Category: Spring 2008 Newswire
Maine’s Manufacturing Industries being Replaced by Service Industries
Industry
Bangor Daily News
Vicki Ekstrom
Boston University Washington News Service
5/02/2008
WASHINGTON— Lisa Northup never thought she would be changing careers at age 41. But after more than 20 years at Moosehead Manufacturing, the furniture factory shut its doors, changed owners, consolidated and left Northup jobless last June.
Rather than find work at a different mill, Northup, who lives in Guilford, chose a more stable path and in September began classes at Bangor’s Beal College to become a medical assistant.
“There’s so much in the medical field. We can all find a job,” Northup said. “But there really isn’t a lot of call for jobs in factories like Moosehead.”
Maine’s once flourishing “icon industries” – paper and lumber, as well as shoes, potatoes and blueberries – are quickly leaving the state with the expansion of free international trade, economists said.
Taking the place of these manufacturing industries are service industries like tourism, freight transportation, financial services and especially health care, said David Douglass, an economist at the Maine State Planning Office.
Maine has lost about 22,400 jobs in manufacturing in the last decade. The state gained about 29,000 jobs in education and health services during the same period, according to the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Because of the thousands of people affected throughout the country, trade has become a hot-button issue on Capitol Hill and along the campaign trail, as the presidential candidates argue over their positions on the North American Free Trade Agreement. All of the members of the Maine delegation want to take a second look at NAFTA, the free-trade deal signed by President Clinton in January 1994 that eliminated import duties on most products traded among the United States, Mexico and Canada.
The main arguments over NAFTA and other free-trade agreements revolve around job losses caused by competition from countries that sell similar products at cheaper prices, often because of lower wages.
Advocates argue that the United States benefits because a rise in exports adds jobs. The Department of Commerce estimated that U.S. exports to Canada and Mexico after NAFTA went into effect created more than 600,000 jobs, according to the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank.
But in the decade after NAFTA’s authorization more than 1 million jobs were lost because imports increased, said the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank.
“That’s why I never supported NAFTA,” said Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine. She said she thought it disproportionately affected Maine and some of its industries.
As free-trade deals make it cheaper to manufacture goods in other countries, Maine’s traditional industries are “indisputably” affected, particularly in lumber and paper, which lost four mills and 200 jobs in the last four months alone, Snowe said in an interview.
When thousands of jobs are lost in a state, its residents suffer as revenue sinks and less money is available for basic services. In Maine, a state with one of the oldest populations in the country, those basic services include providing help to struggling seniors and boosting the quality of education in schools to help retain young people.
“The impact of mill closings on Maine’s communities is obviously devastating, especially on the middle class,” said Rep. Tom Allen, D-Maine, who said he is working to increase aid to laid-off workers.
Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, also is working to assist these workers and is a cosponsor of a bill to reauthorize Trade Adjustment Assistance, the program that provides additional training and money to workers affected by trade agreements.
In addition to helping those hurt by deals like NAFTA, Rep. Michael Michaud, D-Maine, is working on legislation to create a new trade model. NAFTA became the model for subsequent free-trade agreements in Peru, Panama and South Korea, which have contributed to additional off-shoring of jobs.
“I think that’s a failed model,” Michaud said about NAFTA. “You look at shoes, the textile industry, the paper industry – they’ve all dramatically been affected [by free trade] because it’s very difficult to compete with countries that pay very little.”
Forster Manufacturing Co., the Maine wood product factory that invented the toothpick, closed in 2002.
Great Northern Paper Co. , which made a third of the paper used for American newspapers in the 1950s, filed for bankruptcy in 2003.
Northup’s former employer, Moosehead Manufacturing, a family-owned furniture company founded in 1947, closed its doors in 2007 before being sold and consolidated.
These closings are regularly offered as evidence that Maine’s forest industry, which began producing wood products in the 1640s, is facing severe economic pressure from foreign countries. When the same chair that Moosehead sells for $120 can be made in China for $18, Maine’s companies can’t compete, said John Wentworth, the former president of Moosehead Manufacturing and grandson of one of the company’s founders. Wentworth is now the sales and product manager of the new Moosehead Furniture, which continues to have facilities in Maine.
“The furniture industry is pretty small now in Maine,” Wentworth said. “For a state that has the highest amount of forest land, to have such a small industry is a testament to how hard it is to have a manufacturing company in the state.”
Forestry is the largest manufacturing industry in Maine, where 89 percent of the land is covered in trees, said a 2007 report by the North East State Foresters Association. The industry contributes more than $5 billion to Maine’s economy each year and employed close to 18,000 Mainers in 2005. This included landowners and foresters (who grow the trees), loggers (who cut them down and bring them to the mills), and manufacturers (who make the lumber into products like paper and furniture).
But “our extensive forest cannot shelter us from the chill winds of international competition,” said Lloyd Irland of The Irland Group, a Maine consulting firm that focuses on forestry matters, in a 2004 report.
This trend in the forest industry is similar to what Maine’s shoe industry experienced in the mid-1990s. Once famous for its Bass and Dexter shoe companies, Maine’s shoe manufacturers moved overseas after a 1993 trade agreement.
But while many in the forest industry expect to have a bad year, most believe the industry will never completely disappear. One reason industry experts give for this is that the industry is suffering not just from competition as a result of trade, but also from a worsening U.S. economy and housing market, said economist Charles Lawton, who works for the Maine consulting firm Planning Decisions, Inc. If these factors improve, so could the industry’s outlook, he said.
While overseas trade has greatly affected paper and furniture manufacturers, Maine sawmills continue a struggle with Canada that has rocked trade relations for decades.
Unlike the American system governed by market prices, the Canadian government owns 97 percent of the forests and can set cheap rates to cut trees, called stumping fees. If a Canadian mill has trouble surviving, the government lowers the price, causing the price of lumber in Canada to be cheaper than lumber in the United States. Along with these government subsidies, energy costs are lower in Canada. Canadian companies also don’t directly pay for their employees’ health insurance because the country has a nationalized health-care system.
To equalize trade deals, Canada and the United States came to an agreement. In the 2006 Softwood Lumber Agreement, Canada agreed to place a tax on exported lumber to bring the price up to the market value.
While the agreement has helped, Snowe said, it took more than 25 years to reach. “In that time the Canadian subsidies were eroding the foundation of our manufacturing sector in the state of Maine,” she said. “And we’re still having huge challenges with failure to uphold the agreement” because Canada isn’t collecting some of the taxes.
While the Canadian government argued the subsidies were going to communities, not companies, Snowe said the money to these towns went toward building roads and other uses that were directly tied to the lumber sector.
It would be impossible for the United States to cut ties with Canada completely, regardless of how unfair the pricing system may be because ties between the countries are so strong that both country’s lumber industries would greatly suffer without the other, said Eric Kingsley, vice president of the environmental and forest industry consulting firm Innovative Natural Resource Solutions LLC.
Fraser Papers, a pulp and paper mill company with operations in New Brunswick, Quebec, Maine and New Hampshire, is one example; one of its pulp mills is located in Canada, and its paper mill is just across the border.
“As much as it’s easy to focus on Canada because they’re right next door to us, it depends on the day whether Maine and Canada have a symbiotic or antagonistic relationship,” Kingsley said. “Like any relationship, it’s not all rosy, but it is longstanding.”
Because of the aging population of the state, it may be a “natural evolution” for the number of jobs in health care to grow, Snowe said. But Snowe does not believe the forest industry should be neglected.
“If you think about where the job loss is occurring in the plant and lumber mill closures, they’re happening in very rural areas of our state,” Snowe said. “It’s very difficult to replace those jobs.”
Collins agreed, calling these forestry jobs the “backbone of Maine’s rural economy.”
As a new generation of workers leaves their families in rural Maine to go to areas with better job markets, the abandonment of natural resource industries like forestry means families will be less rooted and there will be “fewer opportunities for multigenerational families to be in touch,” Irland, of the forestry consulting firm, said.
“Small-town life in many parts of Maine will never be the same,” as the forestry industry becomes one of the last manufacturing industries to leave, Irland said. “Yet in all the change and gloom, we should remember that a key trait of Maine has always been adaptability.”
“Maine workers are very resilient,” said Adam Fisher, a spokesman for Maine’s Department of Labor. “Some of the issues around trade have hit rural places hard. It’s a challenge to come back from, once you’ve lost a job, especially one you’ve had for a while. It’s hard for those workers.”
That’s where Susan Moore steps in. Moore helps to run a Dover-Foxcroft career center which gets federal funding to train workers who have lost jobs because of trade. Moore has urged Northup and others to enter the medical industry.
“The labor outlook indicates that jobs in the medical industry are growing,” Moore said. “We’re here to get people trained and skilled to find a good job so they will get employed after they leave.”
For Northup, medical assisting is something she hopes will “open up a whole lot of possibilities” for her future.
Sununu and McCain: A Pair of Mavericks
MAVERICKS
Union Leader
Matt Negrin
Boston University Washington News Service
1 May 2008
WASHINGTON — When John McCain traveled to the Middle East in August 2003 after the United States invaded Iraq, John Sununu was at his side.
Two years later, when McCain briefly visited Uzbekistan to condemn its totalitarian regime, Sununu was again right behind him.
And in January 2006, when the Arizonan addressed free-trade issues in New Zealand, Sununu flew along.
Since coming to the Senate, Sununu has tried to model himself after McCain as an independent lawmaker and political maverick. He has sought a mentor who is heralded for voting his mind and is running for president on that message.
“Any politician would want to be seen as an independent voter,” said Andrew Smith, the principal professor of the Survey Center at the University of New Hampshire. “What both McCain and Sununu are doing is something that every good politician tries to do.”
The question for the New Hampshire Republican, who is seen by many as one of the sharper minds in the Senate, is whether these traits will help or hurt him as he faces one of the toughest Senate reelection bids in the country in November.
When John met John
Sununu was a House freshman when he first met McCain in 1997. After he was elected to the Senate in 2002, Sununu, then 38, immediately began forming a friendship with the man he calls a “role model” for successful leadership. His motivations were both political and personal.
“I found that I could learn a tremendous amount by watching the way he worked in the Senate,” Sununu said in an interview. “Whether you agree or disagree with him on a particular issue, he’s effective.”
Since then, the two have flown together to more than 15 countries — from Lebanon to Iceland to Kyrgyzstan — and have sometimes sparred on the floor of the Senate chamber. They also have joined hands in the Commerce Committee to write legislation barring Internet taxes and have called for detainee rights for military prisoners and less earmarked spending.
McCain, in an interview, said he took Sununu along on international trips with him early in his Senate career because he saw him as “the future of the Republican Party” and believed he would be helped by exposure to that type of travel.
“I think he’s the smartest person in the United States Senate,” McCain said.
At 43, Sununu is the youngest member of the Senate; McCain is 71, a political veteran and the Republican presidential nominee-in-waiting. McCain has speculated on a number of younger GOP lawmakers as potential running mates, and has mentioned Sununu’s name.
“They’re friends in the true sense of the word, not just political friends,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., McCain’s close buddy who traveled with McCain and Sununu to Beirut and Uzbekistan in May 2005. “You have political friends, and you have real friends.”
Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, says the friendship between Sununu and McCain is “grounded in their interest in political reform and democracy.”
Graham, 52, joined the Senate the same year as Sununu. Along with Collins, they became the core of McCain’s entourage shortly after.
“There is a camaraderie among the four of us,” said Collins, 55, who went to New Zealand and Antarctica with Sununu and McCain in 2006. “We have a common thirst for knowledge and a desire to learn firsthand about the public policy issues that we’re facing.”
Sununu and McCain also share a dry sense of humor and a taste for casual banter, Collins and Graham say.
“He’s got a New Hampshire sense of humor,” Graham said of Sununu. “From a South Carolina view I find it intriguing, a bit dry and witty. You have to listen close or you’ll get zinged.”
Independence in the Senate
In the Senate, Sununu has voted about 85 percent of the time with the GOP in the current Congress, basically in line with his fellow Republicans’ voting patterns. Democrats are using that statistic against him in the race with former New Hampshire governor Jeanne Shaheen.
“His record doesn’t show really any independence whatsoever,” said Alex Reese, a spokesman for the New Hampshire Democratic Party. “That shows that he’s just kind of rolling over for George Bush.”
The state’s Democratic Party accuses Sununu of failing to act on the three biggest issues facing New Hampshire: opposing help for middle-class families in the face of the sluggish economy, favoring a continuation of the Iraq war and voting against increased health care spending.
Nevertheless, Sununu has bucked the Republican Party and the Bush administration in his opposition to reauthorizing major parts of the Patriot Act in 2005, his efforts to block energy bills in 2003 and 2005, his call for former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to be fired and his support for giving legal rights to detainees at Guantanamo Bay.
“He has positioned himself as a maverick, meaning he’s pissed off both Republicans and Democrats in Washington,” professor Smith said.
Sununu does have somewhat of a reputation in the Senate for intellectual arrogance. He is persistent like McCain. “He has strong views and doesn’t hesitate to express them,” Republican Senator Judd Gregg said of Sununu.
But Sununu did not back off from remarking about McCain’s temper. “I’ve seen him very frustrated, even angry at times, but it was always over issues of principle, issues he felt passionate about, felt strongly about,” like earmarked spending, he said.
Standing up to the party to stick up for the state is what politicians should do, according to Sununu’s father, a former New Hampshire governor and chief of staff to President George H.W. Bush. “Politics is more fun when you do it that way,” John H. Sununu said.
“I think that’s why John likes being a senator so much,” he added. “He’s comfortable with the positions he’s taken.”
Those stances are more or less inspired by the advice McCain has given the first-term senator. When Sununu opposed the White House during the reauthorization of the Patriot Act, McCain warned him that he would be pressured to back down by his Republican colleagues but Sununu should do what he thought was right. “Those are the most difficult moments,” Sununu said.
“It’s quite obvious to me that John Sununu looks up to John McCain as a guy who’s really had a fascinating life and a great record as a U.S. senator,” said Warren Rudman, a former Republican senator from the Granite State who served with McCain and considers both senators friends of his. “And John McCain looks at John Sununu as a real up-and-coming guy with potential for the future.”
That may be why McCain hand-picked the Massachusetts Institute of Technology-trained engineer just a few months after Sununu entered the Senate in 2003 as a travel companion to Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Israel and other Asian countries. After that trip, the two flew on four other world tours from 2004 to 2006 to promote democratic ideals.
If the Arizonan is elected president this November, Sununu predicts, he will remain the same kind of person in the White House.
For Sununu’s own ambitions, he is young enough to postpone running for higher office for several years. As for a Cabinet position in a McCain presidency, Sununu said, “Look, if the president of the United States calls you and asks you to do something that he or she thinks is important to the country, you at least listen.”
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Support for Families of Deployed Soldiers Needed, Some Say
SOLDIERS
New London Day
Erin Kutz
Boston University Washington News Service
May 1, 2008
WASHINGTON – When Elizabeth Lilly Rivera’s daughter returned in October from her 15-month deployment in Iraq, she would often wake up in the middle of the night with nightmares and drive off in her car, never saying where she was going or what she was doing. Rivera would wait anxiously by the window until her daughter returned.
During the daytime, her 22-year-old daughter, Celia Crespo, exhibited panic attacks, bouts of extreme sadness and an intense, undecipherable anger, Rivera said. Even though her job at the National Guard’s armory in New London put Rivera in contact with families affected by the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, it was difficult to understand her daughter’s behavior.
“It's just a slew of emotions,” said Rivera, a New London resident. “Some of them are hard to ride the wave with.”
Crespo, an Army National Guard specialist, described her emotions as part of the “normal feelings some soldiers go through when they come home.” For a while she sought monthly counseling for posttraumatic stress disorder at one of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs’ community-based Vet Centers, but has since elected to stop the formalized treatment.
“Now I control it myself,” she said. “I just want to keep improving on my own. That’s just me and that’s how I am.”
The VA’s protocol does not allow the department to directly counsel the family members of veterans, leaving people like Rivera to draw support from friends, private clinicians or military unit resources.
“The VA is authorized to work with families when it is part of a treatment plan designed to benefit veterans,” said Dr. Ira Katz, director of mental health for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. “People work within those limitations to do as much family work as possible.”
Since Sept. 11, 16,500 Connecticut residents have deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan, 55 percent to 60 percent of whom are National Guard and Reserve members lacking the support system of a military base, said Linda Schwartz, commissioner of the Connecticut Department of Veterans Affairs.
About 60 percent of military personnel serving in Iraq and Afghanistan are married, compared to 4 percent of those who deployed to Vietnam. Fifteen percent of those now deployed are women, Schwartz said.
With the mental, emotional and behavioral fallout of the war spreading far beyond the combat zones and into the homes of the deployed and returning troops, lawmakers, mental health professionals and veterans advocacy organizations say existing mental health services fall short.
Jim Tackett of the Connecticut Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services cited depression, anxiety, sleep disturbance, irritability, anger, substance abuse and hyper-vigilance as “a universal, predictable set of challenges” facing returning service members.
Rep. Joe Courtney, D-2nd District, said veterans’ casework accounts for some of his office’s highest volume of business. Veterans who come to him aren’t aware of the services available to them, a problem further exaggerated with returning soldiers whose posttraumatic stress or traumatic brain injuries complicate even the simplest daily tasks, he observed.
The entirely voluntary force in Iraq and Afghanistan forces many soldiers already with mental health issues to reenter combat and make their problems go from bad to worse, Courtney added. “The system was clearly not prepared to deal with a major long-term conflict like the one our country is experiencing,” he said.
In anticipation of heightened problems among troops returning from service in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Department of Veterans Affairs mental health budget has increased from $2 billion in 2001 to $3.5 billion this year, Katz said. Next year’s mental health budget approaches $4 billion.
The VA’s efforts in increasing its psychological staff is commendable, but may have not come in time, said Ed Burke, Courtney’s field representative and legislative aide on military affairs.
“They’re trying to gear up, but the problem is that the issue is here already,” said Burke, a Vietnam veteran.
Close to 300,000 of the 800,000 men and women who have returned from Iraq and Afghanistan have come to the VA for care and are represented relatively evenly between regular active duty officers and members of the Guard or Reserves, Katz said. About 120,000 of them have been diagnosed with mental health problems, only half of which are posttraumatic stress disorder diagnoses.
But a study released by the RAND Corporation found 18.5 percent of the nearly 2,000 veterans surveyed exhibited signs of posttraumatic stress disorder or depression and 19.5 percent could have a traumatic brain injury, which effects mood and behavioral functions. The study estimates that if these numbers are proportionate for the 1.64 million deployed soldiers, 300,000 veterans are suffering from PTSD or major depression and 320,000 are facing a traumatic brain injury.
Matthew Cary, president of the advocacy organization Veterans and Military Families for Progress, noted the ability of state governments to step in when the federal system is overburdened.
"The VA doesn’t have the personnel to address all of these mental health issues,” Cary said. “But governors have moved rather quickly through their state veterans offices in putting their state money towards veterans services."
In 2007, Connecticut used the profits from the sale of a state-owned hospital to establish the Military Support Program, which funds at least a dozen private counseling sessions for members of the Reserves and National Guard and their families, during and after deployment.
The program, run by the Connecticut Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services, features a 24-hour hotline that provides emergency counseling or referrals to its more than 225 specially trained mental health professionals.
A measure before the Connecticut general assembly now seeks to expand the services to all active duty military forces, said Tackett, who directs the Military Support Program.
By February 2008, the hotline had received more than 300 calls and helped more than 180 families, Schwartz said.
Rivera said she has not used the Military Support Program herself, but recommends it to her clients as the family services center coordinator for the New London armory.
Rivera leads family programs for units deploying out of New London’s armory, which brief soldiers and families on the roller coaster of emotions to expect.
She also facilitates support groups for family members left at home, where she said she grew close with a member whose husband and daughter were deployed in Iraq.
It was in this friendship that Rivera said she could be honest about her own feelings and gain solace.
“We were able to break down in front of each other,” she said. “We got through it together.”
Rivera said she’s also drawn strength and support in her church, especially since Crespo’s return. Her daughter’s turbulent emotional displays have subsided and Rivera has learned how to anticipate coming storms.
“I get a sense of when she’s going to have a bad day,” Rivera said. “I kind of know when she’s OK and when she’s not.”
Crespo, who lives with her mother, noted the role her family has played in her improvement. “We clashed a couple of times but my family has been a big help,” she said. “They were mainly my help more than I was.”
For many returning service members, the inability to admit to any struggle can be the biggest roadblock to accessing the necessary care. According to 2007 study by an American Psychological Association task force on military deployment, returning service members cited embarrassment, fear of a damaged career and concern that their leaders and units would lose confidence in them as major barriers for seeking mental health services.
Schwartz said the Military Support Program’s family counseling services could directly aid veterans who are otherwise reluctant to ask for help.
“Many military members who might not go into treatment will go with their families to help work things out,” Schwartz said. “It’s not like they have the problem, they’re doing this for their family.”
Some legislators have argued that the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs has exhibited similar hesitation in admitting to struggles. In mid-April CBS News reported intercepting emails Dr. Katz sent to a colleague that indicated that suicide attempts among veterans were much higher than what the department reported publicly.
The VA did not release the suicide rate mentioned in Katz's emails because it was unsure of the accuracy of the numbers, Katz told CBS in response to its reports.
Katz did not further comment on the numbers’ discrepancy, but is set to testify at a House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs hearing May 6.
At a Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee hearing April 23, U.S. Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) questioned whether lawmakers could trust the VA. She said getting veterans the help they need, not public relations, should be the department's priority.
“We are not your enemy, we are your support system,” Murray told witnesses from the VA and Department of Defense. “Unless we get accurate information, we cannot do our job.”
Increased transparency may help alleviate mental health epidemics among veterans. The RAND study showed that if 100 percent of returning service members exhibiting PTSD symptoms received treatment, $1.7 billion could be saved, through increased job productivity and decreased suicides. The costs of treating posttraumatic stress disorder and depression in the two years after deployment are estimated to be as much as $6.2 billion.
Rivera said she encourages all returning troops to meet with counselors immediately, even if they’re not yet feeling the weight of these mental health conditions.
“With them, it’s always ‘I don't need that,’ ” she said. “But the bottom line is you need to take care of yourself to be there for your family.”
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Local Control Dominates Sex Education in New Hampshire
SEX EDUCATION
Keene Sentinel
Kenna Caprio
Boston University Washington News Service
May 1, 2008
WASHINGTON – Though the abstinence-only debate over sex education has flared up again in Washington, the controversy is having only a limited impact in New Hampshire, where sex ed programs and curricula remain under the jurisdiction of local school districts and communities.
Though there is increased concern about the rise in sexually transmitted diseases among young people—the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in March that one in four teenage girls in the United States has such a disease—critics of abstinence-only-until-marriage programs say they have not been effective.
New Hampshire, while it accepts federal abstinence-only grants, leaves it up to local school districts to decide what kinds of sex education programs, if any, to include in their curriculums. The state distributes the federal funds not to the schools themselves but to nonprofit organizations, which must match three of every four federal dollars received.
While the state mandates education about HIV and AIDS, it does not otherwise require sex education.
“The high schools make a determination themselves as far as what the curriculum can include,” said Lisa Bujno, a community health services director for the New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services.
In Washington, meanwhile, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on April 23 conducted the first-ever hearing on the effectiveness of federal grants for state and local abstinence-only-until-marriage programs and whether they should be continued.
Rep. Paul W. Hodes, D-N.H, a member of the committee, described the rise in sexually transmitted diseases among the young as a “public health crisis.”
He added: “It certainly appears from the testimony at the hearing that abstinence-only programs are not effective in addressing the crisis that our teens and young people are facing in terms of the consequences of sexual activity.
“The testimony was clear that we now have scientific evidence showing that abstinence-only is not effective at preventing both disease and unwanted pregnancies. What is important, obviously, is to have comprehensive sexual education in which the importance of abstinence plays a significant role.”
Hodes favors an end to abstinence-only grants and instead supports grants for comprehensive sex education programs, according to Mark Bergman, his communications director.
Since 1982, the federal government has spent more than $1.5 billion on
abstinence-only-until-marriage programs, with more than $175 million allocated in the current fiscal year under a program created in 1996.
An increasing number of states have refused any federal grants for such programs.
New Hampshire, while it accepts such grants, received only $94,901 in federal funds last year for abstinence-only programs, with Catholic Medical Center in Manchester the lone grantee.
Area high schools, including ConVal Regional High School in Peterborough and Conant High School in Jaffrey, sometimes invite outside speakers to discuss abstinence with students, according to Bujno.
Jeanne Pride, who teaches independent living at Conant High School, invites Robin Ng, a speaker from W8NG: Because U’R Worth It! to come talk to her students. W8NG, an advocate of abstinence-only sex education, received $27,805 in federal abstinence-only funds in fiscal year 2006 but not in 2007.
“The kids know up front that this is an abstinence presentation,” Pride said, adding that Ng “does a good job of relating to the kids.”
In her course, Pride covers topics from basic anatomy and childbirth to sexually transmitted diseases, birth control, parenting and relationships.
Describing her job, Pride said, “I’m filling in, not taking the place of parents.”
Pride devotes more time to talking about sexually transmitted diseases than pregnancy, she said, because students are “much more likely to get STDs than to get pregnant.
At the House committee hearing, Shelby Knox, a 21-year-old youth speaker and blogger for the Huffington Post, spoke about her experience growing up in Lubbock, Texas. She said she took a virginity-until-marriage pledge at church, received abstinence-only-until-marriage sex ed, saw acquaintances become pregnant and realized that she believes in comprehensive sex education.
In her prepared statement, she said: “I believe in abstinence-only in a religious sense…. Even if we did wait until marriage, we still lacked a basic understanding of our bodies, reproduction and how to prevent pregnancy as well as a long list of sexually transmitted infections and the skills to navigate conversations about sex and protection.
Pro-abstinence organizations are quick to point out that abstinence education does more than just stress abstinence.
“I think one thing that is important to understand is abstinence education isn’t just telling kids to ‘say no to sex’; the programs are more comprehensive than that. They get into character building and goal setting,” said Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America, an organization that promotes public policy based on Biblical principles.
Valeria Huber, executive director of the National Abstinence Education Association, echoed that view: “[There’s] so much misinformation about what abstinence education is…it’s been reduced to a war of sound bites.”
A speaker from Catholic Medical Center, the single recipient of abstinence-only federal funds last year, was invited to discuss abstinence with Judy Heddy’s ConVal students this school year. Heddy also had a representative from Planned Parenthood speak to her students.
In her class, Heddy covers healthy relationships, sexually transmitted diseases, birth control and abstinence.
The speaker from Catholic Medical Center, Heddy said, covered “relationships, making choices, consequences of bad choices, benefits of waiting to have sex.”
According to the medical center’s Web site, it provides a “WAIT (Why Am I Tempted) Training – High school program for juniors and seniors on sexual abstinence in preparation for marriage.”
The hospital’s abstinence education program “has components that relate to healthy relationships, character formations, positive youth development, life skills and marriage preparation,” said the state Health Department’s Bujno.
Abstinence-only programs that receive federal funding must adhere to a strict eight point guideline.
Among the criteria: teaching “that abstinence from sexual activity is the only certain way to avoid out-of-wedlock pregnancy, sexually transmitted diseases and other associated health problems,” “that a mutually faithful monogamous relationship in the context of marriage is the expected standard of human sexual activity” and “that sexual activity outside the context of marriage is likely to have harmful psychological and physical effects.”
ConVal also offers an “opt-out” choice for students and parents if they are not comfortable with the subject matter of the class. According to Heddy, no one opted out this year.
In New Hampshire, it is up to educators and communities to listen and discern the best way to educate and protect students and young adults from the potential health risks of sexual activity.
At Keene High School, the co-superintendent, William B. Gurney, said that though students cover sex ed in 9th grade, the school is considering an 11th-grade health class as well.
“A lot of things covered in the freshman class [we] may do very well to discuss again with11th graders as they get ready to go off to college and into the real world,” Gurney said.
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Gamblers Betting on Frank to Overturn Law
GAMBLING
New Bedford Standard Times
Matthew Huisman
Boston University Washington News Service
April 30, 2008
WASHINGTON – The odds may not be in his favor, but Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., has gained a valuable ally in his fight to overturn a 2006 law banning online gambling. Poker Players Alliance, a grassroots organization fighting for poker players’ rights, has put its chips on Rep. Frank’s proposal.
With more than one million members, the alliance in mid April began actively lobbying Congress. Members have flooded congressional offices with more than 17,000 letters in the past month, attended town hall meetings in districts and flown to Washington to meet with lawmakers, according to John Pappas, executive director of the alliance. There are 25,000 members in Massachusetts alone.
The alliance is betting on Rep. Frank’s new bill, which would negate the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006, a law that prohibits the transfer of funds between online gambling sites and financial institutions. Exceptions to the rule include online lotteries, fantasy sports and horse racing.
Introduced in early April by Rep. Frank and Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, the bill would prevent the Federal Reserve Board and the Treasury Department from implementing regulations for the enforcement of the 2006 law. Since the act did not outline methods of enforcement, the responsibility falls on the Fed and Treasury.
Guidelines proposed in October of last year would require banks and financial institutions to identify and block transfers from unlawful Internet gambling sites, putting them in a law enforcement position.
According to Treasury spokeswoman Jennifer Zuccarelli, the two agencies hope to have a final rule in place by the end of the year, assuming Mr. Frank’s latest bill does not pass. The bill, which has 11 cosponsors, has been referred to the Financial Services Committee, of which Rep. Frank is chairman.
“The ban on Internet gambling infringes upon two freedoms that are important to many Americans: the ability to do with their money as they see fit and the freedom from government interference with the Internet,” Rep. Frank said in a statement.
Rep. Frank last year introduced legislation calling for federal regulation and licensing of Internet gambling and online betting. That bill, still in committee, would take financial institutions out of an enforcement role. Last year’s bill differs from his latest bill because the older legislation includes guidelines for regulation.
“They put a tremendous amount of pressure on the banks with no way to enforce it,” Rep. Frank said.
Because of the lack of technology to determine the nature of bank transactions, it is hard to determine if gambling is involved.
“It’s very difficult to separate out which transactions are retail and which are gambling,” said American Bankers Association spokesman Peter Garuccio. “You cannot tell based on a merchant’s name what the transaction is.”
Mr. Garuccio used the example of an online gambling site that might also sell T-shirts. For a bank to differentiate between a gambling transaction and one for a T-shirt by the same vendor would be nearly impossible, he said.
Last month, a House Financial Services subcommittee held a hearing on the proposed rules for enforcement of the 2006 act. Bank representatives and federal officials testified about the potential problems with the proposal.
“The statute as enacted and the regulations as proposed are both burdensome and unworkable and are unlikely to result in stopping illegal Internet gambling,” Wayne Abernathy, executive director of the American Bankers Association, testified at the hearing.
Mr. Abernathy said the burden placed on financial institutions by the 2006 act imposes “an unprecedented delegation of governmental responsibility with no prospect of practical success.”
Some supporters of Rep. Frank’s latest bill think it is too inclusive, which could hurt its chance of passing. Charles Nesson, a professor at Harvard Law School and founder of the Global Poker Strategic Thinking Society, said Mr. Frank should focus primarily on poker as opposed to all forms of online gambling.
“Strategically speaking, to take on the whole thing is more difficult than focusing on online poker,” Mr. Nesson said. “He’s got a libertarian principle he’s after.”
Mr. Nesson advocates poker use for educational and entertainment purposes because he maintains it is a game of skill rather than a game of chance.
“Adults who engage in a game of skill like poker should be allowed to do so,” the Poker Players Alliance’s Mr. Pappas said. “Just because it moved from the kitchen table to the computer table, doesn’t mean it should be illegal.”
Mr. Pappas said the alliance supports Rep. Frank’s bill but is primarily focused on the rights of poker players as opposed to all online gamblers.
In Massachusetts, the gambling debate has taken a different turn. Gov. Deval Patrick proposed legislation in October that would have provided for three casino gambling locations in the state. The bill, which the House voted down in late March, also included a clause to ban all forms of Internet gambling.
The proposal drew the attention of the Global Poker Strategic Thinking Society, which fought against the bill's inclusion of poker in the online gambling ban. Mr. Nesson said he did not know why the clause was placed in a bill that so strongly advocated other forms of gambling. He said the state should approach poker as a learning tool.
A February 2007 telephone poll by the Center for Policy Analysis at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth showed that four percent of Massachusetts residents participated in some form of online gambling during the previous year. That number is almost twice the national average, but not the largest in New England. Seven percent of New Hampshire residents gambled online, according to Clyde Barrow, director of the center.
Despite the popularity of poker, not everyone is buying into Rep. Frank’s proposal to allow Internet gambling. The National Coalition Against Legalized Gambling, a non-profit organization that opposes the bill, maintains that online gambling brings an addictive product into people’s homes. The coalition supports a ban on all forms of gambling, including online poker.
“In these economic times, the people that sponsor this want people to gamble more,” said Thomas Grey, spokesman for the coalition. “Wouldn’t it be better to work and save and invest your money at this point?”
The coalition and other organizations like Focus on the Family, a Christian organization that promotes conservative public policy, insist the Internet and the lack of adequate age-verification technology would give children easy access to online gambling.
“The strength of Internet gambling is that its secrecy and anonymity allow its accessibility,” said Chad Hills, the analyst for gambling research and policy at Focus on the Family. “Nobody has to know that you are even playing.”
Mr. Hills said his organization opposes all forms of online gambling and any attempt to regulate it because the Internet is impossible to control.
“You can’t stop it, so how do you regulate it?” Mr. Hills said. “How do we know playing poker isn’t going directly to fund a group of terrorists who are going to come in and bomb a large population?”
Mr. Pappas argues that improved age-verification technology coupled with government regulation would allow for a safer and less problematic solution as opposed to outright prohibition.
“The whole idea that we can achieve some sort of a prohibition is false,” Mr. Pappas said. “People have just found other ways to fund their accounts.”
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New Bedford High School Teacher Runs His Fastest Half Marathon in Washington
TEACHER
New Bedford Standard Times
Matthew Huisman
Boston University Washington News Service
April 21, 2008
WASHINGTON – As a cold wind blew, thousands of runners crowded into race corrals in front of Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Stadium for the start of the third annual National Marathon and Half Marathon. With the sun peeking over the horizon and the temperature in the low 40s, D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty announced the start of the race, sending a horde of runners into the streets.
Crowded among the runners on the last Saturday in March was Adam Chale, a special-education teacher at New Bedford High School. Mr. Chale, who has competed in almost 50 road races, finished his fastest half marathon – 13.1 miles – with a time of one hour, 58 minutes and 48 seconds.
As Mr. Chale waited at the start, he said, he was cold, nervous and excited. “I hadn't run a half marathon since Miami in January, so I wasn't certain that I'd do all that well,” Mr. Chale said. “I just wanted to be competitive with myself.”
After the start, Mr. Chale said, he felt fine as the pack of runners started to move. The course led runners through all four quadrants of the city and finished near the start line. When Mr. Chale crossed the finish line, he said, he looked up and saw the clock read lower than his personal goal of two hours.
“I felt this great sense of accomplishment like I had just won the Olympics and was ready to take my victory lap with the American flag,” Mr. Chale said. “OK, maybe not the Olympics, but there was some clandestine fist pumping going on.”
Mr. Chale, 42, grew up in Wheatley Heights, N.Y., and started running at a young age with his sister, Amanda, and their father, Allen. Amanda Chale told the story of when their father took the two of them to a track and told them they needed to run four laps before he would enter them in a race.
“Like anything else you expose your kids to, it puts it out there and shows somebody what they might want to try,” Ms. Chale said in a telephone interview.
In high school, Mr. Chale ran the 400 meter and 800 meter in track and the 5 kilometer race in cross-country and was a member of the fencing team. he competed in the 1981 New York State cross-country championships along with his team.
“I took a hiatus from running after high school, about 20 years,” Mr. Chale said in a telephone interview. The decision to pick up running again happened after he gained weight, Mr. Chale said. After experiencing chest pains he decided it was time to change his lifestyle. He started off walking at first, and then decided to run, slowly increasing his mileage.
“It’s been a transformation of his body and mind,” said Lisa Stoeckle, a fellow teacher at New Bedford High School. “When I met Adam he was not in the physical shape that he’s in today.”
Now Mr. Chale said that he runs for his health and enjoyment, adding that he usually runs by himself and without music.
“I like to have a sense of what I’m doing and I like to keep my head clear,” Mr. Chale said.
“I think that the running helps him to get his life prioritized,” his sister said. “It’s a good way for him to think and work through things.”
For the past five years, Mr. Chale has been a special-education teacher at New Bedford High School, primarily helping students with difficulty reading or with learning disabilities. He said he enjoys teaching because of the satisfaction he experiences when a student finally realizes a solution to a problem.
“You always enjoy it when a child gets it,” Mr. Chale said. “There is a light in their eyes when they get it.”
Mr. Chale said that he was inspired to be a special-education teacher in part because he was diagnosed with a learning disability as a junior in high school. Mr. Chale said that he understands the frustration his students feel.
“I had a high IQ, but my grades were poor,” Mr. Chale said.
After graduating high school, he attended the C.W. Post Campus of Long Island University as an undergraduate and graduate student earning his Master’s and going on to teach in New York City and upstate New York before coming to New Bedford.
His colleagues describe Mr. Chale as a dedicated teacher and a role model for students and faculty alike. Ms. Stoeckle said she has known Mr. Chale “since the day he walked into the high school.” She describes him as a shy and reserved person who cares about his students.
“He relates to their disabilities,” Ms. Stoeckle said. “He feels their frustration when they are caught in a difficult learning situation.”
Michael Winderlick, who teaches biology at New Bedford High School, said that Mr. Chale’s athleticism is inspirational to students and faculty. Mr. Winderlick said that Mr. Chale and he participate in after-school sports with other faculty and that Mr. Chale helps out with running programs and with the track team.
Mr. Chale said his next half marathon will be May 4 in either Providence, R.I., or on Long Island, N.Y. He is also planning to run in the New York City Marathon on Nov. 2, 2008, provided he is chosen from the lottery of runners. Mr. Chale expects to find out if he makes the cut some time in June.
Mr. Chale is engaged to be married in September to Francie Behar, a physical therapist at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. The couple met at a softball league in Boston, Ms. Behar said in an interview. Ms. Behar and Mr. Chale have no plans to give up their current work positions.
“I hope that his kids are aware of all of his accomplishments and can do better by his example,” his sister said.
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Connecticut Expands Support for Military Families
SOLDIERS
Norwalk Hour
Erin Kutz
Boston University Washington News Service
April 18, 2008
WASHINGTON – More than half of the military personnel deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan have spouses or children and when they return from deployment, the transition can be hard not only on the soldiers but on their families, who often share the mental, emotional and social pressures of the war.
“This war is really, really different because we are relying so much on National Guard and Reserve forces,” said Linda Schwartz, commissioner of the Connecticut Department of Veterans’ Affairs.
Schwartz said that 60 percent of members of the military serving in Iraq and Afghanistan are married, compared to 4 percent of those who served in Vietnam, and that 15 percent of those serving are women.
The Reserve and Guard forces don’t have the continual flow of support from living on a military base or installation and the VA hospitals and counselors can be miles away, presenting a challenge to their transition into civilian life. Since Sept. 11, 16,500 Connecticut residents have deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan, 55 percent to 60 percent of whom are Guard and Reserve members, Schwartz said.
“There’s a universal, predictable set of challenges for soldiers coming home,” said Jim Tackett of the Connecticut Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services. He cited depression, anxiety, sleep disturbance, irritability, anger, substance abuse and “hyper-vigilance.”
The Connecticut National Guard offers counseling to families with a deployed member in any branch, helping them understand the feelings of withdrawal and anxiety they may experience, said Michelle McCarty, youth coordinator for the Connecticut National Guard.
Linda Rolstone, the wife of a National Guard soldier deployed in Afghanistan, said the emotions she has experienced while her husband is deployed in Afghanistan have been a roller coaster and the National Guard’s family services helped prepare her for what to expect.
“When he first got overseas, there was a lot of anxiety as far as his safety,” said the Meriden resident about her husband, Army Maj. Kim Rolstone, who was deployed in July. “The other emotion was worry about my kids and how they were going to handle it.”
One of her most frightening moments came at 3 a.m. when the phone rang and she wondered who was calling and what the news would be. Her husband turned out to be OK but it was a rough few minutes.
Rolstone, a mother of four, said she’s managed to remain busy during the day but at night can be awake with worry. She said she can manage the feeling with her husband emailing almost every day and calling twice a week, but that a few weeks ago, not hearing from him for five days almost pushed her to the panic level.
In 2007, Connecticut created the Military Support Program to help returning soldiers in the National Guard and Reserve as well as their families - people like the Rolstones.
The program features a 24-hour hotline, referral services to more than 225 trained mental health counselors and funding for counseling sessions. A measure before the Connecticut general assembly now seeks to expand the services to all active duty military forces as well, said Tackett, who directs the Military Support Program.
As of this February, the hotline had received more than 300 calls and helped more than 180 families, Schwartz said, pointing out that the hotline can provide immediate counseling and around-the-clock services that ordinary VA clinics and hospitals cannot.
“If you’re having a crisis you don’t want to wait until Monday morning,” she said.
Nationally, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs has anticipated the challenges created by deployments. The department’s mental health budget in 2001 was $2 billion, while this year’s was $3.5 billion, said Dr. Ira Katz, director of mental health for the VA. Next year’s mental health budget is close to $4 billion.
“The VA has been ramping up since the beginning of the war,” Katz said.
Veterans can receive free health care services through Veterans Affairs facilities within five years of their return from deployment, but the VA’s ability to directly treat families is limited, Katz said.
“The VA is authorized to work with families when it is part of a treatment plan designed to benefit veterans,” Katz said. “People work as much as possible within those limitations to do as much family work as possible.”
About 300,000 of the 800,000 men and women who have returned from Iraq and Afghanistan have come to the VA for care, Katz said. About 120,000 of them have been diagnosed with mental health problems, but only about 60,000 of those diagnoses have been posttraumatic stress disorder. He also said the number who have sought VA care is split relatively evenly between regular active duty and Reserve or Guard.
The Military Support Program in Connecticut helps families, not just service members, get direct access to counseling and support. Schwartz said this cooperative counseling could even push members to seek counseling who normally wouldn’t because of the stigma associated in admitting to mental health difficulties.
“Many military members who might not go into treatment will go with their families to help work things out,” Schwartz said. “It’s not like they have the problem, they’re doing this for their family.”
The Department of Defense has also recognized the enhanced needs of Reserve and National Guard members and in March announced the creation of Deployment Support and Reintegration Office to monitor Reserve members throughout the several months after they return and help them readjust to everyday responsibilities.
Schwartz said during the immediate return from deployment, members are so enthralled with simple civilian routines such as driving a car or being able to shower every day that emotional difficulties don’t set in.
Any counseling done immediately falls on deaf ears because soldiers are consumed with the excitement and anticipation of getting back to their families, Schwartz said. But, she added that after a month or so back home, service members’ difficulties in adjusting to civilian life can really appear.
“When you’re living on the edge for a year, it’s really hard to come back down from that experience,” Schwartz said. “They like that feeling and try to recreate it on the highway or doing daring things.”
The need for an adrenaline rush comparable to the one found in war zones can push them to drive reckless or while intoxicated and can cause breaches of the peace and domestic violence charges, she said.
“I see we’ve come to a place in time where the VA and Congress are going to have to take stock of where we are,” she said. “We’re going to be doing war a lot this way in the future. Maybe it’s time to rethink the way in which we take care of families and treat them.”
Katz said both the VA and Congress have explored the idea of strengthening the network of support for families.
“We’re now exploring and Congress is exploring whether this is an area in which there could be regulatory changes or where new legislation may be of value,” he said.
Major Rolstone is scheduled to return around the beginning of May, and his wife said their family has already received information about the reintegration program for Reserves and expects to take an active part in its services. Their 20-year-old daughter is also in the Guard and is scheduled to leave for Iraq in May.
Rolstone has stopped working part-time as a registered nurse since her husband’s deployment and said that the logistics of his return may be a bit bumpy.
“I’ve gotten into a routine for a year,” she said. “Integrating him back into that routine I’m sure will be a little bit awkward. But he’s just really looking forward to it even if it’s a little nuts.”
The Military Support Program is also working on allocating money toward consulting teachers on how to support children with family members deployed, Tackett said.
The Military Support Program is so new that research on its effectiveness has not been conducted, but it has created awareness that more work is needed, Tackett said.
“What we do have is a deeper appreciation of the public health challenge we’re facing,” Tackett said. “I think our challenge is that when soldiers return, that we help their family members and all civilians understand the intense pressure cooker that they’re going through.”
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Collins Seeks to Have Iraq Shoulder More Financial Burdens
Iraq funding
Bangor Daily News
Vicki Ekstrom
Boston University Washington News Service
4/18/2008
WASHINGTON – Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, is urging Senate leaders to take steps to require Iraq to shoulder more of the financial burden of rebuilding their own country.
Collins was joined by Sens. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., and Evan Bayh, D-Ind., in proposing legislation at a Capitol Hill press conference on Thursday.
The legislation would require the Iraqi government to reimburse Americans for fuel they use in Iraq. It may also include having Iraq reimburse for the salaries, equipment and training Americans provide Iraqi soldiers. Reimbursements would come in the form of direct initial payment or subsequent payment on American loans.
The three legislators attempted to pass similar legislation in 2003, when the rebuilding of Iraq was in the early stages, but that legislation did not get passed. Had Congress passed the legislation then, they said, the Iraq government would need to repay the more than $45 billion the United States has spent on Iraq reconstruction in the last five years. Collins also said she believes that if the first $10 billion allotted to reconstruction in 2003 had been a loan, the reconstruction would be further along because the Iraqis would have had a stake in the process.
The United States is paying about $90 million a month for the salaries of the Sons of Iraq, the local security force, which was critical in the progress made in the Anbar province and around Baghdad, Collins said.
Additionally, while Iraq oil revenue is estimated to be about $56 billion, American gas prices have reached record highs, negatively impacting the U.S. economy. Some economists have said that America is nearing a recession, and yet the United States spends about $10 billion a month in Iraq.
“It’s one thing to be asked to help those who can’t help themselves,” Bayh said at the press conference. “It’s another thing entirely to ask the people to borrow more money from China that our children will need to repay, with interest, to give to a country that is running a surplus and is not spending its own money to help itself.”
While American troops in Iraq spend about $3.23 a gallon for gasoline for military vehicles, Iraqi citizens spend only $1.30 a gallon because of government subsidies, Bayh said.
“Why are we paying that cost?” asked Collins at the press conference.
“You don’t do that to your friends,” Bayh said.
The three senators wrote letters to the Senate leadership, Appropriations Committee and U.S. State and Defense departments presenting these policy proposals.
“The time has come to end this blank check policy and require the Iraqis to invest in their own future,” said the April 17 letter sent to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. “It is not our intent to punish or harm the government of Iraq; rather, we believe this is an opportunity for Iraq to demonstrate its desire to act independently from the United States.”
Rep. Tom Allen, D-Maine, who is running against Collins for the Senate, said he agrees “that Iraqis need to take more responsibility for their country,” but the best way to account for the taxpayers “is to set a deadline to bring American forces home responsibly and end our involvement in Iraq’s religious civil war,” he said.
Congress recently enacted legislation written by Allen to establish a bipartisan commission to root out waste, fraud and war profiteering.
Collins is looking to make her legislation part of a war-funding bill that Congress will consider in the next few weeks. She believes it will be met by “overwhelming support.”
“This idea’s not a Democrat or Republican idea. It’s just plain common sense,” Bayh said.
Collins said several of her Republican colleagues have already pledged their support, some wanting to be cosponsors.
In contrast to 2003, Collins said she believes the administration has evolved in its thinking and is more open to the concepts being presented, “but I have a feeling that we will want to go further than the administration will want to go,” Collins said.
Some in the administration are saying that these proposals are already being done in Iraq because the Iraqis have begun to take over some of the reconstruction costs. But the senators distinguish the difference between the natural process of assuming the costs of reconstruction and the need for the Iraqis to begin to pay the salaries of the Iraqi soldiers and to reimburse the United States for the oil Americans are using in Iraq to help the Iraqi people.
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Supporting Obama, in Public and in Silence
PRIMARY
Union Leader
Matt Negrin
Boston University Washington News Service
17 April 2008
WASHINGTON — New Hampshire’s two Democratic House members are marching down opposite paths in showing their support for presidential contender Barack Obama as the Pennsylvania primary looms.
Rep. Paul Hodes, who endorsed Obama in July, wants the contest between Obama and Hillary Clinton to be over. He said he has been wooing his fellow unpledged superdelegates, among them undeclared House Democrats who may ultimately decide who gets the party’s formal nod in August.
His counterpart, however, has been mute. Rep. Carol Shea-Porter has for two weeks declined to comment on the fierce battle for the Democratic nomination, even as supporters of both Obama and Clinton have made public their backing of the candidates leading up to the April 22 Pennsylvania vote.
Shea-Porter’s silence is not unheard of in this race. Last year, she vowed not to endorse any candidate unless a compelling reason surfaced. Both candidates vigorously sought her support, and she even dined with Bill and Hillary Clinton over the Labor Day weekend.
But she broke her neutrality in December when she backed Obama, citing his ability to inspire the “largest number of Americans to turn out for this critical election.”
To Dante Scala, a political science professor at the University of New Hampshire, the behavior of Hodes and Shea-Porter “is kind of consistent with the way they’ve been all along.”
Both Granite State freshmen were named national co-chairs for Obama’s campaign after their endorsements. What that nebulous role means is up to each of them. Whereas Shea-Porter has stayed in the shadows, Hodes has brought the competition to the corridors of the House.
“I’ve talked to numerous members, many of my colleagues,” Hodes said. “Press statements confirm a softening of Sen. Clinton’s superdelegates.”
Shea-Porter, meanwhile, issued this statement on April 17: “Like everybody else, I am watching this race closely, and I know that whichever Democrat emerges from this will make an excellent president. It is my hope that this will be determined before the convention.”
Clinton leads Obama in superdelegates, 254 to 230, a much narrower lead than she held months ago, according to the Associated Press. Including the pledged delegates, Obama is ahead of Clinton, 1,644 to 1,504.
When asked how he is persuading the uncommitted superdelegates, Hodes said, “Those are trade secrets.”
Shea-Porter’s reluctance to discuss the race may be indicative of her vulnerability in November. “She’s got other things to worry about, frankly, like keeping her seat,” Scala said.
The Pennsylvania primary may not determine the nominee immediately, but it could cast a bleak pall over the Clinton camp if she merely scrapes by in a state she was once expected to take in a landslide. The fight for the nomination may well come down to the party’s convention in August, where Clinton would have to persuade the superdelegates to choose her over Obama even if she trails him in both popular votes and pledged delegates.
“I have great respect for Sen. Clinton, who is a tough campaigner,” Hodes said. “I know how difficult it would be for her to end her campaign.”
The heated battle for the nomination reached a new point of tension in late March as Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy, a party elder and Obama supporter, called for Clinton to quit. “There is no way that Sen. Clinton is going to win enough delegates to get the nomination,” Leahy told Vermont Public Radio. “She ought to withdraw and she ought to be backing Sen. Obama.”
The New Hampshire Democratic Party, like its counterparts across the country, is staying out of the fistfight and anxiously waiting for a clear leader to emerge. On Jan. 8, Granite State voters narrowly chose Clinton over Obama, though they each earned nine pledged delegates in the primary.
“It’s still very early,” Ray Buckley, chairman of the state’s Democratic Party, said recently. “Very rarely in the past have we known the nominee at this point.”
When asked if it is right for Obama supporters to urge Clinton to quit the race, Buckley said, “Everyone has their own reason for what they have to do.”
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Courtney Inspirted by Pope’s Message of Compassion
COURTNEY
New London Day
Erin Kutz
Boston University Washington News Service
April 17, 2008
WASHINGTON – Pope Benedict XVI’s mass at the Washington Nationals stadium Thursday was an opportunity for Republicans, Democrats, civilians and military to come together, said U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney, D-2nd District.
Though the clear markings of a baseball field could be seen from his seat, he said no reverence was lost on the 46,000-person crowd. “It really was being in church—people were really engaged,” Courtney said. “The Blackberrys were off. All eyes were on the altar.”
Courtney attended the papal mass with his wife, Audrey, who’s a member of the choir at St. Joseph’s Church in Rockville. He pointed out the pope’s themes of hope.
“There was clearly a message of compassion, something people in public office should really be attuned to,” Courtney said. “To me, at the end of the day that’s what public service is about.”
In addition to noting the impressiveness of the music at the mass, Audrey Courtney said the experience testified to the enormity of the Catholic faith. “That was the feeling I got from it—being part of something so big and so ancient,” she said.
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