Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
A new Esquire profile of Rep. Jeff Flake (R-AZ) details the Senate candidate’s childhood on an Arizona cattle ranch — where he was sustained by federal school lunch programs — programs he has repeatedly voted against as a Congressman. Arizona GOP Senate Candidate Openly Hostile To Free School Lunch Program He Relied On As A Child:
Flake’s elder brother, Scott, explained to Esquire how they benefited from entitlement programs meant to provide nutrition for children from low-income families:
It didn’t feel like we were poor, but we always qualified for free school lunch and those kinds of things. I guess it was just a function of having so many kids. They made enough money raising cattle to raise big families very efficiently, carefully. But they didn’t have enough money to send anybody off to college. If you wanted to go to college, it was encouraged and good luck to you, but you had to figure out how to do it.
Though Flake was a direct beneficiary of the federal school lunch program, he’s refused to support these free school lunches for other children. Flake has regularly been one of a few hard-line conservatives to vote against child nutrition and school lunch programs in Congress.
In 2004, Flake and just 4 other members of Congress voted against reauthorizing funding for child nutrition programs. He has also steadfastly opposed even recognizing the importance of school lunch programs over the years, voting against Congressional resolutions celebrating the School Breakfast Program and the Child and Adult Care Food Program, which provides food assistance in daycare for low-income families.
Most recently, he refused to express support for “the goals and ideals of the National School Lunch Program.” Each time, he was joined by around 10 other members in opposing the overwhelmingly popular programs.
There are around 48.8 million people currently living in food insecure households like the Flake family. 20 million children take advantage of free and reduced lunches every day.
This is what ideological extremism — defining the working poor as a "culture of dependency" on the government — looks like. Those school breakfasts and lunches are often the only meal many children will receive during the day. Flake would let these children go hungry in the name of ideological purity to "small government" conservatism. Where is his humanity? Where is his "family values"? Where is his Christian compassion?
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“In 2004, Flake and just 4 other members of Congress voted against reauthorizing funding for child nutrition programs.”
In researching Flake’s votes, whenever I would see a House vote with only single digits of Congress members in opposition, I could count on Flake’s name being among the “no” votes.
Some of these were so innocuous one wonders what Flake’s motives are. When the House voted 395-7 for the 2008 Coast Guard Reauthorization Act, Flake voted no. When the House voted 413-2 for the 2010 Assuring Quality Care for Veterans Act, Flake voted no.
In 2010, House Resolution 403, which passed the House of Representatives by a vote of 405-2, was simply “Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that there should be established a National Teacher Day to honor and celebrate teachers in the United States.” Flake voted no.
When the House voted 405-5 to pass an utterly uncontroversial resolution celebrating the 20th anniversary of the Albert Einstein Distinguished Educator Fellowship Program, Flake voted no.
On another resolution, “Recognizing National Homeownership Month and the importance of homeownership in the United States.” Flake was in the tiny minority again as it passed, 405-6.
You have previously brought up other occasions where Flake voted no with a tiny minority of House members, even those who are conservative Republicans, as when he was one of only 12 House members to vote against the new G.I. Bill http://www.blogforarizona.com/blog/2012/10/votevetsorg-ad-in-opposition-to-jeff-flake-uniform.html
In 2008, the House voted 376-1 to pass Plain Language in Government Communications Act. Jeff Flake was the one “no vote.” http://grayson-for-congress.blogspot.com/2008/04/out-of-touch-weirdo-rep-jeff-flake.html
I could cite maybe hundreds of these instances, whether on totally noncontroversial resolutions or substantive legislation supported by the vast majority of Democrats and Republicans alike, that Flake stands out for his weirdo “no” vote.
What would account for such a voting record, not just out of touch with the majority, but with the most conservative members of his own party?
Flake likes to be noticed. He’s a show horse, not a work horse. As I wrote after Flake found himself a minority of one in last voted I cited:
“Democrat Carl Hayden, the Arizona legend who holds the record for longest service in Congress, started his first term in the House in 1912, a few days after Arizona became a state. He never forgot the advice of Maryland Democrat Frederick Talbott, who advised the new legislator:
‘Son, there are two kinds of Congressmen — show horses and work horses. If you want to get your name in the papers, be a show horse. But if you want to gain the respect of your colleagues, don’t do it. Be a work horse.’
Carl Hayden remained a work horse in Congress for 56 years until his retirement at the end of his seventh Senate term in 1968. Then a high school senior, I wrote to him that year and I treasure the letter I got back, safely enclosed in a plastic album in the bedroom closet in my Apache Junction home.
Jeff Flake is no Carl Hayden. In a 2006 poll, House staffers of both parties voted Jeff Flake one of the three biggest show horses in Congress.
Jeff Flake seems to confuse being a legislator with being a stunt man or a publicity agent for himself.
How else but publicity-chasing to explain his solo vote, in a chamber of 435 lawmakers of various political beliefs, against a bill “establishing plain language as the standard style for Government documents issued to the public, and for other purposes”?
I guess Jeff Flake prefers obfuscation (“the concealment of meaning in communication, making it confusing and harder to interpret”) to putting things plainly.
If I had his pitiful record in Congress, I would too.”
There are right-wing Republicans we may strongly disagree with, but some of them actually work hard on legislation. Jeff Flake doesn’t. There’s no reason to believe he would be an effective U.S. Senator.
If he’s not just a show horse, then the only way one can account for his voting record is that he is suffering from a serious mental illness.