UPDATE: Margolis reports at vtdigger that the VDP has relented and will allow press at the event after all. -JO
Not for nothing, but this is kind of pathetic. Per Vermont News Guy:
As of Tuesday evening, though only the 60-to-100 Vermont Democrats who pay their $50 (or more) to attend the event will have the foggiest idea what Frank says Sunday, or what Vermont’s own Rep. Peter Welch says, either.
“We’re not making the event open to the press,” said Robert Dempsey, the party’s executive director.
Why? Because the party is “trying to raise money,” Dempsey said. “It’s not necessarily a matter of policy to make all our events open to the press.”
So… we have a genuine east coast political celebrity on our hands to use for a fundraiser and we’re sequestering him from anything that gives the event attention?
Strategically, I don’t get this other than being worried that if someone says something off-color it will create a media narrative they dislike. But it’s Barney Frank we’re dealing with here, not Lady GaGa. Frank is witty, charming and not afraid to say what he thinks, but I’ve seen him speak at Pride events where off-color language is almost expected of speakers, his speech was completely work-safe.
From my POV, this classifies as major FAIL. Not only do they make the party look paranoid and petty, they reveal a major failure of initiative. Having someone as well known as Frank come to a fundraiser shouldn’t be sequestered and private. It should be live streamed and broadcast on youTube.
We can be better than this. We should be better than this.
So… to the party: I want to support you and I want to see you succeed. But if you do something as obviously boneheaded as this, I’m certainly not going to refrain from telling you so. As Margolis points out, you have a short window in which to change your mind about this.
Do the right thing.
Do the smart thing.
Please.
to attract as large an audience as possible. Vermont has to be the friendliest state to left-leaning Democrats, and consequently, the place where the most positive response is likely to be found for a national figure. This isn’t Arizona or Texas where Democrats could be excused for meeting with their national leaders in key-pass bunkers
This decision is consistent with the feeling I get that the Democratic Party as a whole may be losing touch with the very people who catipulted them into power with a resounding call for change.
However, what is not being reported is that there is a Monday breakfast with Congressman Frank in Burlington with more than 100 people attending that is not a fund raiser and although invitations are required the invitations seemed to be pretty widely circulated several weeks ago. I find it interesting that either the press has not picked up on this or if they have they have chosen not to report on it because the sound bite of being barred from the Sunday fund raiser sounded much better.