Congressman sets up campaign HQ in village
The 318 Oswego St. location fared poorly for Montana Mills and Mister Lister. Both businesses tanked after opening up in our village business district.
Ever since 2008, however, the single-story structure at the corner of North Willow Street has proven effective for each of the politicians who have rented it as a campaign headquarters.
Democrat David Stott used it to unseat Republican County Legislator Jim Farrell two years ago. Then in 2009 Republican challenger Judy Tassone turned the tables on Stott after leasing the same location.
Maffei rents L’pool hot spot
One of the main reasons it’s such a prime spot for candidates is that its frontage directly faces incoming traffic from Onondaga Lake Parkway and is easily spotted by motorists heading out of Liverpool on Oswego Street and Old Liverpool Road as well.
Now incumbent Democratic Congressman Dan Maffei is renting the space from its owner, Chuck Hafner, and is using it as his headquarters for his first re-election campaign. In 2008, Maffei handily wrested the 25th District House of Representatives seat away from Republicans who held it for a quarter-century.
Maffei, who lives in DeWitt, rallied his troops here June 12 and 13 to officially open the office. He and his supporters also got the ball rolling with a petition drive and door-knocking campaign.
The first-term congressman is being challenged this November by Republican-Conservative candidate Anne Marie Buerkle, an outspoken opponent of abortion and a participant in recent “Tea Party” events. In a Tea Party speech in Rochester, Buerkle urged voters to “take back our country.”
Buerkle courts Tea Partiers
Apparently Buerkle believes that Democrats such as Maffei, under the leadership of President Barack Hussein Obama, have stolen America out from under the conservatives who really deserve it.
But Maffei sounded every bit like a conservative himself when he delivered a pro forma Memorial Day speech here at Johnson Park on May 31. His brief remarks overflowed with praise for the armed forces.
What else could he do? Two years ago, Obama promised to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and American voters loudly agreed by sending the first black man ever to the White House.
Like most politicians, however, once he won office Obama quickly forgot his promises. In the 18 months since that ground-breaking election, the president and his Democrat-controlled Congress have only increased U.S. involvement in overseas wars.
Maffei favors military withdrawal
Though he didn’t do it here on Memorial Day, Maffei maintains an admirable anti-war position.
“We should have gotten our soldiers out of Afghanistan a year and a half ago,” the congressman told a WSYR-AM radio audience July 8. Noting this district’s “shallow support” for the desert wars, Maffei has boldly questions the president’s ever-more-militant policies.
“I would prefer that we, you know, basically do a withdrawal,” Maffei suggests.
Nevertheless, the freshman congressman has voted in favor of nearly a dozen appropriations bills for military might and increased intelligence. Well, Dan’s a politician and politicians sometimes say one thing and do another.
Wars go on and on an on
So, with support from Congress, Obama shows no inclination to curtail the wars. Buerkle joins in the commander-in-chief’s aversion to pacifism.
“America must project strength to the world, foe and friend alike,” she has stated. “We can’t do this if we limit our choices for dealing with the enemy.”
Regardless of the Democrats’ broken promise to end the wars, Maffei will easily win re-election but not because of his anti-war stance or pro-war votes. No, he’ll win because he’s renting the best-located campaign headquarters in Onondaga County, right here at 318 Oswego St., where 35,000 motorists will see his name plastered above the plate-glass windows every single day through Nov. 2.
