Ask Billy Kennedy

Submitted by James on Mon, 07/26/2010 - 4:40pm

Billy Kennedy

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Lainey Edmisten, who is working for Billy Kennedy for Congress, posted an introduction this morning. This is a follow up thread, an experiment in powerful questions.

In years past, candidates have dropped in at BlueNC for what we've called live blogs. They're fun conversations and they're certainly good for boosting site readership, but the truth is, they don't really get to the bottom of anything important. The very structure of a live blog format is not consistent with thinking. Maybe it's time to try something different, like adding a good old-fashioned interview into the mix.

If I had an hour to sit down and talk with Billy Kennedy, what would you want to find out? I'm looking for hard, tough questions.

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We know you have plenty of things to keep you busy, so how you respond to this is totally your call. Feel free to participate in the discussion here, or not. It's all good. Beyond that, I'd love to set up a phone interview with Mr. Kennedy sometime over the next couple of weeks. You'll even know what some of the questions are.

James's blog

My question

Submitted by James on Mon, 07/26/2010 - 6:02pm.

I want to hear Billy talk about the district in general ... and what people there must be thinking to send a person like Virginia Foxx back to Congress repeatedly. Do people know what she's really doing (or not doing, more accurately) ... or is it more that they don't know but they're just willing to believe her happy horseshit?

I also want to know what Virginia Foxx is really like.

Do good. Be nice. Have fun.

Let me reply to this one as a

Submitted by ARScharfenberg on Tue, 07/27/2010 - 1:16pm.

Let me reply to this one as a former resident of Boone, NC. Ginny is a crazy person I don't think I need to go into that in detail as I'm sure there are better tales of her insanity out there than I could write about here.

I was told by the person cutting my hair up there after the election that she voted for Obama and Foxx. Her main complaint was that she could not afford her daughters health insurance and still afford her own health insurance so she was paying for her own meds out of pocket. She said and I quote loosely here "I hope Virginia Foxx can do something about our health care"

So I think you should give Billy a pass on answering that question. The only explanation I can think of is that they just don't know and when someone wants to tell them they are so conservative (socially for the most part) that they are not willing to listen. The 5th is a weird weird place.

My questions for Kennedy

Submitted by Jake Gellar-Goad on Mon, 07/26/2010 - 6:17pm.

Where do you stand on LGBT equality issues including service in the military with repeal of DADT, immigration equality efforts like UAFA, and repeal of DOMA which prevents the feds from recognizing marriage equality in the states that do have it?

Where do you stand on the Citizens United SCOTUS ruling and campaign finance reform efforts?

I would ask about jobs, since I know how much trouble my dad and other family and friends had finding work in Mt Airy that wouldn't pack up and move away, but there is no way that anyone running for office will get there without talking about jobs until they are blue in the face so I'm not as worried on that one.

What would you say

Submitted by scharrison on Mon, 07/26/2010 - 6:17pm.

to those (potential) donors who are hesitant, especially in this current economy, to donate money to a campaign with such daunting demographics? What level of advertising (and by extension, fundraising) do you think it will take to make it a close race?

Great questions.

Submitted by LaineyEdmisten on Mon, 07/26/2010 - 10:33pm.

James, let's schedule an interview. Do you like the mountains?

Sorry, Billy

Submitted by scharrison on Tue, 07/27/2010 - 1:21pm.

It looks like the DFA competition is over:

There is only one Grassroots All-Star, but Beth wasn't the only winner. Democrats Mac D'Alessandro in MA-09 and Bill Hedrick in CA-44 came in 2nd and 3rd place respectively. These two All-Star Finalists have earned DFA-List endorsements and will get the full power of our national movement to back them up from now through Election Day.

Bummer. :(

You beat me to it!

Submitted by Jake Gellar-Goad on Tue, 07/27/2010 - 1:32pm.

Didn't see your post, but it looks like you beat me to it by about 8 mins.

I posted in another of the Billy Kennedy threads about why I think that despite not winning, the campaign still got some good online mileage out of this contest, and how they might continue to cash in on it.

Small comment on Kennedy's site

Submitted by Jake Gellar-Goad on Wed, 07/28/2010 - 10:03am.

I was looking around for the e-mail listserv sign up and found that it wasn't as easy to find as maybe it should be.

I mean if you go to Elaine Marshall's website you have to get through a sign up page before getting to the rest of the content.

Something like that, or having a join the team sign up button on the main page might be nice. Haven't under the contact us page is alright, but if you can sign up for text msg alerts on the front page, seems like you should be able to sign up for the listserv too.

Just my .02