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January 12, 2007
Who Is John
Hall?
John Hall was best known for singing the seventies pop hit
Still the One. Now he represents New York’s 19th
Congressional District and is poised to become one of the most
liberal members of the House despite representing a conservative
swath of the Hudson Valley. Hall squeaked out a victory thanks
to a perfect storm that included Republican abandonment of
conservative principles, a negligent media and a diehard corps
of rich, leftist supporters.
Republicans lost the House because too many were concerned with
nothing but their own political fortunes. Hall’s opponent Sue
Kelly typified this trend. Kelly offered little to her
constituents but pork projects and bloated government while
tolerating corruption. Twelve years of indifference to Reagan
Republicanism left Kelly and others with nothing to run on.
Conventional wisdom says that Iraq and opposition to illegal
immigration caused the downfall of dozens of incumbents. But war
proponent Joe Lieberman thumped an anti-war candidate despite
being abandoned by his party.
Likewise, Republican Congressman Peter King, an outspoken hawk
who represents a Long Island district demographically identical
to the 19th, won by a whopping twelve points. King
powerfully articulated bold stands on border security and
intelligence gathering and the electorate responded.
Hall was vulnerable on national security. He believes that we
are “aiding the recruitment of our enemies” when we proactively
defend ourselves. His Iraq policy to “extricate our troops as
quickly as possible” is the definition of cut-and-run. Had
Kelly been a vocal terror warrior post-9/11 and focused on
Hall’s calls for capitulation, she too would have won big.
The media’s failure to scrutinize Hall helped him immeasurably.
Never was candidate Hall asked why he suddenly popped up in the
19th District in an election year after living for
decades in liberal Ulster County. Don’t the voters deserve to
know if Hall “moved” to the district to exploit the political
situation?
Hall, a college drop-out, turned 18 in 1966 and was draft
eligible for six of the most troop-intensive years of the
Vietnam War. Because he was running for office during a time
of war to represent a district where one in eight residents
served in the military, the press had a duty to ask Hall if he
was drafted, got deferments or neither.
The local papers dredged up Senate challenger John Spencer’s
past and made an issue of his drinking after he got back from
Vietnam. Wouldn’t you love to know what rock star Hall was
doing during the sixties and seventies?
Hall's campaign was supported by the likes of Susan Sarandon,
who is so radical she was uninvited to a 2003 event at the
baseball Hall of Fame because she was actively undermining the
morale of American troops in Iraq. Musician Bonnie Raitt, who
in 1999 traveled to Cuba to play for Castro and bash the United
States in the Karl Marx Theatre, played a concert to raise money
for the Hall Campaign.
Hall was endorsed by the Progressive Democrats of America, a
group that so misunderstands the threats we face, they advocate
a cabinet-level "Department
of Peace" as a national security measure. On the board of
this irresponsible organization of appeasers is Representative
Barbara Lee, the lone member of Congress to vote against the
post-9/11 war with the Taliban.
Hall tries to paint a quaint picture of concerned citizens
coming together in a grassroots effort to win the election. At
his victory party he crowed, “People power and individual
contributions overcame $2 million in special interest
contributions from my opponent.” However, experts agree that
Hall would not have enjoyed the narrow 4,255 vote margin but for
gay rights activist Adam Rose who donated an astounding $500,000
to an unregulated political organization called Majority
Action.
According to the Times Herald Record, Rose’s “$500,000 donation
to Majority Action accounted for nearly a third of the $1.8
million the group raised in the election cycle. Majority Action
soon after announced plans to spend the same amount exposing
Kelly's record and linking her to Washington scandal.” Thus, a
single donor, operating under an election law loop hole,
laundered a half million dollars into the Hall campaign and
swung the election.
As his term starts, Congressman Hall must realize that he
represents a district that is home to West Point and 77,000
military veterans. If he ignores us and caters to the Hollywood
liberals who got him into office he will undoubtedly be a one
hit wonder.
Kieran Michael Lalor, a Marine Corps veteran of Operation
Iraqi Freedom, is the founder of EternalVigilanceSociety.org
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