason that her sewing machine never worked right.”
Although his curiosity may have killed, or at least injured, the sewing machine, Eggers’ parents, who live in Chichester, agree that it’s their son’s inquisitive nature, not drive, which has taken him so far in life; all the way to the White House, in fact.
“Driven is not a word I would use to describe Jeff,” Barbara Eggers said. “He’s very curious, involved in different things and wants to learn more.”
When asked if he agrees with his mother’s description, Eggers replied, “I think that’s a very astute observation. Coming from my mom, she’s going to be the one most qualified to make such a careful observation.”
Eggers’ father Jim, a retired Air Force officer, noted that “there’s not much mechanical that Jeff won’t tackle or try to understand. He will take things apart just to see how they work.”
The parents and son have a mutual respect for each other.
Eggers said his father, as a military officer, “made a deliberate attempt, somewhat to the sacrifice of his career, to put his family first.” Eggers’ younger sister Jennifer, 33, is a doctor who now lives with her husband, Ashish Chaudhari, and son, Cole, 2 1/2-years-old in Concord.
“That afforded us the ability to stay in New Hampshire for grades Kthrough12 and gave both my sister and I a lot of stability, which is unusual for military kids,” Eggers said.
Eggers was a “very good student,” in elementary and middle school in Durham and later in high school at Phillips Exeter Academy, according to his mother, who is on a one-year sabbatical from the elite prep school after several years of being dean of the faculty there.
“I was aware that he did well in school and was pretty smart,” said Eggers’ sister, Jennifer. “I tried to copy that to some level, but he was much smarter in math and building airplanes and wind tunnels and I wasn’t really interested in that. I was more interested in biology. We had different interests, but he was someone that I thought I should be like in terms of being smart and working hard.”
Added Jeffrey Eggers: “We were raised in a household that really respected and put a lot of attention on grades and academic pursuits. My father really planted and fostered and grew an intellectual and academic curiosity in both my sister and I.”
With “above-average” schooling, which Eggers said was made possible by his mother’s teaching jobs, Eggers was accepted into several prestigious colleges, both military and civilian.
Although he had already accepted admission to Stanford, Eggers had a change of heart after what he said was an “epiphany” that finally connected his desire to become a naval officer with going to a naval college.
“He went right down to the wire in making that decision,” Barbara said.
Eggers said he had to call Stanford and say, ‘I was kidding. I’m going to the Naval Academy.’ ”
As a laid-back kid with long hair, Eggers found the initial transition into the Naval Academy difficult.
“All of a sudden I shaved my head and was getting barked at and marching around,” he said.
After the initial shock wore off, Eggers found normalcy in athletics and other extra-curricular activities. He played ice hockey throughout his four years at the academy, something that had been a part of his life as far back as he could remember.
“Our whole family was on the ice rink from an early age,” Eggers said. “My father was an ice hockey referee. My mother was a figure skating coach. My sister was a figure skater. And I was an ice hockey kid. We had a pond next to our house that would freeze over in the winter. On weekends, it wasn’t uncommon that all four of us would end up with ice skates on our feet at some point.”
Dave Ismay, who met Eggers while they were both in their second year at the Naval Academy, said Eggers was a “natural athlete.”
Going away to Annapolis deprived Eggers of the stability with which he grew up. After graduating with a degree in aerospace engineering, he went to England for two years on a Navy scholarship to study mathematics and philosophy at Oxford.
It was another abrupt transition, but also a “rich and rewarding experience that was a contrast from the experience of the Naval Academy, which even in the classroom is very rigid,” Eggers said.
Then, “literally the day after I finished my last exam at Oxford, I flew to San Diego and reported for my first training command there,” Eggers said.
His sister traveled from New Hampshire to San Diego to see her brother.
“If we have the opportunity to be close, there wasn’t a question about whether or not we’d be there,” Jennifer said. “I was definitely excited to be there and see him.”
From there, Eggers’ military career would take him around the world, to places like Southeast Asia and Hawaii, where he was able to put his mechanical skills to good use doing research and development on a mini-submarine for the Navy’s special operations community.
Eggers remained in close touch with his family in New Hampshire. Packages and letters from home started arriving while he was at the Naval Academy and “continue to this day,” Eggers said.
In April of last year, Eggers was deployed to Iraq as commander of the Naval Special Warfare Task Unit assigned to train Iraqi soldiers and police officers in the Anbar province.
“It was a mother’s worst fear,” Barbara said, of her son’s deployment to Iraq. Eggers often talked with his parents about friends killed in the Navy.
Although Eggers knew the task of training entire police and army units would take years, he said that in his seven months in Iraq he witnessed “small tactical victories.”
“We were able to watch certain Iraqi units that we’d spent the whole time with go from being unable to organize to be organized, trained, equipped and led to conduct their own independent operations,” Eggers said. “That was very fulfilling.”
And the packages from home continued. “I would drink a lot of coffee over there to stay awake,” Eggers said. “And most of it was supplied fresh by my parents.”
His parents welcomed him home in October, 2005, flying out to San Diego to see him.
Although Eggers admits that he never really thought of a career in the Navy when he first reported for training after completing his Masters degree from Oxford, he now recognizes how much the Navy has given him.
“It’s been a continual string of very rewarding and exciting opportunities,” he said.
The latest of which is his fellowship at the White House.
“I’m still working in the government, but it’s a very different kind of work – wearing a suit everyday instead of a uniform,” said Eggers, who is assigned to the National Security Council. “It’s a very unique opportunity that not a lot of people get to enjoy.”
Now, he said, he looks forward to those “rare opportunities I have to wear my uniform and stay in touch with my Navy community.”
Throughout the application process, Eggers looked to family and friends for advice.
None of his close friends or family was surprised by Eggers’ decision to apply. And the only person who was surprised when he was selected was Eggers himself.
“I don’t think it felt like it was actually happening until I got here,” Eggers said.
Eggers talked with Ismay throughout the process, sharing some of the other applicants’ impressive bios with him. But in Ismay’s mind “it was a no-brainer. Jeff was by far the most attractive candidate,” he said, noting that his best friend is “freakishly high achieving.”
As with past challenges, Eggers faces the duties of his fellowship and his placement with the National Security Council, where he serves as director for weapons of mass destruction terrorism, maritime security, hostages and special operations in the Directorate for Combating Terrorism, head on.
In that position, he helps Stephen Hadley, the national security advisor, and shapes U.S. policy by working with federal departments and agencies to check for consistency with other existing programs and initiatives and to ensure that resources are properly deployed to achieve national strategies.
Eggers said he enjoys the fellowships’ “well-rounded approach to leadership” that has allowed him and the 13 other fellows to meet with senior officials in all branches of the government.
While he was appointed by President Bush, Eggers has yet to actually meet his commander in chief. He and the other fellows will get their chance in December when they sit down with the president.
And while they are excited for their son, Barbara and Jim Eggers, who now call Chichester home, have other reasons to love his appointment to the White House Fellowship.
“This is the first time the family’s been in the same time zone in 13 years,” Barbara said. “So he’s going to come home for Thanksgiving.”
It is a trip Eggers also is looking forward to.
“There’s something very pleasant and enjoyable about New Hampshire in the fall,” he said. “So the holidays are particularly nice to go home to. If we’re lucky, we’ll get a white Christmas.”
But for right now, Eggers is looking forward to a Thanksgiving with his family and his mom’s home cooking.
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Bradley Considering a Run in 2008
Bradley Exit
New Hampshire Union Leader
Kendra Gilbert
Boston University Washington News Service
11-14-06
WASHINGTON, Nov. 14 – A large trash bin overflowing with old papers, folders and discarded knickknacks sits outside Rep. Jeb Bradley’s Capitol Hill office door, awaiting removal. Inside, another bin occupies the office sitting area and is halfway to capacity.
Surveying the two rows of baseball hats that line the top of the office’s walls, which were given to the representative by constituents and friends, Bradley’s press secretary, Stephanie DuBois, remarked, “We’re going to have to find a box for those.”
No one in Bradley’s office saw it coming.
“I had gone into the election day feeling pretty good; I felt we had run a good campaign,” Bradley said in an interview in his office. “And then we came up short,” he continued, recalling his defeat a week ago by Democratic opponent Carol Shea-Porter.
Bradley attributed his loss to President Bush’s declining approval as well as the recent scandals involving Republican members of Congress and the popularity of New Hampshire’s Democratic Gov. John Lynch.
With the next two years now open, Bradley said he hopes to get back to his passion for mountain climbing, something he didn’t have much time for while in Washington.
“I’d like to complete the 4,000-footers in the winter,” the avid hiker said of climbing all of New Hampshire’s 48 mountains that have elevations more than 4,000 feet. “Now, if the weather’s right and I feel like climbing Mount Washington, I can climb Mount Washington,” he said.
But that doesn’t mean Bradley is ready to give up politics altogether. After taking some time off after the new Congress takes charge in January, Bradley said he “expects to be pretty actively involved politically” while back home in New Hampshire.
“Running for elective office is something that I will certainly be considering,” Bradley said.
Although he would not specify which office he would be seeking, Bradley said a 2008 bid is something “in all likelihood” he is considering.
“I feel that in 2008 things will be different,” Bradley said, while sitting on a chair in his office under a picture on the wall marked with a small yellow Post-It note.
The other photos on his office walls, and the family photos on his desk, are all similarly marked; those are the keepers and will not be joining the other office throwaways in the Dumpster.
Looking back on his four years in the House, the collaborative effort between the New Hampshire and Maine delegations to keep the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard off the military base-closing list was among his most important accomplishments.
“That took a lot of different people coming together,” Bradley said.
As a member of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee, Bradley said veterans’ issues were “near and dear” to him.
Before this session adjourns, Bradley said, he hopes that Congress will pass appropriations bills and “establish reasonable levels of spending.”
From New Hampshire, Bradley said he will carefully “observe” and “monitor” the new delegation, which includes incoming Democratic freshman Paul Hodes.
Hodes defeated Rep. Charles Bass, whom Bradley said he worked closely with during their four years they spent together in Congress.
“Charlie and I are good friends,” Bradley said. “We worked very well together, and he’s obviously become a good friend.”
Bradley called the Republican to Democrat turnover in New Hampshire a “historic change” but said that he thinks it will “be somewhat temporary in nature.”
“We’ve got to get back to talking about things that unite Republicans,” Bradley said.
For now, Bradley said, his top priority is to find jobs for his staff, many of whom have been with him from the beginning.
“I’ve had more staff that have been with me for the full four years than most offices have,” Bradley said. “My top priority is to find placement for my staff and help them transition.”
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N.H. Senators Congratulate Democratic House Colleagues
React
New Hampshire Union Leader
Kendra Gilbert
Boston University Washington News Service
11-8-06
WASHINGTON, Nov. 8 – Following the defeat Tuesday of New Hampshire Republican Reps. Charles Bass and Jeb Bradley, New Hampshire’s Republican senators said they will extend the olive branch across the Capitol to their new Democratic House colleagues and work together in the new Congress.
“They’ve obviously won a tremendous victory,” Sen. Judd Gregg said in a statement Wednesday congratulating Democrats Paul Hodes and Carol Shea-Porter on their respective wins over Bass and Bradley.
Sen. John Sununu echoed Gregg’s commitment to work with the new representatives. “I welcome their partnership and will work with my new colleagues in the House on behalf of the people of New Hampshire,” he said in a separate statement,
The New Hampshire delegation, which for the past four years has consisted of the same four Republican members, will be divided starting in January, with Democrats in the House and Republicans in the Senate.
“This is going to be an interesting undertaking, and I’m looking forward to it,” Gregg said. “For my part, I intend to work with my colleagues across the aisle, as I have always tried to do.”
This is the first time in nearly 95 years that the two New Hampshire House seats will be held by Democrats, and the Republican senators said they hope the freshmen will meet the opportunity head on.
“They are now responsible for governance, especially here in New Hampshire, where we have some very big issues facing us, which I believe require fiscal prudence and responsible government,” Gregg said.
After congratulating Hodes and Shea-Porter on their victories, Sununu said that “the challenge before them to provide substantive leadership rather than just rhetoric is very significant.”
The senator’s words were similar to a statement by New Hampshire Republican Committee Chairman Wayne Semprini.
“The Democrats ran on the Republican agenda of no sales tax and no income tax,” Semprini said. “Now they must lead and show results. The citizens of the Granite State will be watching.”
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Former Page Recalls Her Experience; Praises Program
- Photos by Jill Connor
Portraits of Class’s Profile subjects: Kaitlyn Funk(cq), a page appointed by Rep. Jeb Bradley (cq) (R-1st NH) for the 2004 summer session, visits her former work place. Kaitlyn, a George Washington University student from Manchester, New Hampshire, thought it was a "great experience" and occasionally comes back to Capitol Hill to have lunch with other former pages.
NHPage
New Hampshire Union Leader
Kendra Gilbert
Boston University Washington News Service
11-2-06
WASHINGTON, Nov. 2 – For one summer month between her junior and senior years at Trinity High School in Manchester, Kaitlyn Funk was a congressional page.
Now a sophomore at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., studying philosophy, she has nothing but good things to say about the previously low-profile program, which has now become synonymous with sex and scandal.
“It was a phenomenal opportunity to work on the floor and help representatives,” said Funk, whose father encouraged her to apply.
The page program allows high school students to come to Washington for a semester or one of two summer sessions and assist members of Congress by running messages and answering phones, among other things. Each page is sponsored by a representative or senator.
Funk was sponsored by New Hampshire Republican Rep. Jeb Bradley.
“We think the page program is extraordinary, as it allows students to learn about the legislative process firsthand,” said Salley Collins, press secretary for the Committee on House Administration.
Funk, now 19, agrees, often using the word “cool” to describe her experiences on Capitol Hill.
As a page, Funk witnessed the House vote on the controversial Defense of Marriage Act.
“It was cool,” she said about being on the floor for the vote. “My parents were watching it on TV and I was there. I got to see it happen.”
Not only does the program give high school students a close-up view of Congress, but it also allows them to explore a new city and meet new people.
The program gave Funk a freedom not usually experienced by a 16-year-old, and when she moved back home that August, she joked, she was “hard to live with.”
“It was an adjustment coming home,” she said. “I had tasted independence.”
Going into her senior year at Trinity, Funk said she felt more prepared because of her experience in Washington.
Funk’s U.S. history teacher Marigrace O’Gorski said that Funk was a “very enthusiastic student who was always participating.”
While in Washington, Funk bonded with other pages and counts many of them, including her current college roommate, as her friends today.
“When we were out of work, we could go anywhere in the city,” Funk said. “We had the Metro, we had money and we had each other.”
According to Collins, the pages are under constant supervision while they are in the dorm where they live and while they are at work. If they going out they are required to use the buddy system and they have to sign in and out of the dorm.
Funk said she believes the bond among pages is so strong because other high schoolers cannot relate to the experience.
“It’s an experience that no one else can understand,” Funk said. People would ask her where she was all summer, and she would tell them she was working on the floor of Congress and they wouldn’t understand how momentous that was, she said.
Funk has strong opinions on the Mark Foley scandal, which involved a House member having inappropriate email conversations with former pages, but she insisted that the program was safe and that she never heard anything about inappropriate e-mails or instant messages while she was a page.
“There was never any talk and nothing ever happened that would lead me to believe that there were inappropriate relationships going on,” Funk said.
While pages frequently run messages between members and their offices, Funk said, they never really have much interaction with the members themselves, except on the floor.
However, after the scandal broke, she said, two of her male friends who were also former pages told her they had received e-mails from Foley.
Despite the recent scandal and the whirlwind of rumors about getting rid of the program, Funk can’t say enough good things about it.
“I always talk it up,” she said. “Even if you’re really not that interested in politics, I think that as a citizen of the United States, it’s a great opportunity.”
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New Hampshire Delegation Fares Poorly with Veterans Group
Vet Grades
New Hampshire Union Leader
Kendra Gilbert
Boston University Washington News Service
10-25-06
WASHINGTON, Oct. 25 –The New Hampshire congressional delegation fared poorly in a new rating of support for the military overseas and the veterans back home.
New Hampshire Rep. Charlie Bass, R, received a C+ rating from the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, a two-year-old non-partisan advocacy group, as did Rep. Jeb Bradley, R, despite his being honored Wednesday as Person of the Year by the New Hampshire chapter of the Association of the U.S. Army. Republican Sens. Judd. Gregg and John Sununu each received a D grade.
“In our opinion,” said Paul Rieckhoff, founder and executive director of the veterans’ organization, “anything less than an A is a poor grade.”
While declining to comment on another organization’s rating system, Joe Davis, spokesman for Veterans of Foreign Wars, said the New Hampshire delegation has been “generally supportive of veterans’ issues.”
The new grades were calculated based on a member’s voting record on issues affecting veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and members of the armed services currently overseas.
Health care for reservists, military death gratuities and adequate spending for traumatic brain injury research, which Rieckhoff said was a “signature of this war that is affecting thousands of people,” were some of the top issues on which members of Congress were graded.
The veterans’ group scored senators based on 155 votes made since Sept. 11, 2001, while representatives’ scores were based on 169 votes.
Rieckhoff said the ratings, announced on Friday, represented a non-partisan effort to inform Americans about the voting records of a Congress that constantly professes its support of the troops.
“There are a lot of people in Washington who say they support the troops and we wanted to find out who really did and who was just offering empty rhetoric,” said Rieckhoff, who served in the Army in Iraq in 2003 and 2004.
Because neither Sununu nor Bradley entered office until 2002, their scores were based on slightly lower vote totals.
Bradley, who sits on the Veterans’ Affairs Committee, said in a statement that he has “always been, and will continue to be, a strong advocate for our soldiers and veterans as a member of Congress.”
In August, Gregg and Sununu each voted against a $2 million increase in spending for traumatic brain injury research, which counted against them in the scoring.
Both senators, however, voted in April of last year to increase the military death gratuity to the families of soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan from $12,000 to $100,000.
The organization rated Bass and Bradley poorly because, for example, they voted last year against adding to a defense budget bill a provision that would have given free health care to all Reserve and National Guard personnel.
“In our opinion,” Rieckhoff said, “that’s inexcusable.”
Recently, Bradley succeeded in getting an amendment attached to a fiscal 2007 appropriations bill that added $795 million to the health care budget for veterans.
“When it comes to our veterans, and our troops serving in harm’s way, I will continue to support measures that provide them with pay, benefits and resources they need and deserve,” Bradley said in a statement.
Of the 1,500 veterans who are members of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, 127 are from New Hampshire, including a number of members of the state’s National Guard, according to Rieckhoff.
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Congressional Races: Where the Money Comes From
FECNewHampshire
New Hampshire Union Leader
Kendra Gilbert
Boston University Washington News Service
10-18-06
WASHINGTON, Oct. 18 – When political action committees give money to House races, incumbents usually get the lion’s share, and New Hampshire Republican Reps. Charlie Bass and Jeb Bradley are no exception.
“PACs like to place safe bets,” said Massie Ritsch, communications director of the Center for Responsive Politics, a non-profit, non-partisan research organization based in Washington that tracks money in politics and its effect on elections and public policy. “If you’re a candidate that’s not already in office, it’s hard to convince the PAC that you’re worthy of their support.”
Democratic challengers, like Paul Hodes in the 2nd District and Carol Shea-Porter in the 1st District, have to rely heavily on individual donations to make up for the lack of PAC money coming their way.
“PAC support is one of the major advantages incumbents have in raising money,” said Anthony Corrado, a professor of government at Colby College in Maine. “It’s often the case that PACs will give 7 to 1 their proportion of funding to incumbents versus challengers.”
2nd District
As of Sept. 30, 2nd District Rep. Bass had received $562,908 in campaign donations from PACs – which are groups that represent specific interests and raise and donate money to political campaigns – according to his filing with the Federal Election Commission.
That money accounted for 61 percent of Bass’ total campaign contributions of $918,789. Contributions from individuals totaled $355,681, according to the campaign filing.
Bob Biersack, spokesman for the Federal Election Commission, said PAC contributions often represent more than half of an incumbent’s receipts.
Republicans running for reelection, like Bass and Bradley, often receive most of their donations from business and corporate PACs.
According to the Center for Responsive Politics, Bass received more than 71 percent of his PAC contributionsfrom business PACs.
Ideological and labor groups made up the remainder of Bass’ campaign donations from PACs, with the congressman getting only 3 percent of his PAC money from labor unions, according to the center
However, in New Hampshire’s 2nd District, bigger PAC checks don’t always mean a greater financial advantage. Hodes has raised $1,035,135, about $100,000 more than Bass in total contributions, according to Hodes’ filing with the Federal Election Commission., with only 18 percent of his donations coming from PACs. Individuals have donated nearly $700,000 to Hodes’ campaign.
1st District
Shea-Porter, running against Bradley, had not received any money from PACs until recently, she said. Most of her $11,489 in PAC donations came from union political action committees, she said.
“They are the ones that represent the workers of America and they are the ones that I’ve spent my life working with and for,” Shea-Porter said.
“For the most part, labor unions give 95 percent of their money to Democrats,” Corrado said.
When asked about PAC contributions, Bradley said, “I have almost a thousand people that contribute to me individually. That is a significant proportion of my campaign.”
Donations from PACs made up 51 percent of the $949,465 Bradley raised through Sept. 30, according to his campaign report filed with the Federal Election Commission. And nearly 70 percent of the PAC money came from business, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. The remainder of his PAC contributions came from single-issue groups and union PACs, although he received only $13,000 from labor union PACs.
Because PACs can donate no more than $10,000 during an election cycle to an individual candidate and individuals can contribute no more than $4,200 per cycle to a candidate, taking contributions from PACs allows candidates to raise more money in a short period of time.
“You can raise more money by contacting a few PACs than by contacting individuals,” Ritsch said. “They can write the biggest checks, so they are hard to turn down.”
Shea-Porter said her late PAC contributions have allowed her to run television ads, but said that such a small amount “doesn’t level the playing field.”
“Challengers can be particularly critical of an incumbent’s PAC fundraising,” Ritsch said. “But that might be because the PACs rarely give to challengers. If they did, challengers might not have such a problem with it.”
Bass and Bradley
While much of their financial support has come from the pocketbooks of private interest groups, Bass and Bradley are far from the top of the list of House members who receive PAC donations.
In terms of total money current House members received from PACs , Bass ranks 129th out of 435, and Bradley comes in at 164th, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
Fourteen members of Congress have said they do not take any money from PACs.
Bradley said that he does not take any money from tobacco PACs and that when he votes, “it is based on representing New Hampshire values in Washington.”
“That’s how I make up my mind on the issues I am voting on,” Bradley said.
Bass campaign spokeswoman Lindsay Jackson said that the PAC contributions Bass receives “are reflective of the hard work he has done to represent the constituents of New Hampshire.”
“When politicians get criticized for taking any sort of money, it’s usually the PAC money that gets singled out,” Ritsch said. “It’s hard to not see PAC money as representing the interests of business, labor or ideological groups looking to influence lawmakers.”
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