Press Release: Chris Gibson Watch launched by Glens Falls DFA as public service providing accurate information on Gibson’s extremist record
Press Release
For Immediate Release
Democracy For The Greater Glens Falls Area, a member of the nation-wide network of groups led by Democracy For America, has established a public information service, http://www.chrisgibsonwatch.com, to provide fact-checking, accurate and timely information, and constructive alternatives, to the positions, policies, activities, politics and campaign finances of right-wing Republican Rep. Chris Gibson. The new service will also explain the consequences of Gibson’s positions and actions for residents of New York’s 20th Congressional District, and who Rep. Gibson actually represents.
The Gibson Watch website is also a highly-integrated web-based system: posts to the Gibson Watch site, which is organized in searchable blog form with side areas for special information and media, are automatically fed to a special twitter account, http://twitter.com/gibsonwatch, for those who want to be immediately alerted to the service’s postings on a regular basis. Postings will also be automatically fed to the Gibson Watch Facebook page, http://http://www.facebook.com/pages/Chris-Gibson-Watch/108979135849779 Anyone who is interested in following Gibson Watch postings are urged to subscribe to the twitter feed. Gibson Watch is a volunteer, collaborative effort and is not affiliated with any political campaign or candidate. It’s goal is based on the reality that congressional representatives, particularly from upstate New York, routinely go to Washington and then consistently vote against the interests and beliefs of their constituents— and get away with it— due to the geographically dispersed nature of a district as large as the 20th, which generates considerable confusion since voters often do not know what is going on in other areas of these large districts, and the unfortunate fact that today’s news organizations do not always have the resources to adequately follow what a member of Congress is actually doing.
As a result, misrepresentations often go uncorrected. One current example is Rep. Gibson’s recent statement he is an original co-sponsor of a provision passed in the House of Representatives to repeal a requirement in the Healthcare Reform Bill that small businesses file 1099 forms with the IRS for every purchase of goods and services over $600. In fact, this problem was first identified by Rep. Scott Murphy last year. It was Murphy, a small businessman himself and an expert on small business problems, who sponsored the first legislative action to relieve the paperwork burden of this provision. Gibson is to be applauded for supporting Murphy’s initiative. But it is intellectually dishonest, and a bad sign of what area voters can expect, for Gibson not to give Murphy credit for identifying this problem and being the first to take action, the equivalent of a student copying another’s homework, or an author copying another’s work without attribution. (GIbson defeated Murphy last November.)
The Gibson Watch team of volunteers will identify or develop areas in which they have expertise, whether it be educational issues, environment, economics, national security or others, and follow Gibson’s positions accordingly. It is the intention of Gibson Watch not to merely critique Gibson’s policies and actions, but to also provide concrete policy alternatives that benefit the people of the 20th Congressional District.
Gibson Watch will especially focus on how Gibson’s positions are out of the mainstream of his district and upstate New York in general, and damage the local economy, jobs and environment. However, Gibson Watch will not neglect the impact of Gibson’s policies on the nation as a whole. One example would be the consequences of eliminating the 1099 reporting provision cited above. Despite Republican claims that deficit reduction is their overriding priority, eliminating the reporting requirement is unfunded, unlike earlier Democratic provisions, and will add to the deficit in the same way other unfunded Republican tax cuts also add to the deficit.
The Gibson Watch team is open to all liberals, moderates and progressives across the 20th CD and the upstate New York region who support responsible positions that build the district and the nation, support peace, economic and social justice, human rights and human dignity, and America’s progressive tradition of a government, as Lincoln put, “of, by and for the people,” not the powerful, the connected, or privileged and wealthy elites.
Democracy For The Greater Glens Falls Area was founded as a Dean For America Meetup in March 2003 and had its first meeting as such in April 2003. When Gov. Dean suspended his campaign in 2004, he went on to create Democracy For America, which the local group also joined, formally becoming Democracy For The Greater Glens Falls Area, but also widely known as Glens Falls DFA. With DFA National, GFA-DFA continues the principles of the Dean campaign of backing progressive candidates and causes, resisting right-wing extremism and building a new American community.
for info: Coordinator, Larry Dudley, ldudley@nycap.rr.com
