Home We’d like to talk to Warner and Webb, too
Virginia News

We’d like to talk to Warner and Webb, too

Contributors

Let me make this clear – if I’m Jim Webb or Mark Warner, I’m not letting a tea-party guy set up a health-care town hall for me, because I’d know what was really being set up – an ambush.
That said, and I have a hard time believing that I’m going to agree with David Karaffa on anything other than that the sky is generally blue and the earth is round – and he might not be with me 100 percent on that last point, but I digress.
Ahem. I want to have a chance to hear our senators out on health care, and give them a piece of my mind on the same. Obviously for different reasons than the David Karaffas of the world, but still.

“It is unfortunate that not only have our senators refused to hear our voice, but also have not given us an alternative means to speak with them. This is what Valley residents are frustrated with,” Karaffa wrote in a news release that he sent out to the local media this morning providing an update on his planned Sunday, Sept. 6 town hall at Riverheads High School in Greenville.

Karaffa has invited Warner and Webb to take part in his town hall, but they have declined the invitations.

My side is just as frustrated at the lack of opportunity to address our two senators on health care as the tea-partiers. Warner and Webb both hold important cards in the high-stakes poker that the health-care debate has become as centrist Democrats with bargaining chips in the form of votes that could sway the final health-insurance reform package significantly one way or the other.

The tea-party set doesn’t get that. They’re in their own little self-marginalized worlds where all Democrats are socialists hellbent on destroying America from within. But our side gets that Warner and Webb are middle-of-the-aisle guys who can in their quest to seek bipartisan common ground be dragged to the periphery in the process.

And there’s no question that a public option needs to be a key component of whatever health-care reform we end up with at the end of the year.

We could use a town-hall setting, then, just as well as the tea-partiers, to get our point across the Warner and Webb.

Tele-town halls and scripted campaign-like visits to health centers aren’t real interactions with voters.

Looks like we’ll have to settle with bending Bob Goodlatte’s ear at his lone local town hall, on Saturday, Sept. 5, at Turner Ashby High School in Bridgewater. As if Goodlatte has any say in what’s going to happen.

Warner and Webb do. We’ll have to hope they read their letters and e-mails, because other than that, we won’t have a chance to get their attention.

 

– Column by Chris Graham

Contributors

Contributors

Have a guest column, letter to the editor, story idea or a news tip? Email editor Chris Graham at [email protected]. Subscribe to AFP podcasts on Apple PodcastsSpotifyPandora and YouTube.

Latest News

How To Bet On Super Bowl 2025
Politics

Super Bowl Free Bets: Get $6,850 In Betting Offers For Eagles vs. Chiefs

patrick mahomes - How To Bet On The Super Bowl
Sports News

California Sports Betting Update: Bet On Super Bowl With CA Betting Apps

Bet on the Super Bowl in California using our safe and trusted offshore sportsbooks. Sports betting is a hot topic in California, and while in-state sportsbooks are not yet available, residents can safely bet on the Super Bowl using licensed offshore sportsbooks.  These platforms provide a secure and legal way for Californians to wager on...

Kendrick Lamar
Sports News

How To Bet On The Super Bowl Halftime Show In The U.S.

All eyes will be on Kendrick Lamar during the Super Bowl half time show, with the hip hop superstar gearing up for one of the biggest performances of his life. See here for how to bet on the Super Bowl halftime show in the U.S. For those looking to bet on the half time show...

How To Bet On Super Bowl 2025
Football, Sports News

Chiefs clinch onto favoritism in latest Super Bowl odds as Eagles support continues

uva basketball virginia tech women
Basketball, Sports

Women’s Basketball: Virginia Tech coasts past reeling Virginia, 87-62

donald trump maga
Politics, U.S. & World News

Rivera Sun: The Trump/Musk wrecking ball must be stopped before it’s too late

ben cline elon musk
Politics, U.S. & World News

Ben Cline is ‘fed up’ with people complaining about Elon Musk: You know what to do