A Right Way and a Wrong Way

It is absolutely, 100% right to hold your congressman accountable for his voting record, in public, in front of his constituents. I said so when I was pulled aside by a longstanding member of Houston County's GOP who was trying to make sense of why several Ron Paul supporters were heckling Georgia's 8th District Congressman Austin Scott for his vote on the NDAA bill after his speech at last Saturday's District Convention . Unfortunately, the questions Scott was asked were indirect. Not really questions, even. More like shouted accusations and blame.

Party insiders think that all  Ron Paul supporters get organized before these things and the insider I was talking to assumed, incorrectly, that what happened last Saturday was part of a concerted effort, and that I was the head of it, or at the very least had some control over those responsible for it, which I don't. In our conversation I had to justify the heckling and never got to the substance of the questions on NDAA.

I am a lifelong Republican. I ran in 2009 for the seat that Austin Scott now occupies. I did it as a single mom with two young children in tow while I was working on my MBA. It was hard and thankless and many in the Party were unnecessarily rude  and dismissive of me (and others running) because they wanted someone with legislative experience  to run against the incumbent Democrat Jim Marshall. And in the end they got their wish. Many, though, saw how I fought  even when I wasn't always treated fairly. In 2011 I ran for 2nd Vice Chair of the District GOP and I was the only officer who ran unchallenged from the floor.

When I was running for Congress, I was the highest ranked non-incumbent congressional candidate recognized by liberty groups in 2009. I was ranked higher than Rand Paul by LibertySlate.com. That is why, two years later, someone sought me out to do a radio show that is nationally recognized, and why I get to speak at Campaign for Liberty events, and why I'm featured on the news.  But I've also stood alone waving Ron Paul signs on a corner near a shopping center  the day after Thanksgiving in 2007, during Ron Paul's last campaign.

I'm only saying all this to prove the point that there is room for every kind of person in the liberty movement. We all shout down the establishment in our own way. But for the record, there is a good way to ask pointed questions and a terrible and sloppy way to ask pointed questions. The terrible and sloppy way includes  shouting rudely at a sitting member of Congress, which only confuses the audience. The terrible and sloppy way also includes accusing long time activists like me of being a "boot-licker" who's "sitting silent and absorbing lies."  If you need help on the 'good' way, I suggest you ask Adam Kokesh, Nathan Cox, Michael Boldin, and several others. None of them are "boot-lickers"  to the Republican Party, either, and there's no denying that the whole world knows that they are in love with liberty.

Ron Paul and Myself chatting at Campaign for Liberty event January 2010

Update: Ugh. I just realized if you're not privy to the back story, the original version of this post makes it sound like I'm angry at being asked by the party insider about why someone was questioning the Congressman in the first place. No. I was angry that I had to make excuses for the manner in which the question about the NDAA was handled in the first place.