Are the MA representatives allowed to vote while not present? It seems very strange that an entire state's representatives will not have a vote on this issue because of a scheduling conflict. Can the votes not be phoned in?
Unfortunately, that sets a very dangerous precedent. Already we have a situation in which senators and congressmen skip debates and skip votes, and end up uninformed about the bills they do vote on. Do you really want to increase that?
And if they can vote absentee for 'extreme' circumstances only, who gets to decide? The party leaders? The proponents of the bill? The opponents?
Feingold is the only one that sticks out in my mind as bucking this trend - he never missed a single vote, even as he was losing his 2010 re-election campaign and his opponent was working the campaign trail every day.
Unfortunately, people like Feingold are the exception, not the rule.
Also frustrated by this. I understand there are other things happening, but we have absolutely no representation on this thing? Even some sort of absentee voting for such an extreme circumstance?
Do they? I don't think there's anything more important for these particular politicians than representing the interests of their constituents.
There's a reason we have police and local authorities in addition to high-level politicians. They handle local politics and issues. If we actually need our state representatives so involved in something like this that they can't perform the functions they were elected for, then that's a systemic problem that should be addressed.
Is this a bit insensitive? Perhaps. But these people have a responsibility to look at the big picture, and if that means ignoring something tragic but not related to their responsibilities, they need to recognize that and act appropriately.
