Part five in a six-part series by Jeremy Beecher of WJET-TV regarding the 3rd Congerssional Candidates including commentary from "yours truly". This segment part aired on Erie WJET TV 24 on Wednesday, May 12th.Segment Five focuses on candidate Ed Franz of Crawford County.
The interview includes commentary from Roberta Biros, editor of Mercer Conservatives. The statements and summaries were taken from 40 minute interview that was filmed at the station on Monday, May 3rd.
Enjoy.
We will post the other segments as they are made available by WJET.
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I have seen that Ed Franz's support seems to come largely from the Grove City area, and in particular associates of Grove City College.
ReplyDeleteI posed several questions to Mr. Franz on his Facebook page. To his credit, he answered one before he started to ignore me; he said that he would not vote against extensions of unemployment benefits. He didn't say how he would pay for this.
Since Franz works for GE and is a union member, I thought it odd that he was running as a conservative. One of the primary questions I wanted to know is if he was elected to Congress, would Franz support the continuation of government subsidies--huge, taxpayer funded grants from the state and federal government--to corporations like GE. I also wanted to know if Franz would vote for a law that encouraged China to allow the yuan to appreciate, especially since GE has large contracts with the Chinese government.
Frustrated with his lack of response, I emailed both Franz and his associate, the Grove City College think-tank director, Lee Wishing. Wishing called and left a message at my house, telling me that "Ed doesn't look at his Facebook page, I run it now." Wishing then emailed me answers to my policy questions, which I found strange since it is Franz who is supposed to be running for office.
From your standpoint, why all the support for Ed Franz from Grove City College? He's hardly the most economically conservative candidate in the race. He really can't claim the social conservative title, either (that would go to Clayton Grabb, who recently wrote that he thought emergency rooms should "take cash, credit, or debit card," before admitting poor patients for services, and who has touted his intention to legislate to America's "Christian roots.")
Franz and Lee Wishing make the oddest of political bedfellows, in my opinion. Beyond that, I don't believe Franz has much of a chance to win the primary, anyway.
I’ve never received much in the way of feedback from Mr. Franz on specifics. When I initially contacted the candidates regarding a very specific query in early March, Steve Fisher was the only candidate to respond to my questions. Mr. Fisher did so in writing and on the same day that I emailed the questions. As someone that feels that transparency and accountability is EXTREMELY important, that impressed me.
ReplyDeleteFranz never responded in writing, and he only discussed the issues with me briefly in person. He isn’t one to be tied down to any specific answer and that bothers me. It is interesting to hear that you have experienced similar problems in getting answers.
To be perfectly honest, however, ALL of the other candidates (with the exception of Fisher) have danced around direct questions in my experiences. Huber, Grabb, and Kelly did provide answers to me eventually when they were asked questions face to face, but they ignored all written requests. To be even more fair, though . . . Bob Robbins, Michele Brooks, Dick Stevenson, and Mark Longietti ALL DODGED the same questions too. NONE of our elected officials agreed to answer the questions . . . but that isn’t exactly an endorsement.