More On Rep. Carol Shea-Porter(D-NH)
I know this is a local issue for me, but I have to get the word out there about this congresswoman who somehow got elected. If you didn’t vote for her, she doesn’t think you are one of her constituents. She doesn’t care about your opinion. How can she be qualified to be a representitive, if she doesn’t think she represents half of her constituents.
From the New Hampshire Union Leader:
FIRST DISTRICT Rep. Carol Shea-Porter is not just friendly with anti-war protesters. She is one. Two years ago she was tossed from President Bush’s speech in Portsmouth for wearing a T-shirt that read, “Turn your back on Bush.” So it is no surprise that she is on good terms with anti-war demonstrators. However, now that she is a member of Congress charged with representing everyone in the 1st District, she needs to make sure she does not treat her pro-war constituents with the same disrespect she showed the President.
Shea-Porter has gotten into a public dispute with two constituents over her response to their criticisms. The two women, each with a family member serving in Iraq, wrote letters to the editor criticizing Shea-Porter’s opposition to President Bush’s plan to send more troops to Iraq. The New Hampshire Sunday News reported the story this past Sunday.
On Monday, Shea-Porter issued a news release defending herself and dismissing one woman as “a political partisan who had opposed me.”
The woman Shea-Porter went after in the news release claimed that Shea-Porter said over the phone that she’d been elected by anti-war voters and did not view pro-war people as her constituents. The other said a Shea-Porter staff member had called her to complain about the letter to the editor that she’d written.
We don’t know exactly what was said during those phone calls. But if Shea-Porter’s tone in conversation was anything like the tone of her news release, then it is easy to see how the women would have come away offended.
Shea-Porter claims to “listen to everyone, not just those with whom I agree. None of us should want to create a climate where we speak only to those who agree with us.”
If she really wants to create a climate in which those with opposing viewpoints feel respected and represented, she should stop quarreling with them and politely hear them out, like her predecessor Jeb Bradley used to do. She might also serve them cider if they decide to protest outside her office some day.
America's Watchtower 
The two women who complained are both Republican activists — one from a prominent Republican family who is well thought of in this area. They were and are strong supporters of Jeb Bradley, who has announced he will challenge Shea-Porter to win back his seat in 08.
I have no information on the t-shirt incident and would like to see verification of this. I dead hear that some women were wearing these shirts, but I do not recall that Shea-Porter was one of them. And if she was? She wasn’t running as a Bush supporter.
I read Shea-Porter’s news release in the Herald and would not describe it as you have done here. It is true that the women who complained about Porter’s serving hot cider to anti-war protestors called her someone who is a” true definition of hypocrisy” and “enc ouraging the terrorists” I think it is quite commendable that Shea-Porter called both of the women. Unfortunately, their minds are so closed that they called her call “intimidation.” Wow. . . I wish a Congressman or Senator would call me if he disagreed with something I said about him–that would be a sign of a person who is not afraid to talk to someone who has another view.
Phoebe George Woolf
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