Claire McCaskill has more balls than Billy Long. Doesn't it seem a little hypocritical that in August 2009, candidate Billy Long showed up outside of the Gilloz Theater to promote his own political career slapping Billy Long for Congress stickers on as many people as he could as Claire McCaskill prepared to face angry voters. I am no fan of Claire Mama Caskill, but Billy Long is beginning to impress me less, especially when you consider McCaskill is willing to give town hall meetings in the Republican dominated 7th District and Billy Long won't allow public town hall meetings unless they are in a controlled environment like the tele town hall meeting where voters can call in and listen to Billy Long answer the questions in a controlled environment.
Back then Billy Long wouldn't take a tough question and ran when they were asked. Throughout the campaign Billy Long ran from tough questions and shut voters and journalists out. Now as a Congressman he is running from voters and journalists who have tough questions. Let's not forget, during one debate, Billy Long was caught using his iPhone as his monkey Curtis Trent text messed them to him, as candidate Tim Davis observed.
Randy Turner reports today:
Anyone waiting for an opportunity to ask Seventh District Congressman Billy Long about the issues that affect southwest Missouri and the nation might as well forget it.
Long's aides are letting it be known that the Congressman feels he reached more people through his recent telephone town hall meeting than he could reach through in-person meetings.
Left unmentioned is the obvious: With the telephone meeting, Long may have reached thousands of people, but all they had a chance to do is listen to Long reel off folksy one-liners and take questions from carefully pre-screened listeners. I might add that in the one hour town hall meeting, Long only fielded five questions, with one of those being specifically about one man's problems with the Veterans Administration.
Of course this means one obvious thing. Billy Long is afraid of the voters of Southwest Missouri. He fears accountability and tough questions that might actually show that Billy Long is a "fed up" hypocrite. No town hall meetings Billy? I thought you weren't afraid of anyone, anywhere, any time.
The voters of Southwest Missouri deserve better than Congressman Long and his rehearsed one-liners. Billy Long knows a live town hall meeting will confirm his own political incompetence. He is afraid of them knowing they would pose as the massacre that would end his political career.
