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Anne Northup's "Scandal"

by Theresa Fritz Camoriano

This week, we have been treated to two days of front page headlines about Congresswoman Anne Northup's "scandal".  Based on the placement of the articles and their language, you would think that Anne Northup was raiding the U.S. Treasury and stuffing millions of dollars of taxpayers' money into her pockets.  However, if you actually read the articles, you will find that she has done nothing wrong.  Clearly, The C-J doesn't mind risking losing its own credibility in order to help promote the Democrats' agenda.

Looking into the story, we find that Northup's husband has a company that makes radios for Harley motorcycles, and it needed some kind of routine permission from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for a radio it was manufacturing.  It applied for the permission, but the FCC turned it down, based on some formality.  (They didn't use the right color of ink, or didn't put papers in the right order, or something like that.)   The company asked for reconsideration, but the FCC was dragging its feet, and time was running out.  So, the company asked Congresswoman Anne Northup's office to help.  Again, this was a routine matter, resulting in a letter similar to hundreds of letters her office sends out on behalf of local constituents to help them through the bureaucratic maze.  The FCC ended up giving the permission, which, it said, was a routine matter, giving no special favor to Northup's husband's company, and not even realizing that it was her husband's company.

While I have no personal experience in dealing with the FCC, I have plenty of personal experience with the U.S. Patent Office, so I have no trouble believing that there was foot-dragging by a government agency over a routine matter.  I'll give you just one recent illustrative example from my practice.  I received a routine rejection to a patent application.  I reviewed the rejection and called the Examiner to schedule a telephone interview to discuss it.  When the appointed time came, I called, but the Examiner was not there.  This happened repeatedly, with the Examiner repeatedly being mysteriously absent at the appointed time.  Finally, I had an interview with the Examiner's supervisor, and, on June 5, I filed an amendment to the application, which I thought would resolve the issues, based on my conversation with the Examiner. 

I expected to receive an allowance by the end of June, but the end of June passed with no word from the Patent Office.  On July 17, we began calling the Patent Office to make sure it had received our amendment.  We had received the stamped return postcard, so we knew that the amendment had been received in the Patent Office, but the Examiner said that he had not received it.  So, we faxed it to the Patent Office again.  Still, the Examiner said he did not have it.  After several more phone calls, most of which were not returned, the Examiner said our amendment had been received, but the file was lost, and he couldn't take action without the file.  We also learned that the clerk for that department had died, and, due to hiring freezes, she would not be replaced. 

After many more phone calls to the Examiner and his supervisor, we were told that the file was still lost, and nothing was being done.  Time was running out, so we called the supervisor's supervisor and left a message of our sad tale.  This prompted the supervisor to go into the Examiner's office, where he miraculously found the file in a huge pile of junk that, based on his description, made the Examiner's office sound something like my teenage daughter Nina's bedroom!  We still have not received a response, but we are hopeful.  And I can certainly understand when other people, like Northup's husband, have similar problems with government agencies and become so frustrated that they call their congressman for help with the bureaucracy.  If my case continues on much longer without a response, I might even call Northup myself!

So where's the Northup scandal?  Of course, there is no scandal, but most people would not bother to read to the end of the article to find out the truth.  Instead, they see the headline and assume that the newspaper would not give the situation such prominence if there were not a scandal afoot.  They assume that Northup is corrupt and is using her office to line her pockets.  Ignore the facts.  Case closed.

The newspaper also used the opportunity to paint Northup as a wealthy person, creating the presumption that she therefore is out of touch with her constituents.  Of course, it does not mention that her opponent is also wealthy -- a trust fund kid.  The C-J certainly cannot be accused of being unbiased or even-handed or of restricting its editorials to the editorial page!

While the Democratic party may have difficulty raising money in campaign contributions from average citizens as compared with the Republicans, as long The C-J continues serving as the Democratic party's mouthpiece, as it clearly has done in this case, the Dems have a substantial edge over any competitors.  After all, what are a few thousand dollars in ads compared with such biased front page newspaper coverage?   

While I disagree with Northup on many issues, I have seen no facts to suggest that she has used her office for improper personal gain.  As usual, The C-J is blowing smoke and creating a scandal out of nothing in order to mislead the people and promote its own agenda.  And that really is a scandal! 

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