Congresswoman Kristi Noem continues her public meetings on education and the oppressive federal control thereof called No Child Left Behind with a meeting today at 2 p.m. at Lennox High School and tomorrow at 3:15 p.m. at Vermillion High School.
Of course, given sloppy mangement in Noem's office, I'm not sure she actually wants lots of people to show up. By scheduling meetings for mid-afternoon, she excludes much of the working public. She runs the risk of getting a crowd of retirees who are more interested in talking about her vote to end Medicare than her coming votes on education.
A friend in the newspaper business says the press release from Noem's office didn't arrive until 5:33 p.m. Tuesday. That meant the Wednesday morning meeting at Milbank probably got no pre-press. If the Watertown Public Opinion squeezed the 3 p.m. Watertown meeting into the Wednesday morning edition, most readers probably already had their day planned. (The event didn't make the P.O.'s online calendar.)
Rep. Noem was bragging in the Public Opinion just last weekend about how great she is at using technology to stay in touch with us constituents. Her Facebook page has one photo of yesterday's Milbank meeting up (looks like she got maybe a dozen attendees), but there's no information about the remaining meetings. Noem doesn't give any heads up on these meetings on her Twitter feed. Neither does her communications director Joshua Shields.
(Shields' most recent tweet: ".@RepKristiNoem line from @Keloland interview at her ranch: 'Got some gophers we need to shoot out here'".)
Congresswoman Noem couldn't even get a press release out to her favorite blog, which is starving for any content nowadays.
Maybe Noem has sent out other messages that we haven't heard about (rather like trees falling in forests). But it would appear that, with two blog posts, I've been working harder to publicize the Congresswoman's public appearances this week than the Congresswoman herself.
Yes, you should find that ironic.
p.s.: I would advise the Congresswoman to tell her staff to schedule and announce her public meetings much earlier, but alas, she's not terribly interested in learning the ropes on how to be an effective Congresswoman.
Oh, Congressional Barbie--will you ever learn? It's not enough to giggle "Legislating is hard!", snap your gum, and send your latest pot roast recipe off to KELO-land.
Chris! Get some friends together and fill the seats at that Vermillion meeting!
The first question to Noem at every meeting should be: "Why did you vote to kill Medicare?"
Please get that question and the response on camera!
As one who expects more from Noem than we got from Herseth, I think she could have/should have done a better job at promoting these meetings. As one who joined Senator Abdnor's staff eight months after he became a Senator and who had been a congressman for 8 years, I can tell you they did everything better and more smoother each succeeding year. My bet is this was a last minute decision based on time becoming available. In the old days, there were no internet communication resources. Now there is and I suspect they will get better at using them.
However, from one who didn't expect Herseth and doesn't hold Johnson accountable for having virtually no public meetings (I'll guaranteee you Noem will have more public meetings her first year in office than Herseth did in the first year of her last term and is already way ahead of Johnson), the criticism seems rather duplicitous.
Regarding the Medicare question, although not the topic of the meeting and typical of liberals to try to distract from the purpose of the meeting, I hope it is answered. Medicare will be broke in a few years. At least she is proposing/supporting a solution that will continue to provide medical care to seniors. What is your competing solution? Oh, yeah, more of the same that has the program on the brink of insolvency.
Noem likes the kind of town halls that are by phone because she doesn't actually have to take the risk of people being upset with her votes.
Teletown halls are a lot less risky and she can act as if she is still meeting constituents.
Imagine if one of her town halls had a ruckus... It would look bad for her.
Chris you should ask that question!!!
Ultimately, the voters of South Dakota have to take responsibility for who represents them. We currently have two people in Congress who are the total creations of propagandists who aren't really very good at what they do, because anyone who can function at the eighth grade level can see that the words and images have no correspondence to the reality. John Thune's congressional record is one of fecklessness and sponsoring legislation which has no effect, such as his efforts to protect the right of cows to unrestrained flatulence. Noem follows the precedent with sponsoring legislation to prevent the EPA from doing what the EPA can't do in the first place. South Dakotans vote for cheerleaders. When it comes to legislators, the majority go for the pom-poms and the false gossip.
As for Noem and education, if we want real education for our kids, the best effort will be to keep Noem as far away from it as possible. Except maybe to lead cheers on the football field and bake a few brownies. She and Bryan got rid of their cattle, so those beef roasts are a myth, unless she's cooking horses these days. Just what do they run on that "ranch" besides welfare subsidies?
Noem and Thune do one thing well that Daschle aslo did well it's meet the reporters and build good relationships with them. I don't think Herseth did much to foster a good relationship with reporters. Herseth too her support for granted and it cost her.
Now Noem has certainly told her fair share of fibs to get elected and I have a feeling the medicare vote will really do her in. Noem will do or say anything to get elected. Like she's not a career politician but do you ever think she'll just decide not to run? I mean Thune doens't think he's a career politician but what else has he done since 1996?
Now, Mike, that's unfair to Thune. He's not just a career politician. He worked as a lobbyist, too!
Good point! Noem is a career politician.
Noem said she'd serve for 10 years when she ran and Herseth had only served for 6 and Noem was calling her a career politician...
i disagree... I found SHS significantly more accessible as Noem... When SHS was going to be in the state we had enough notice to plan coverage, Noem's people barely let media know she's coming... earlier this year when she was supposed to be in Madison, Elisa and I learned about the visit from the county commission... NOT from Noem.