"I voted no on the motion to suspend the rules and pass H R 297, Children's Hospital GME Support Reauthorization Act of 2013, which reauthorizes federal payments to children's hospitals for operating graduate medical training programs... The bill passed 352-50."
"I voted no on the motion to suspend the rules and pass H R 225, National Pediatric Research Network Act of 2013, which expands the existing Pediatric Research Initiative (PRI) to include a new National Pediatric Research Network... It passed 375-27."
"I voted no on H R 325, No Budget, No Pay Act of 2013...
The bill passed 285-144."
"I voted no on H R 152, Disaster Relief Appropriations Act, 2013... The bill passed 241-180."
Justin Amash represents a wing of the Republican party that has essentially decided to refuse to govern, and is content to simply object to anything Congress tries to do that is not ideologically pure, which is pretty much everything.
[EDIT: To those who commented below upset with my "refusal to govern" comment -- look, governing requires solving problems that the public wants you to solve. That solution can even be essentially less government.
For example... a lot of Republican voters don't like Obamacare, but I doubt many of them liked our pre-Obamacare healthcare system. Take an extreme, free-market/libertarian form of healthcare policy -- repeal not just Obamacare, but things like the employer tax deduction for health insurance, requiring hospitals to provide life-saving care for anyone regardless of payment capability, etc -- I would vehemently disagree with that, but I would consider crafting and trying to pass such legislation an attempt to govern. But if the bulk of your legislative activity is doing things like voting to repeal Obamacare twenty-three times, as Rep. Justin Amash did in 2011-2012, then I would argue you are just politically pandering to your constituent base -- or worse, your campaign's financial donors -- and not governing.]
On the other hand, I do appreciate his attempts to justify and explain his actions. This type of transparency is desperately needed in the Senate, where everyone uses arcane procedural rules (e.g. filibusters, "holds," and so forth), as anonymous tools of obstruction pretty much constantly.
While I doubt I'll ever agree on any of Rep. Amash's views, I hope that more of our elected representatives continue to use tools like social media not just for campaigning and voter outreach purpose, but for information and transparency in the governing process once they're actually in office..
Read the legislation. It's eye-opening how much stuff has a pretty sounding name, with lofty intentions, that have pork and other garbage attached. I'm afraid you just fell for the "think of the children" style reasoning.
Scroll down to January 4th on Rep. Amash's Facebook page. This was the day that the House voted on $9.7 billion in Sandy aid, which was pretty much just to replenish FEMA's flood insurance fund. The entire bill is one page. (http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/113/hr41/text)
Rep. Amash voted no, and there is no explanation of his vote on this date. He couldn't have objected to "pork and garbage," because there was none. Perhaps he objected to the $9.7 billion not being offset with cuts in other federal spending, but then I'm surprised he didn't explain that on his Facebook page.
I'm aware that most legislation has pork and other garbage attached. But if you continuously vote against any legislation with pork and garbage, without attempting to amend or propose alternative solutions without pork and garbage, and even vote against bills without pork and garbage that have historically been previously uncontroversial, (in this case, disaster relief assistance) then my opinion is that you are just refusing to govern.
You didn't look very hard, I only used control-f "H R 41" on Facebook and found it. Here is his full explanation on H R 41.
I voted no on the motion to suspend the rules and pass H R 41, which temporarily authorizes the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to borrow an additional $9.7 billion from the U.S. Treasury to carry out the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP). The bill increases FEMA's borrowing authority from $20.7 billion to a staggering $30.4 billion. NFIP needs another bailout for Hurricane Sandy claims because it still hasn't repaid taxpayers the $18 billion provided after Hurricane Katrina.
Although I oppose the federal government's involvement in the flood insurance industry, it's appropriate for current NFIP policyholders to have their claims paid for flood damage. But another bailout should be fully offset with spending cuts elsewhere or at least coupled with significant reforms to this poorly designed and managed program. Under this bill, NFIP will owe U.S. taxpayers $30 billion, with little prospect of ever paying it back. The bill passed 354-67.
So he feared taxpayers would be on the hook for $10B program with a proven track record of mismanagement. Sounds like he made the hard decision and said no, the right call in my opinion.
Thank you for finding his explanation. I blame Facebook's infinite scroll.
I don't see this as a "hard decision." He cast a symbolic vote to remain ideologically pure. Had our Congress consisted of at least 217 Justin Amashes, their votes would have had the practical effect of denying thousands of people devastated by Hurricane Sandy from having their flood insurance claims paid. That's all the additional funding was for -- flood insurance claims. You can argue about the mismanagement of FEMA in general, but this $9.7 billion had nothing to with that. Voting down this bill would have basically forced FEMA to tell a bunch of people hit by Hurricane Sandy, "Hey, that flood insurance you paid into that you're depending on to rebuild your home? Yeah, you're not going to get any money from those claims until we figure out how much we need to jack up the age of Social Security, sorry."
This is not governing. Look, you can argue that the federal government should not be providing flood insurance (especially insurance that is heavily subsidized) as it encourages people to live in high-risk areas for natural disasters. And you can argue that the current process of allocation disaster assistance from the federal budget should have a better process than "ask for a bunch of money for flood insurance whenever FEMA runs out." I consider these are very valid points.
Yet anyone attempting to govern would make these arguments when they wouldn't interfere with thousands of people experiencing a hardship from receiving assistance that was heretofore uncontroversial, and they would actually then proceed to turn those arguments into legislation and then pass it.
This is what I mean. "Refusal to govern" means doing little else besides casting symbolic votes, which a wing of the Republican party like Rep. Amash is mostly content to do. Rep. Amash is not actually making any "hard decisions" or "right calls." He doesn't have to bear any responsibility for denying people hit by Hurricane Sandy their flood insurance claims, yet he doesn't care to actually solve the macro-level problems behind his opposition to the bill to begin with.
Afforess and anyone else -- I love discussing public policy, so if you want to continue this discussion in a more efficient manner than exchanging HN comments, just e-mail me (see my profile for the address).
Pork is just a fact of life in Congress and is a rather negligible amount of spending. Refusing to govern because bills have pork/riders is negligent. He should resign.
Pork isn't corruption. It's not illegal. It's a part of the democratic process. It is in the bill and it's voted on. It sounds like your issue is with democracy itself, not with corruption.
Jobs created by pork are disturbingly similar to public sector jobs, even when they're nominally private sector jobs enabled by government grants/contracts.
Create a section in a government agency to deal with some known problem, hire people directly into the government for that. Same effect, but you can't hide behind the false veneer of creating private sector jobs. It also becomes much more obvious that if you want to sustain those jobs in the long term you have to perpetually fund those salaries.
A quick count of the first 22 votes on his Facebook profile shows 11 yes votes, 11 no votes. How does disagreeing with half of the bills qualify as refusing to govern?
Do you just blindly vote Yes on every ballot initiative?
Clearly I didn't mean Rep. Amash just sits around and votes "no" on everything. But his only "yes" votes are on symbolic bills like repealing Obamacare. If it involves spending money without offsets, he votes no, with no exceptions. Seeing as the bulk of Congressional governing involves how to tax Americans and then spend those taxes, his voting record involves a lot of saying "no."
I appreciate his reasoning for a lot of his votes, and in isolation, his arguments sound very valid to me. But you can take a principled principled stand and make the best compromise you can to move things towards your principles, or you can just try and prevent anything from happening that doesn't align 100% with your principles to begin with. If you're just going to vote against everything except the occasional symbolic vote to on bills that ensure ovums have the right to carry assault weapons, then this doesn't strike me as actually governing.
I think the issue if that you're trying to lump Amash in with the greater republican party. He may run as a republican, but that's mostly because it's much harder to get into office as a third party.
Until we get more true conservatives in office there is little else he can do except "refuse to govern".
I am definitely not lumping Amash in with the greater Republican party. I deliberately said Rep. Amash "represents a wing" of the party, because the voting record of many Republicans do not resemble his.
My understanding of Rep. Amash is that he is unpopular with House Republican leadership -- for example, John Boehner, the Speaker of the House, kicked him off the House Budget Committee.
I disagree with Justin politically w.r.t. nearly everything, but I definitely admire his approach. He's also a genuinely thoughtful and nice guy, and very adept at explaining why he holds the positions he does.
Same here. I find he is able to defend himself on things I would never accept personally, and in a pretty sensible way. Granted, most of his votes are "more spending not offset by cuts"-type votes, but he also votes sensibly on some bills, with good justifications ("this bill creates redundant regulation.... congress doesn't need to do this, this agency already does it").
I admire his way of doing his job, even if I absolutely despise his political views.
How can you despise the political view of acting responsibly with taxpayer money? How can you look at the US Debt Clock (http://www.usdebtclock.org/) and not realize that we're committing the equivalent of child abuse by inflicting enormous debt on children who haven't even yet been born?
I'll never understand the hypocrisy of the group of voters that freaks out over a possible 1 degree shift in the average temperature of the planet over the next 50 years (that we may or may not have any control of whatsoever) -- yet doesn't want to take any action to slow down the runaway spending that will certainly destroy more lives in a much bigger way.
Honestly politics is so corrupt at this point that is rather vote for an honest politician who I disagree with than a corrupt politician who "supposedly" agrees with me.
And I'm not just saying platitudes. I live in Kent County, MI and voted straight democrat in 2012, except for Amash.
Me too, but I was surprised to see a cogent reasoning for voting against the No Budget No Pay act that changed my mind about it. It is refreshing to see an elected official explain his votes in a way that isn't simply national talking points.
I commend Rep Amash for his transparency, it's a refreshing change from politicians that do nothing besides talk in double speak and view being tied down to an actual point of view as a political liability.
That being said, next time he comes up for election he'll probably get slaughtered in the primaries when a more extreme candidate portrays any pragmatism in the political process as an impurity that needs to be purged.
We really don't like seeing how the political sausage is made.
Rep. Amash is a Tea Party libertarian up for re-election every two years, had no primary challenger in 2012 and it is unlikely he'll be primary challenged next cycle either.
That's only 2 years with no primary challenger, if the political fortunes of the Tea Party wane you can bet he'll see a challenger sooner or later. We're discussing a 6 year span here, career politicians can potentially spend decades in office depending on how little their constituency changes and how happy their constituency is with their voting record. The second part is critical as it's not usual to have a vote by vote explanation that could be used as fodder by either a primary challenger or a challenger from the other party.
Like I said, I admire the guy, especially if his libertarian-ism extends to areas that dovetail with the GOP and Tea Party on social issues like gay marriage or marijuana legalization. Coming out against SOPA was good but you never know if it was authentic or if he just saw which way the political winds were blowing.
The electoral boundaries set based on who was in office in 2010 have a way of sticking around in most areas. I note that in 2012, Democrats won the sum total of House votes 48.8% to 48.5%, while the Republicans retain the House by a significant margin, 232-200 actual Congressmen. The Republicans invested heavily in winning state legislatures before this period, and are now reaping the rewards in gerrymandered districts.
Maybe not in the primaries, but a viable challenger could come from the Democrats. Michigan still went blue in the electoral college for the Presidential vote.
Then again, between gerrymandering and demographic shifts individual districts can become more OR less defensible to incumbents.
Michigan as a whole can go either way, but Justin's district is about as solidly republican as they come. Short of radical redistricting, that's not going to change (edit: I see that the 3rd district did become more balanced in the most recent redistricting, but it's still a pretty solid republican seat).
What does that word even mean anymore? According to his Wikipedia page there's not much redeeming about his social views. I guess you did say Tea Party "libertarian".
That having been said, I admire how he offers his rationale and using Facebook for good.
I read the parent comment as being about the social parts of his views, which don't really seem to be about the government refraining from bothering people. Defining marriage as between a man and a woman, and life as beginning at conception, are both pretty significant (attempted) exercises of the state using its authority to resolve ethical disputes.
This was previously on amashforcongress.com; I found it searching for his views on this issue.
"I believe in the sanctity of traditional marriage, and I oppose government efforts to redefine this private, religious institution."
This seems like a safe way of him saying that the government should not have any say in what constitutes a marriage, but that he is personally against it. There's nothing wrong with disliking something, but not wanting to force your will onto others.
If that were actually his legislative agenda, that would be interesting. But I don't see him pushing that in terms of how he votes.
The government already does not interfere with the private, religious aspects of marriage. The Catholic Church can define marriage however it wants, and the state has no say in it, which is why you can't get a same-sex marriage in a Catholic church.
What's being debated is who should be recognized as married for official purposes (5th amendment rights, tax filing, survivor benefits, inheritance in the absence of a will, etc.). On that question, Amash supports the Defense Of Marriage Act, which says that the government should recognize only opposite-sex marriages, and not recognize same-sex marriages. If he opposed DOMA, and instead introduced legislation to abolish all government recognition of marriage, I'd give him kudos for that!
"What's being debated is who should be recognized as married for official purposes"
It shouldn't make a difference whether or not someone is married... you know, equal protection under the law. The solution to things like survivor benefits and the others you mentioned (and you're right, Amash doesn't mention this solution) is to simply have private contracts that people decide upon themselves.
"If he opposed DOMA, and instead introduced legislation to abolish all government recognition of marriage, I'd give him kudos for that!"
Seriously, find a single Tea Party candidate that ACTUALLY has that view on marriage. That IS the view I have on marriage, it is the libertarian view, and there isn't a single Tea Party candidate that supports that view.
The problem generally is that there's more to Libertarianism than fiscal conservatism, and Tea Party interests tend to be just as selectively fiscally conservative as the battered-brand mainstream Republicans once they're placed in power. It' s a gimmick for Republicans who don't want to be called Republicans but be elected by socially conservative Republicans that call themselves Libertarian :p
the tea party was started by a bunch of people who were just mad, disconnected and a little dumb... the govt, even tho a lot of them depend on it for the programs they rail against, seemed like a good target. out of control spending is a well tested phrase and 'tea party' has some good symbolism attached. you look at the cross tabs dissecting demographics and against their opinions and you really start to question what exactly they're thinking. would love to see multiple political parties emerge, and i know these people mean well, but their 'movement' is a hypocritical mess.
I think it split into two parts when some intelligent people were talking about the dangers of Keynesianism and some idiots thought they were talking about Kenyans.
The disappearance of visible intelligence from the right doesn't justify your leftist position (or the implication of it). An unprincipled competent does more evil than a principled incompetent.
Eh, it's more interesting than insulting. I'd be sincerely fascinated to know what they would do with the "rabble", and why they believe that the "rabble" wasn't being targeted by these "no waste" but assuredly nonsecular candidates.
I'm not making any promises here, it'd probably be better if the fiscal AND SOCIAL libertarians worked on their own party than rebranding and being fully digested by the battered Republican or Dem parties. The Dems, to their "credit", don't promise to be civil libertarians either.
"The Dems, to their "credit", don't promise to be civil libertarians either."
Only 1 or 2 republicans are talking about civil liberties but they are being disproportionately effective. Transforming an existing party is the only realistic direction, given the control the 2 parties have over the process. The activist dems are probably silenced by the success of the mainstream dems.
You say that as if any Tea Party candidate has actually espoused anything that truly constitutes limited government. _delirium more or less summed it up. Why don't you actually read his Wikipedia page to see what I'm talking about instead of repeating really boring quips.
You'll note my comment implies that I like actual libertarianism and just not the crap that the Tea Partiers go around calling libertarianism.
>Why don't you read more than just his Wikipedia page?
Because reading it is enough to know that he doesn't fit the bill of a libertarian?
>Do you really like actual libertarianism?
Yes?
>judging people in categorized groups instead of as individuals isn't very libertarian of you.
Haha, what is your point? Make one instead of just trying to find something to argue about. Find me a Tea Party candidate that fits the actual definition of a libertarian and then we can talk.
Every politician, even a legislator, can explain his votes especially on a party line.The contents of a bill is where the influence game is played. Heck if they are certain the bill will pass they can vote against it anyway.
How legislation is constructed matters far more. I haven't seen the type of focus on the influence that committee members have on bills and senators have on homestate appointments. A chairman can personally rewrite a bill and only send it to the floor when he is satisfied that it will be supported by the leadership. It is a tremendous position of power that isn't recognized.
What you've identified here is an interesting extension of the "open government" culture that I think this phenomenon represents.
If Rep. Amash continues his political career in the same vein, can we count on him to continue to disclose what goes on in subcommittees?
Will he be politically neutered because he cannot be counted on to keep the details of backroom deals secret? Will he make enemies by bringing the DC unmentionables to light?
With all respect, Amash is already pretty "extreme" in his views (namely fiscal policy). I think it's been widely discussed that Repub. voters on the more extreme side are in it for fiscal policy, not social, so I have a hard time seeing how he could be challenged.
Plus he has this whole "anti-establishment" thing going on that is working pretty well to define him as an independent thinker.
I'd donate $10k in a heartbeat to a bi-partisan PAC (or equivalent) whose goal was to fund the campaigns of people who do this. Someone should get working on this.
Maybe consider donating to Mark Kelly & Gabrielle Giffords' PAC. I've heard that that Mark is actually a moderate republican, even thought he is married to a now-retired democratic congresswoman. The PAC is somewhat bipartisan http://americansforresponsiblesolutions.org/
Before her shooting in 2011, Rep. Giffords did blog regularly, Although she didn't give vote-by-vote explanations herself.
I'd be much frustrated not to see startups cracking on this on elections to come, what with all the crowdfunding being carried over to many other domains (e.g. YC's first non-profit backing)
Huh. I'm not a giant fan of his votes... but I really like reading why he is voting on each issue. I hope he is truly transparent and honest; the cynic in me believes he'll probably only share politically polite reasoning for his votes.
I also hope that this level of sharing grows. It's a pretty small thing for a member of a representative government to do, yet so obviously important. "I represent you. I voted X on issue Y, because Z."
unfortunately this guy is crazy...and on the far right fringe of things. in recent years, as more and more people have become involved in the political process we've developed this notion that there's a correlation between transparency and competency that simply does not exist. And the perceived transparency, such as some 100-200 word facebook post summarizing hundred page bills, is merely an illusion buffered by overly simplistic and misleading explanations.
Why does his attempt at transparency, even though you doubt its earnestness, make him crazy? Most politicians give no justification at all, or only offer totally vacuous platitudes and other bullshit.
100-200 words of justification that you don't agree with/ doubt is still preferable to silence or some 5 minute interview on Meet the Press rife with passive-agressive rhetoric and demagogical nonsense.
where do i say his attempt at transparency is what makes him crazy? I actually think, distortion and all, it's a start. That said, you look through his voting history and talk w/ people on capitol hill, this guy is off his rocker...
Yeah, because those people are completely outside of a bubble and worth trusting. Really? You give a rat's ass about what the average "inside the Beltway" person has to say? They're the cause of most of our government problems, why would you trust anyone in DC who isn't swimming in the opposite direction?
I just read through a few pages of the explanations for his votes and I have read large portions of the discussed bills. Amash is being very thoughtful and responsible with the duties of his office in a way that very few in DC care to emulate.
If you read his justifications, they make sense (or seem to at least.... I can't claim to read the hundred page bills). Its a little accountability at least.
Clicking "read more" requires me to log in to Facebook. I don't have a Facebook account (nor do I want one). I've noticed this pattern with other groups and businesses. Facebook is not free and open if you choose not to let them sell your information.
If this representative is intending to make his rationales public, he should choose a public venue.
But given the tracking information Facebook sifts via their extensive federation throughout the Internet today, I don't feel any inclination to make it easier for them by registering for their marketing programmes.
He's intending to make it public in the venue that most easily facilitates this type of exchange with the widest number of users.
>But given the tracking information Facebook sifts via their extensive federation throughout the Internet today
Log out and clear your cookies. If you're not clearing them regularly anyhow you're already being tracked by many sources.
I get not wanting a profile with all your information on Facebook but like I said that isn't required to access this and saves him spending resources to build a system to go in its place.
I really like the concept, but there are better venues for this kind of material. With just 1.5% of "People Talking About This" I suspect it's rare his 42,000+ Likes are seeing these posts in their News Feeds.
I highly doubt that the intent is to have each post seen in people's timelines.
It appears to be a place for constituents to "check up" on their representative in a way that is convenient and open. And I think that it's a bold cultural statement for a Congressman to make.
I used to think that open and honest people didn't stand a chance in Washington, but that may be changing.
It's about as good as Coca Cola (1.6%), and better than Nike (0.9%), Justin Bieber (1.0%) and Lady Gaga (0.9%). That number is never really that high except for the most viral stuff that people like because it's funny, like George Takei's page (108%).
i'm impressed that he's doing it at all. it's really hard for people who are not techies to realise facebook's intrinsic crappiness; at a superficial glance it seems like a fine choice for the purpose.
"I voted no on the motion to suspend the rules and pass H R 225, National Pediatric Research Network Act of 2013, which expands the existing Pediatric Research Initiative (PRI) to include a new National Pediatric Research Network... It passed 375-27."
"I voted no on H R 325, No Budget, No Pay Act of 2013... The bill passed 285-144."
"I voted no on H R 152, Disaster Relief Appropriations Act, 2013... The bill passed 241-180."
Justin Amash represents a wing of the Republican party that has essentially decided to refuse to govern, and is content to simply object to anything Congress tries to do that is not ideologically pure, which is pretty much everything.
[EDIT: To those who commented below upset with my "refusal to govern" comment -- look, governing requires solving problems that the public wants you to solve. That solution can even be essentially less government.
For example... a lot of Republican voters don't like Obamacare, but I doubt many of them liked our pre-Obamacare healthcare system. Take an extreme, free-market/libertarian form of healthcare policy -- repeal not just Obamacare, but things like the employer tax deduction for health insurance, requiring hospitals to provide life-saving care for anyone regardless of payment capability, etc -- I would vehemently disagree with that, but I would consider crafting and trying to pass such legislation an attempt to govern. But if the bulk of your legislative activity is doing things like voting to repeal Obamacare twenty-three times, as Rep. Justin Amash did in 2011-2012, then I would argue you are just politically pandering to your constituent base -- or worse, your campaign's financial donors -- and not governing.]
On the other hand, I do appreciate his attempts to justify and explain his actions. This type of transparency is desperately needed in the Senate, where everyone uses arcane procedural rules (e.g. filibusters, "holds," and so forth), as anonymous tools of obstruction pretty much constantly.
While I doubt I'll ever agree on any of Rep. Amash's views, I hope that more of our elected representatives continue to use tools like social media not just for campaigning and voter outreach purpose, but for information and transparency in the governing process once they're actually in office..