Livermore – Newly elected Congressman John Garamendi (CA-10) held his first Town Hall meeting in Livermore yesterday. Congressman Garamendi was joined by Livermore Mayor Marshall Kamena, several Members of the Livermore City Council, the President of Las Positas College Dr. DeRionne Pollard, and about 100 members of the public.
Garamendi was not at all shy about what he would like to accomplish as the newest Member of the House of Representatives, telling audience members, “It’s all about jobs!”
Indeed, unemployment numbers are of great concern in California as they very well should be considering the current 12% unemployment rate that many might argue is a low-ball figure. But is it the government’s roll to create jobs? In a pre-bailout, limited government society based on free-market principles one might ask, “how would the government know what’s best for job creation?”
One of the first questions from the audience was regarding government run health care and where the federal government gets the authority to enact such legislation. During the question a statement was made that if the government wants to create jobs they should kill nationalized health care.
Garamendi replied with long-winded justification for the government’s involvement pointing out that he recently voted yes on H.R.3962, which passed in the House by a narrow margin. His comments drew a few boos from the audience, with one woman shouting out, “Shame on you!” There were also some supporters that applauded with approval. Ironically, Garamendi informed us all that, “The more we spend [on health care] the worse the result.” He also talked about Medicare, claiming it was a public option that works. A gentleman sitting next to me replied, “Medicare is bankrupt.”
Other questions were asked about federal assistance with education, programs at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, water and extending BART to Livermore, where residents’ have long been paying taxes for BART services (over 50 years) with no tracks laid beyond the Dublin/Pleasanton station.
Garamendi mentioned that there has been a reduction in federal funding for community colleges from roughly $15,000 per student down to $8,700 per student per year. Due to the reduction, Garamendi suggested that the number of students enrolled in community colleges throughout the state will be lower than in years passed. He asserted that extending BART to Livermore is for the communities to decide, not him. He also told audience members that, “the climate is changing” and “sea levels are rising.”
Back in May, I asked candidate Garamendi about his position on the undeclared military police actions in the Middle East, specifically Iraq and Afghanistan and if he would support bringing the troops home from those conflicts safely and securely. Surprisingly, the self proclaimed ‘Proven Democrat’ explained that he was always against the war in Iraq, but that Afghanistan was a completely different story since it bordered Pakistan, which has nuclear weapons. He even went as far to suggest that we would see an expanded effort inside of Pakistan in the near future.
Apparently, Garamendi holds a different perspective now on U.S. military presence in Afghanistan stating that he would not support an increase in U.S. troop levels within that country.
I also asked Garamendi if he actually read the 2000-page health care reform bill (H.R.3962) before voting yes on the legislation. Garamendi replied that he, “read a summary of the important parts of the bill.” Garamendi staffers actually had copies of the summary that were made available for the public to review.
The summary was only 4-pages! The summary section that covered “impos[ing] a surtax on the income of individuals who do not obtain health care coverage and on employers who fail to satisfy health coverage participation requirements” didn’t stop Garamendi from voting yes! Nor did the summary section that spelled out a “5.4% surtax on individuals whose adjusted gross income exceeds $500,000″ or the “2.5% excise tax on medical devices.”
You can only begin to question the principles of a Representative whose first action in Congress was to vote yes on a massive unconstitutional government take-over of health care that he didn’t even take the time to read!
We all understand that a 4-page summary of a complicated 2,000 page bill can not possibly give enough information about legislation that will affect every American’s life.
Next time, Congressman Garamendi should consider reading the U.S. Constitution… it’s only 4,400 words, none of which grant authority for federal government run health care.
Bill Gram-Reefer is Editor & Publisher of Halfway To Concord, founded in 2004. Halfway To Concord is the leading online source for community-driven political news, events, and opinion for Contra Costa County and the San Francisco East Bay.
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get those democrat cities out of our district. livermore votes with a republican majority and john garamendi certainly doesn’t speak for most of us.
They rely on journalists to tell them what’s in a 2,000 page document like that. Did YOU read it? If you tell him which page to look at, maybe he will read it.
Please let me know when John Garamendi is going to have a town hall meeting near or around Carmichael CA. I would love to hear him speak, and would like it to be near my home.
Thank You
Judi Byrnes
Is this a news article or an editorial? Seems like there are biased comments at the end, more like an editorial. Anyway, Mediare is NOT bankrupt. It is not supposed to have assets, like individuals or corporations. It is meant to be funded by various sources, including the premiums that Medicare enrollees pay for Part B ($94/mo) and the 1.3%, or whatever it is, of the payroll tax. In 2009, Medicare will be fully funded for the year except for about $200 billion, I think. That is not bad for a public service program of its magnitude.
What IS bankrupt are our two wars and our military operations and support. There is simply NO tax-income offset for this spending. What we have been doing before, under George W. Bush, has been to simply borrow the money and add it to the deficit. It is the wars and the miliary that have created and continue to add to our deficit, not Medicare or Social Security.
Yeah, a $200+ Billion annual deficit for Medicare is nothing for a government program. What’s to worry? Sound thinking George. Please send more.
I just read a post on Political Blotter that Livermore Lady brought up. Take it from someone who was at the John Garemendi townhall. From what I heard – he said that he didn’t read the entire healthcare bill. Hedid say that he read key summaries. Walter’s question received applause from people at the meeting. This was after Garemendi told people not to do so, which I though was kinda odd. If people approved of his position, I doubt he would have told them not to clap.
Garamendi’s Dear Diary account of the Town Hall.
http://calitics.com/diary/10491/my-first-town-hall-as-a-congressman
Thank you for trying to hold Mr. Garamendi accountable. It is disappointing that it only took him 2 days to violate his oath of office to “protect and defend the Constitution”, and the Constitution does not authorize Congress to provide healthcare. Simply saying its ok because he said he would vote on it all along is childish.
Good article Walter. Con-men like Garamendi need to me exposed. Thank you for taking the charge.
Wrong! Wrong! Wrong!
If John Garamendi is so concerned about jobs, why does he support the Davis-Bacon act, which stipulates that workers on federal construction projects get “prevailing” (union) pay rates?
Under Davis-
Bacon, a bricklayer gets $50 an hour. The free-market rate is $25 an hour.
Why settle for 50 miles of freeway, when one can get 100 miles?
Why employ 50 workers when one can employ 100 workers?
Richard S. Colman
Orinda, CA
Nov. 15, 2009
According to Lisa V.’s report: “he had read the vast majority of the 2,000-page health care bill including all the summaries of key sections.”
So I think the issue of reading a 4 page summary is different than providing a 4 page summary.
Accountability comes with getting the job done. He was elected on his promise that he would vote for the bill. He did it.
End of story.
The massive number of pages of bills submitted requires a staff approach in some issues which is doubly so when you are sworn in on a Thursday and have to make the vote on Saturday.
The real issue here is that you do not like the vote. But your guy lost.
On Afghanistan he has been fairly consistent during the forums that this is a very touchy area, but that he prefers greater civilian involvement.
Don’t we all.
Edi, I know that you’re Garamendi’s #2 fan behind Lisa V. but think about it like this…
Garamendi said he was going to support health care reform if elected to Congress. Okay fine, but are we to be happy or satisfied with the fact that he didn’t read the bill that he voted on? Shouldn’t we expect our Representatives’ to read the entire bill before voting, especially since staffers, lawyers and special interest groups are the ones that actually draft the major segments of the legislative bills that pass through Congress? This is the reason these bills end up being thousands of pages long.
The idea behind electing a legislator to legislate as your Representative is that they actually author the bills, read the bills, refine (or markup) the bills, and then vote on the bills. Cut out any one of those duties, and I would say that someone is not doing their job!
Reading a 4-page Congressional summary for a 2000-page bill is not accountability Edi!
And I would think that holding a town hall meeting would be expected of a new Representative. After all, that gives Garamendi a chance to get to know the residents’ of CD-10, since he never lived in the district.
He said he was going to vote for it and he did, he said he was going to hold a town meeting and he did.
You may not like what he did, but the man does not back away from it. He won the election, and will be standing again next year. Sounds like accountability to me.
Edi, Garamendi was ready to vote yes on Health Care reform before there was even a bill to vote on! Having said that, why would he have taken the time to read it?
No accountability whatsoever!
Livermore Lady, I found that to be interesting as well.
Same event. Different axe to grind. He ran on the promise that he would vote for the Health Care bill.
And he did vote that way.
Is this the same event that Lisa Vordebrueger wrote about on her site? Sounds like a different event.
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