Let me be very clear: I don't hate Burr. When he was my Congressman, I disagreed with his politics but couldn't argue with his accessibility. When he represented the 5th District, Burr was known to personally call constituents who wrote him about legislative questions. He seemed to be willing to ask for illumination on issues with which he had little or no personal experience, and I respected that. I even voted for him once, because I felt that his style was more important than any one political opinion.
But something's happened to Richard Burr. Maybe it's being tapped as a rising conservative star (remember when Dick Cheney appeared at Burr's 2004 Senate campaign fundraiser?), or maybe it's that he doesn't have time to cover the entire state as efficiently as he did one Congressional district. Whatever it is, I've been disappointed in Burr's Senate track record when it comes to actually *listening* to the concerns of the people he's paid to represent.
Several weeks ago, I wrote both Burr and Senator Hagan to mention a piece of the health care reform debate that I thought they might not be aware of: if victims of rape and sexual assault wish to report the crime to law enforcement, they have to get a forensic exam in an ER. The State of North Carolina began paying for the cost of processing the "rape kits" last year, but a) people get raped in places other than North Carolina, and b) no one knows about this. Did you know before you just read it here? And even this policy doesn't cover the ER visit itself. Now imagine that you're a woman less than 72 hours removed from being horribly victimized - think about all the things that would be running through your mind. Whether you can swing an ER co-pay shouldn't be one of them.
That was what I wanted to get across to Burr and Hagan. We're talking about a crime potentially not being reported because a victim doesn't have insurance, or has inadequate coverage. We can all see the injustice in that, can't we? Hagan sent me a form e-mail; Burr a form letter by snail-mail. Gee, thanks, guys.
But then Burr went and cast what I still can't help but think of as the pro-corporate rape vote against the Franken Amendment, indicating that he values defense contractors' well-being over that of their employees. And then last week, Burr got into a tiff with a witness during a health/pensions committee hearing over the issue of insurance companies that treat domestic violence as a pre-existing condition.
In both cases, it appeared to me - disturbingly - that Burr was putting something abstract over the actual real-world experiences of real women in this country. These aren't experiences that Burr can be expected to have had himself, as a relatively privileged man. That doesn't make him a bad person; but it does mean that he should be even more open to those women's voices in order to fill in his own blind spots -- and he's not.
As a woman, I grow more disappointed in Senator Burr by the day.
To paraphrase a line from President Obama's speech at last year's Democratic convention, I don't think Senator Richard Burr doesn't care; I just think he doesn't get it.
No comments:
Post a Comment