True to form, Rep. Cynthia McKinney is in the center of another controversy. No, she didn’t hit anyone. This time she failed to show up to not just one, but two televised debates.
Congressional Quarterly has the report:
Rep. Cynthia McKinney, D-Ga., failed to appear at two televised debates over the weekend, fueling criticism from two opponents who are challenging the controversial incumbent in a July 18 primary in the state’s 4th District.
DeKalb County Commissioner Henry C. “Hank” Johnson Jr. and architectural firm project manager John F. Coyne III, who are challenging McKinney, debated Saturday on WSB-TV and also participated in a second debate Friday that was sponsored by the Atlanta Press Club and which will air tonight at 7 p.m.
It is not uncommon for incumbents to skip debates, which tend to elevate lesser-known opponents. But Johnson’s campaign said that McKinney’s absence was a “slap in the face” to her constituents, and his campaign Web site features Johnson gesturing to McKinney’s empty podium at the Friday debate.
Johnson and other locals are waiting to see if McKinney will attend a debate tonight that is being sponsored by a local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).
Coyne told CQPolitics.com Monday that McKinney has participated in debates that have been on her “home turf” where she feels “safe.”
Yet he noted that McKinney can only be harmed by these larger televised appearances. “She has no incentive to come to these debates . . . She only has votes to lose and none to gain,” Coyne said.
Again, Rep. McKinney demonstrates that she feels entitled to her House seat.
Sweetness & Light notes that Rep. McKinney has a good reason why she’s not sweating her reelection bid: she gerrymandered her district herself.
She’s not gonna let those 2 unknowns have a shot at the title. Besides, it was only a 10 round exhibition debate.
McKinney has evidently received some good advice.
Obviously, she now realizes that she stands a better chance of winning people’s votes if they don’t get to see her in an unscripted setting where she is liable to show her moonbattiness.
It’s good politics. As the incumbent, she has superior name recognition, and nothing the opponents can say about her could possibly damage her chances as much as what she might say herself.
Not showing up is a real slap in the face to her opponents….
Did McKinney AGREE to participate in these debates? If she did, then she is guilty of extreme disrespect for both her opponents AND her constituents. Not that either of those would surprise me.
If Rep. McKinney is re-elected, then her constituents are getting precisely the kind of representation they deserve. It’s just a darned shame that the rest of us have to endure seeing and hearing their moonbat choice for another 2 years!
Looks like the set for “Jeopardy.”
“Alex, I’ll buy a racial insult for $1000!”
Those racist opponents…
and bushitler too did it…
Barbara Boxer did the same thing last time she ran for reelection in California. Although the no show frustrates the challenger, who usually makes a lot of unproductive noise about it, an incumbent ahead in polling is rarely helped and often hurt by joining a debate. Especially considering all the dopey things CM has done to hurt herself lately, staying away is just plain smart. If I were her handler, I’d sit with her at home, make us some popcorn, crack open the champagne, and watch the two opponents go at it.
Skipping debates, despite all the whining, didn’t hurt Barbara Boxer one bit. If CM’s polls say her constituency is still with her, showing up for some dopey debate that she couldn’t win anyway would be a disaster. Much as I would like to see her looney, incompetent, race card playing self, defeated, Cynthia is being handled well.
Good points, Marybel, but I don’t think Barbara Boxer has ever been voted out of office. McKinney has been, and could be out of a job again if she’s seen to be taking her constituents for granted.
It’s a fine line that she’s walking here.
Cynthia McKinney’s Sideshow Bob’s haircut makes me hot!
Let’s give her the benefit of the doubt, maybe she didn’t stand anybody up. Maybe the phone company stood her up and she’s still waiting for them to drive by and prune her hair.
McKinney is a despicable individual, that is unarguable. However someone convinced her to not show up and as someone suggested in an earlier comment, it was probably as to not expose her to “foot in mouth disease” because she would most likely say at least one thing so outrageous as to hurt her re-election campaign. If the challengers or their handlers are smart, they will accentuate their campiagn ads by using McKinney’s documented words against her. And boy there is plenty to choose from.
Just a note but McKinney’s Republican adversary is sounding like it will be a conservative black woman named Catherine Davis. Should make for an interesting race as she is for immigration reform, social security privatization, health savings accounts, school vouchers, and the Fair Tax.
Now let’s see if McKinney will debate her.
In order to return to Washington in 2006 McKinney has to survive the Democratic primary on July 18. But since she is guaranteed to be re-elected by her anti-white, anti-European, anti-democracy, anti-capitalism minions she didn’t even feel the need to attend any debates.
Cynthia knows that her core supporters, the clueless Moonbat Socialists of Georgia’s 4th District, are going to be sure to head to the polls no matter what, and she also knows that laziness and apathy will keep those who are embarrassed by her at home. And YES, I can say that, because I live in Georgia’s 4th District and can’t seem to rid myself of this blood-sucking tick as my elected representative.
Says Neal Boortz:
McKinney will continue to be the open, running, oozing, puss filled sore on the body of the Georgia congressional delegation, and the people who live in her district will continue to go virtually unrepresented in Washington.
Not showing up for a debate? The horror!!!
Happens all the time.
Some politicians think its better to limit their debate appearances. Remember Rove’s boy in 2004 limiting the debates?
I bet McKinney will say Karl Rove planed this. http://politcalteen.blogspot.com/
Rep. McKinney did not agree to attend the debate. The empty podium was a cheap ploy to embarass her and create a controversy. She has attended debates in community forums with both candidates. There were scheduling conflicts in regard to this and another televised debates involving constituent concerns. If you listen to FOX spin central you will be convinced that Rep. McKinney is a “moonbat” I suppose, whatever that is. But a grand jury that had the advantage of the facts refused to indict, and in the end none of you know what actually happened in the incident. She said she would be exonerated, and she was. But, for those who love to hate and reduce political commentary to a Jerry Springer show, this non-incident becomes controversy worthy of national news. As to the real controversies, you need to look a little higher up on the paycheck chain and to the executive branch.
Now Cynthia Ann McKinney has a Masters Degree of Arts in International Relations from the Tuffs Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. She received it on May 22nd,1994. So why does she try to make her biography read as if she has a law degree? She can not take anyone’s Bar examination with her Masters Degree of Arts in International Studies.
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McKINNEY, Cynthia Ann, (1955 – )
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Image, Congressional Pictorial Directory, 109th.
McKINNEY, Cynthia Ann, a Representative from Georgia; born in Atlanta, Fulton County, Ga., March 17, 1955; graduated St. Joseph High School; B.A., University of Southern California, Los Angeles, Calif., 1978; attended Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Medford, Mass.; diplomatic fellow, Spellman College, Atlanta, Ga., 1984; faculty member, Clark Atlanta University and Agnes Scott College; member of the Georgia state house of representatives, 1988-1992; elected as a Democrat to the One Hundred Third and to the four succeeding Congresses (January 3, 1993-January 3, 2003); unsuccessful candidate for nomination to the One Hundred Eighth Congress in 2002; elected as a Democrat to the One Hundred Ninth Congress (January 3, 2005-present).
I just wonder how many of you people are her constituents, and how many are just wingnut noisemakers.
Voters in the district are reporting that the electronic voting machines are malfunctioning, in favor of McKinney’s opponents. Are you highly informed politicos aware of that story? Or is that liberal media spin with no basis in reality?
By the way, is anyone asking where McKinney spent her time instead of going to the debate? Hey, isn’t Congress in session right now? God, you mean she was at work instead? Oh the horror.
Republican whores need to clean out their own houses and stop trying to interfere in the Democratic primaries. There is a culture of corruption in Washington right now. And it’s not Democrats who are abusing the law.
Well,
To Lee, Nell, Carl, Shamalama, chip, and others regarding your words, pictures, and whatever else you maintain within your head concerning The Honorable Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney of the 4th Contressional District of Georgia.
Nothing can make the real patriots, concerned citizens, real White right people and others speak ill of this outstanding congresswoman.
She is BOLD, good looking, straight forward, even when her hairstyle is called into question. She remains our Most Beautiful SHERO, and negative words only strengthens our internal desires to understand better why some people speak ill of her.
This same venom was put up against JESUS, REV. MARTIN L. KING JR,. and others who had some backbone and refused to sell their people out back home.
Cynthia McKinney never go along just to get along. Her personality, strengths, and internal beauty, are self created, self directed, self maintained, and always creating new energy for our youth, regardless of negatives directed towards her. She possess qualities that many good Americans want to see in other elected officials.
Moreover, Cynthia does not slip, slide, hide or jive on the Square of the House Floor. Regardless of a negative media towards her. She speak in the light what she stands up for in the dark. This has been proven again, and again as she stand up to the our Executive Commander-In-Chief on the Iraq War Issue.
Cynthia is in great company and receiving the same type of negative comments as Moses, Jesus, Rev. Martin L. King Jr., Johm Brown, Nelson Mandella, and others who traveled that great line that leads to Luke 4;18. Peace!
Cynthia McKinney is my hero, a woman who stands up to the criminals in Washington and makes them squirm. No wonder they manufacture ugly lies and spin her demise, because she is on to their schemes. She is one brave lady, and a true inspiration. Moonbat indeed, let her go back to DC and be a wombat, going up against the biggest gangsters this country has ever seen in the whitehouse. You go girl!
Would someone from the 4th District please enlighten me as to how the constituients of the district can believe that Cynthia is representing YOUR interests when her campaign contributions mainly come from out of state by a factor of nearly 2:1! The information I speak of is is posted on the Federal Elections Committee web site and is based upon her own campaign financing disclosures. If her election is paid for by outside people, how can her loyalties possibly lie with her constituents? Oh, please add what she has done that specifically affected the 4th district.
As near as I can find in all the public records for Congress, she is not there for the majority of the votes.
I cannot find where she has authored any legislation at all (much less for the 4th district).
She seems to have alienated most of her fellow representitives to the point where they do not want to have their names associated with hers.
Apparently, the Taylor campaign is distancing itself from her since they removed her endorsement from their web site.
So, in closing, how can someone who is so isolated from the rest of the voting membership of Congress and her own party possibly do anything constructive for the 4th District?