{"id":1747,"date":"2017-10-23T21:34:45","date_gmt":"2017-10-23T17:34:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mikeoconnelljr.com\/?p=1747"},"modified":"2017-10-23T21:34:45","modified_gmt":"2017-10-23T17:34:45","slug":"pseudocampaigning-is-here-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mikeoconnelljr.com\/?p=1747","title":{"rendered":"Pseudocampaigning is here again"},"content":{"rendered":"

I received a letter from my member of Congress the other day. That’s Barbara Comstock, “Republican”-District 10 of Virginia, also known as Barbara Comstock-Libous. Actually, to say the letter came from my congressmember is a bit misleading. The letter came from me<\/em>, because I paid for it. “Public servant, official business,” reads the return address. Ms. Comstock’s signature\u00a0is reproduced\u00a0where a stamp would usually appear, like some 18th-century franking mark.<\/p>\n

The “official business” promoted is a meet-and-greet with Ms. Comstock at a local library. That’s a thinly-veiled campaign event advertised in thinly-veiled campaign literature paid for by not-so-thinly-veiled tax dollars. Thanks, Barb.<\/p>\n

The last time I contacted Ms. Comstock’s office was some years ago, when I requested that I no longer receive taxpayer-financed campaign literature at my home. Would you like it sent to your e-mail instead?<\/em> inquired her eager staffer.<\/p>\n

I’m still wondering whether that was a joke.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I received a letter from my member of Congress the other day. That’s Barbara Comstock, “Republican”-District 10 of Virginia, also known as Barbara Comstock-Libous. Actually, to say the letter came from my congressmember is a bit misleading. The letter came … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1747","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mikeoconnelljr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1747","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mikeoconnelljr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mikeoconnelljr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mikeoconnelljr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mikeoconnelljr.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1747"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mikeoconnelljr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1747\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1748,"href":"https:\/\/mikeoconnelljr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1747\/revisions\/1748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mikeoconnelljr.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mikeoconnelljr.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mikeoconnelljr.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}