Rick Crawford Statement on Marion Berry Retirement

“I respect Congressman Berry’s decision to retire and applaud his many years of public service. I will continue to run a strong campaign based on creating jobs, reducing the deficit, and representing Arkansas values. We can’t afford Obama’s liberal agenda and I am ready to go to Washington to be a check and balance on the liberal Congress.”

When Is A Blue Dog Really A Blue Dog?

When is a Blue Dog really a Blue Dog?  That question begs to be asked following the recent actions by Congressman Marion Berry.

First — a little background on the origins of the term Blue Dog.

The Blue Dog Coalition was formed in 1994 in the wake of the mid-term elections in which Republicans took back the majority in the House of Representatives.  The Blue Dog Coalition gave the more conservative members from the Democratic Party a unified voice in the wake of these elections.

The Blue Dog Coalition states that a “…top priority will be to focus Congress on balancing the budget and ridding taxpayers of the burden the debt places on them.”  But votes just this year by Marion Berry calls in to question this very important tenant of the Blue Dog Coalition and should cause individuals in the First District to ask, “When is a Blue Dog really a Blue Dog?”  Here is the evidence:

• October 3rd, 2008: Marion Berry voted for TARP I  ($350 Billion Dollars)
• January 21st, 2009:  Marion Berry Voted for TARP II ($350 Billion Dollars)
• January 28th, 2009:  Marion Berry voted for the Obama Stimulus Package ($787 Billion Dollars)
• February 24th, 2009:  Marion Berry issued a press release where he stated that “eight years of fiscal recklessness by the Bush Administration” created “unsustainable deficits” for our country.
• November 7th, 2009:  Marion Berry voted for Healthcare Reform ($894 Billion Dollars)
• Total Costs of these four votes:  $2,381,000,000,000 Dollars.  That is 2.3 trillion dollars!  That is $8,460 for every single person in the First District, or over $5 billion dollars in debt for the entire First District, not including interest!

The above votes are extremely revealing in comparison to the comment by Marion Berry just this week. After President Obama proposed an increase in troops being sent to Afghanistan, Marion Berry was quoted as saying, “I don’t remember him saying anything about how we’re going to pay for this.” Berry said after the president’s address at West Point, “I just think it’s got to be paid for.”

In October, lawmakers diverted $2.6 billion dollars from funds in a defense spending bill to pet projects.  You can read about those projects and how those funds were diverted here.

Marion Berry, along with his Blue Dog colleagues in both the House and Senate need to ask themselves, “When is a Blue Dog really a Blue Dog”?  The votes previously outlined paint a picture of anything but fiscal responsibility. Instead the votes increasingly and excessively burden taxpayers.  Indeed, the votes tell quite the opposite story – one of being a Lap Dog for Nancy Pelosi, not a Blue Dog representing the people of the First District.  Marion Berry’s conscious-come-lately of fiscal responsibility does not hold water with the people of the First District.

We need someone who will go to Washington who is a fiscal conservative before arrival.  We need someone who is willing to cast votes against spending bills when we do not have the money to support them.  We need to send someone to Washington who will cut taxes and lower our deficits in a way that is fiscally conservative and responsible without having a coalition determining when those times are.

I want to go to Washington and be your conservative voice and vote accordingly so that families in the First District do not have to worry about soaring deficits, out of control spending, and the liberal Obama-Pelosi-Berry agenda that will bankrupt our country.  It is time we send Marion Berry home to Gillete and send someone to Washington who will be a conservative vote, voice, and leader.

($2,381,000,000,000 divided by the total number of Americans in the 2000 census (281,421,906) equals $8,460.  $8,460 multiplied by the population of the First District at the time of the 2000 Census (668,360) equals $5,654,325,600.00)

Congressman Berry Calls Delta Director “Incompetent Moron”

Congressman Berry’s temper and name-calling is at it again. The members of the Mississippi Delta Grassroots Caucus, which lobbies Congressional members who represent the federally designated Delta Regional Authority, are meeting in Washington this week and Congressman Berry could only muster insults and name-calling as way to work on behalf of the people in the First Congressional District of Arkansas:

On the first day of the two-day meeting, Rep. Marion Berry dismissed Johnson, a George W. Bush appointee, as someone who “steals 120 or 130 thousand dollars of taxpayer dollars,” in the form of his annual salary. “He’s a burr in my saddle,” Berry, a Democrat from Arkansas, told the group on Tuesday evening.

“He’s an incompetent moron,” Berry later said in an interview.

Congressman Berry also voted in favor of the censure of Congressman Joe Wilson for his conduct in the House last week during the President’s speech. Congressman Berry, on the floor of the House, referred to a fellow Congressman, Rep. Adam Putnam, R-FL, as a “howdy doody looking nimrod” during debate on a piece of legislation:

This is just another prime example of how Congressman Berry works with others in Washington and how his temper and resort to name calling has been a detriment to the people of the First District. Its no wonder why the First District remains in the position it is in, especially with federal programs like the Delta Regional Authority, when our Congressman can only muster insults in his efforts instead of results in funding for important initiatives.

The people of the First District deserve better representation than someone who can only resort to insults and name calling when it comes to vital legislation that impacts the First District.

It is time to make a change in the First District!

What You Can Do

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