Question about Kucinich's voting record

[hfojvt]

So I am looking around the WaPo site on Congressional voting records and find that Ron Paul only votes with his party 60% of the time.

But the surprising thing to me is to find Dennis down there with on 87.4% in the 108th Congress. That puts him down there with Blue Dogs like Stephanie Herseth at 86.8%, Ike Skelton with 87.6% and Dennis Moore with 91.3%.

So what is the deal? Is he voting against the majority of the party because the majority of the party is voting non-progressive?

I find the same story in the 109th Congress, as Dennis only voted with the majority of Democrats 87.2% of the time. Whereas fellow Progressive Caucus member, Tammy Baldwin, voted with the majority 93.2% of the time.

So what is up with the Blue-Dog numbers there? Is DK voting against the party when the party is wrong whereas Blue Dogs are voting against the party when the party is right?

Here's a link, although I did not check the 110th Congress (which is where the link goes. It would be just my luck if DK was in the mid 90s this year, unlike past years.)

projects.washingtonpost.com/congress/110/states/oh/

edit: Hopefully fixed the link, and see he is at 91.6% this year. However, that is not far from Boyda's 90.7% and other Ohio Democrats are over 95%, still putting DK more in line with Blue Dog percentages.

[John Q. Citizen]

1. Did Tammy vote to fund the occupation and for the patriot act?

Percentages don't mean much, votes on specific bills tell the tale.

[LittleClarkie]

2. I don't think she was in Congress for the Patriot Act

Only since 2004 iirc

[John Q. Citizen]

3. They renewed it in 2005 I think.

[Freddie Stubbs]

6. She voted against the renewal of the Patriot Act in 2006

http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2006/roll020.xml

[hfojvt]

7. no, she was elected in 1998

right after I met her and then moved from the district.
She beat Jo Musser in 1998, then she beat some poly sci prof in 2000, then the crazy fireman in 2002, then Magnum in 2004, and Magnum in 2006.
She even spoke at the DNC in 2000.

[JacquesMolay]

4. I worked for Dennis in 2004...

... I really admire him but I'm not going to support him this time - I think he had his time to speak his mind. He's got some strange voting tendencies that used to nag at me when I worked on his campaign (as a volunteer) - he once voted for legislation banning flag-burning, and at one time he was anti-choice (he said he 'evolved' out of that).

[TahitiNut]

5. It's not about "how often" as much as it's about "when".

For example, one congresscritter might vote against the increase in the federal minimum wage and another might vote against the Iraw War Resolution ... but both could be counted as a vote against the leadership.

There's also a question of which votes are "whipped" ... where the majority/minority leader and the party whip call for "solidarity" on a particular vote. The Dems do this less frequently than the GOPhers.

[dkofos]

8. The real question is how often did he vote the way the majority of

his constituents wanted him to.

[hfojvt]

10. doesn't a question like that

let the Blue Dogs off the hook? And Republicans too?

For a 'Profile in Courage' you need to stand up to your constituents and vote for what's best for the country (or the world).

I was disgusted when Dennis Moore and Jean Carnahan campaigned that they voted for the Bush tax cuts. They should have voted against them and helped explain to their constituents what a bad idea those tax cuts are. That's hard to do, of course, over the right wing noise and money machines, but, in the words of Clinton 'it is the right thing to do.'

[hfojvt]

9. I appreciate your concern

Here's how the AFL-CIO scored him. In 2006 13 right and one wrong. Lifetime 110 right and 3 wrong, or 97%.


http://www.aflcio.org/issues/legislativealert/votes/member.cfm?state=OH&pg=1

The League of Conservation voters scored him at 100% for the 108th Congress and at 95% for the 107th and 90% for the 106th.

http://www.lcv.org/images/client/pdfs/scorecard02final.pdf

The American Conservatives Union, which I won't link to, scored him at 4% this year, with a lifetime score of 10.3%.

Tammy Baldwin, though, made their rogues list, scoring 0% :woohoo: