Congressman Sodrel's Masterful Town Hall Meeting

Even though the Herald Times managed to bury some of the most important news of the day in the “Local” section of the newspaper, the headline said it all; “Sodrel masters town hall crowd”, a fitting headline to a masterful presentation for the freshman Congressman from the 9th district. The fact that the HT chose to print a front page story about tattoos over the grand opening of a local Congressional district office shows their ongoing political bias, never the less, I couldn’t help but wonder how many of the detractors left the town hall meeting Friday afternoon impressed with the rooky statesman. Congressman Sodrel could have taken the easy route and called on only friendly faces during the question and answer period, instead, one after the other he called on individuals in the audience that were there for the obvious purpose of making public attacks on the republican national agenda. One by one he addressed their issues with a depth of knowledge and frankness that seemed to surprise even his staunchest opposition.

For the most part the meeting maintained a civil tone but several individuals seemed determined to stir up controversy. It was reported that local democrats mobilized their troops by circulating an email “call to arms” and in response a fair number of local left-wing activist showed up with prepared material to attack Congressman Sodrel’s recent victory over their candidate of choice, Baron Hill. With the precision of a surgeon, Congressman Sodrel dissected their questions and provided straight forward, no nonsense and informed answers, something they obviously didn’t fully expect. Many of these same critics showed a total lack of proper etiquette and protocol by failing to stand and applaud in acknowledgement of the Congressman when he was introduced. Only further proof of how influenced these people are by the flow of propaganda out of the local democrat party. It appears a small minority of individuals in their party continues to fan the flames of hatred and anger toward anyone with an “R” in front of their name. If this town meeting was any indication, Monroe County is obviously going to be a battleground for the 9th district Congressional seat in the 2006 election. One thing is clear, Mike Sodrel appears to have all of makings of a great Congressman, and we can only hope that some of the more rational thinking democrats will give him the opportunity to prove himself before they participate in any further resistance efforts.