I received the following in an email from a friend who doesn’t want to be identified publicly. I will repost it in its entirety.
Called Castle’s office today, told his staffer that I wanted to complain about Castle’s vote against the stimulus, and that “I’d like to receive his standard explanation letter”. I gave my name and address, and then the guy started to defend Castle’s vote – at which point I grinned, because he was basically inviting the smackdown that was to follow. Let me just state that I did not call with the intention of unloading abuse on Castle’s staff, but if they wanna argue, oh hell yeah, I’m game. And I didn’t call him any names, either – I just stuck it to his rhetoric.
The guy started by saying the bill cost too much. I pointed out that it didn’t cost nearly as much as Iraq, which Castle voted for continually. He began to say that Iraq was a separate matter, not relevant to the point, but I said, “What, it’s OK to build stuff in Iraq but not in America?” He said no, Castle supports the Infrastructure parts of the bill. So I asked him if the problem was all the education spending. Of course not, said the staffer, Castle’s big on education. “What then? The alternative energy tax credits?” Noooo, Castle’s been endorsed by blah blah blah he starts to say, I cut him off; “I know who’s endorsed him, but they might reconsider that now that they see what he just voted against.” The staffer then pulls out his talking points: “He voted against the pork…” “What pork?” I stopped him. “What program? Saying there’s pork doesn’t make it so. Come on!”
And that’s when he brings up “350 million for STD research”. I’ve got him. “Does Mike Castle oppose STD research?” “Well, no, but it shouldn’t be part of this package.” “So he’d support all these things individually, but he’s against putting them together? Are you saying he’s not opposed to the parts, but the way that they’re arranged together?” Faltering, the guy goes back to the overall costs, and how it’s not efficient enough. I told him I agreed – there were way too many tax cuts in there, but that was stuff the Republlicans made them put in there. I knew the guy wasn’t going to tell me on the phone that tax cuts were a bad idea. Instead, he pulls out some unsourced statistic about how we were spending like $230,000 per job created. I know better than to give him a platform by asking him where his numbers were coming from, since most GOP statistics are skewed BS anyway – so instead I told him, “Yeah, well, it’d be more efficient if they didn’t stick so many tax cuts on there.” I broke out my own unsourced statistic, the one Obama quoted about how every dollar invested in spending returns $1.50 in stimulus, but every dollar of tax cuts only nets $0.75. He knew there was no sense in arguing about who’s statistics were right, so he simply told me he’d inform Castle of my concerns and confirmed my address. I told him I looked forward to receiving Castle’s usual bland form letters.