Our very own contributing RP, Oregon State Senator Jason Atkinson, was featured in yesterday’s Christian Science Monitor’s cover story, “The Myth of the Maverick.” Here’s an excerpt:
It has become a ritual of American elections for politicians to pretend as if they’re anything but politicians, and polls suggest voters like them better when they believe that. But this isn’t simply a political phenomenon. From business to medicine to technology, America loves a visionary outsider willing to follow a dream – and break a few rules, maybe even make a few sacrifices, on the way.
“There are some people who are wired differently to say, ‘Hey, I’ve got this thing in my heart, this opportunity in my profession, and I’m going to shake things up,’ ” says Jason Atkinson, an entrepreneur-turned-Republican state senator in Oregon. “That leadership style is quintessentially American”…
Though you probably haven’t heard of him, Senator Atkinson is something of a local maverick in Oregon – or at the very least not a stereotypical Republican. Earlier this year, for example, he cosponsored bills to ban plastic bags in Oregon stores. But his most personally meaningful maverick moment came last January, when his friend Gabrielle Giffords, a Democratic congresswoman from Arizona, was shot at a public meeting in Tucson.
The shooting came just months after the 2010 elections – marked nationally, as well as in Oregon, by militant rhetoric and bitter fighting, Atkinson remembers.
“We had just come off of very, very dirty campaigns, and there was a lot of really raw emotion,” he says. “You had a lot of very upset and wounded people serving in the Oregon Senate.”
The Giffords shooting resonated with Atkinson, who had himself been accidentally shot nearly three years before. Atkinson weighed whether to speak out against the extremity of political rhetoric, locally and nationally.
“Nobody wanted to say anything because everybody understands the anger” that was in the air after fierce campaigns on both sides, he says. “If you say something, you know you’re going to get beat up on talk radio, and by the critics…. But in my mind, something had to be said.”
Without consulting party leadership, Atkinson gave an impromptu, impassioned speech on the Senate floor asking for greater civility in politics. He wanted to see a conversation between politicians about ideas, rather than reducing debates, as he said in his speech, to “the idea that I am right, and you are evil.”
If his fellow politicians were listening, they missed his point. “The blowback for that decision was nothing I had ever experienced,” he says. He received hate mail and threatening telephone calls. “For weeks I had the sheriff’s office parked outside my house,” he says.
Some of that backlash, he thinks, was simply because some politicians thought they could score points by disagreeing with Atkinson. But he thinks there may also have been something else: guilt.
“The big bullies in politics don’t make up 50 percent of one side and 50 percent of the other, so why is that driving everything?” he says. “I think there was a pretty big chunk of guilt.”
Nearly one year later, though, he also thinks that speech made a difference. For starters, the sheriff’s cars are gone and people are being a lot nicer to him. “People who talk to me now want me to think they’re being civil. It’s kind of like, you don’t swear in front of the pastor,” he says with a laugh.
He’s also received dozens of invitations to speak about civility to groups across the state. He’s been sought out for conversations about meaningful bipartisanship. The local conversation, he says, has begun to change.
By Jason Atkinson, on Fri Nov 4, 2011 at 12:00 PM ET
Contributing RP Jason Atkinson has followed up his Internet sensation, “Big Mo” — which debuted here at The Recovering Politician — with a new short film on fishing, “Half Pounder.”
There’s something unnervingly genuine about Jason Atkinson. Unnerving because he’s a politician – once a member of the Oregon House of Representatives, today a member of its Senate, in between a determined but failed candidate for governor – but he doesn’t sound anything like one.
His speech lacks curated sound bites, and he tends to talk about solving problems, rather than who’s to blame for them.
This could be subjective. I met Mr. Atkinson only once; we had several conversations over four days this summer at the Aspen Global Leadership Network’s ACT II conference. (The AGLN paid for my travel and accommodations.)
He is an Oregonian, and I’m an East Coaster, far more comfortable with irony than sincerity.
But with all the blather on cable news, what explains his reasons for practicing politics in a time of intense partisanship like this?
“I used to tell people that I was the guy who actually believed the commencement speech,” he says.
Atkinson, a Republican, has taken some stands considered controversial in Oregon political circles; by his account, that’s at least in part because he thinks of public service before politics. For a long time, these were important but mostly invisible battles guys like him waged in their hearts and souls – or in the proverbial back rooms where political deals are cut.
That changed, for Atkinson, in January, when Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D) of Arizona was shot at a “town hall” style meeting. Atkinson knew Ms. Giffords – the two had been in the inaugural class of the ALGN’s Rodel Fellowship in Public Service.
By Jason Atkinson, on Mon Aug 15, 2011 at 12:00 PM ET
A first here at The Recovering Politician: Contributing RP Jason Atkinson directed and produced the following short film about a trout-fishing trip he took last week with his son in Montana. Stay tuned to the end for an hilarious, live-action imitation of Big Mouth Billy Bass (You know…the singing fish mounted on the wall):
By Jason Atkinson, on Fri Jul 29, 2011 at 8:30 AM ET
I took part in the Aspen Institute’s Global Leader Network bi-annual gathering, and once again I felt like the bellhop to these accomplished people.
Just over 200 fellows from 27 counties all with the same ‘virus’ to change the world. For the seminar “why I stepped up,” I was asked to be a presenter, and like everyone there, my phony meter had long ago broke. I look at the self-help genre through the same Vaurnets as the guy with the Madonna microphone selling the slap-jack.
The seminar was all honesty, and the answer to why people step up and put themselves forward for public service is not linear. It’s very hard to put into words. Some people are hard-wired to mix their personal confidence with their convictions, look past the personal sacrifices and pitfalls, and try to do their best knowing they might never be recognized for it.
As I wrote that sentence, it dawns the need for recognition could be the difference between states-people and politicians.
Mark Hatfield
A few concerns on modern service were articulated I think need to be discussed at the intellectual temple of the The Recovering Politician: First, is service today accepting the values of the party over the values of the person? I know firsthand the stinging backlash from ones own party for being too independent. Caucus politics can be small, petty and very effective. In my state, I’ve never seen a pro-life Democrat go anywhere and neither do pro-conservation Republicans. In my experience, the behind the door caucus politics and the perceived party policies are entirely different. I wonder if Mark Hatfield could get elected today?
The second concern about modern service is process. We have created a system of governance in which process (committees, task-forces, blue ribbon panels) are hallowed. Every state in America has plenty of process; because the process is suppose to provide a voice to everyone, right?
Not so fast. I think process protects the status quo in modern service and makes the role of the elected harder. In my state, task-force members are all bureaucrats and paid lobbyists-both with kingdoms to protect. Why are elected servants not part of process? Simple- they can’t afford it. Most states do not even pay public servants minimum wage. So does everyone have a seat at the process table?
Channing
Before I leave you with the impression that I am a Debbie Downer, let me leave you with a quote from one of her contemporaries–William Ellery Channing who wrote “The office of government is not to confer happiness, but to give men opportunity to work out happiness for themselves.” Yep, that’s my kind of stepping up. It’s a complicated calling.
Our own contributing RP, Jason Atkinson, has a need for speed.
Specifically, he’s pushing to raise the interstate speed limit in Oregon, which is the slowest state west of the Mississippi.
Here is what the (Southern Oregon) Mail Tribune reports:
Sen. Jason Atkinson, R-Central Point, has joined Sen. Bruce Starr, R-Hillsboro, in a push to increase the speed limit to at least 70 mph for noncommercial vehicles and 60 mph for semitrucks and other commercial traffic.
They’ve proposed an amendment to a House transportation bill (HB 3150) that would give the Oregon Transportation Safety Division the authority to raise the limit to a maximum 75 mph at its discretion. Atkinson said he hopes OTSD will meet in the middle with an increase of 5 mph.
Atkinson, who is on the state committee for Business, Transportation and Economic Development, said raising the speed limit would streamline traffic on the interstates.
By Jason Atkinson, on Mon May 23, 2011 at 8:30 AM ET
When I raced in Belgium in 1992, I thought I was finally on the verge of breaking into the highest levels of cycling. I came home to Oregon, back to skiing, got run over by a bubble-gummer driving her Daddy’s Chevy Blazer and ended up in politics. Through it all, I have remained a complete lover of cycling.
As I write, the Lion of Flanders flag is a mast over my farm. I put it up for the Tour of Flanders; keep it up for the Paris–Roubaix (the greatest bike race of the season) and through the Grand Tour seasons. My son, when he was barely able to speak complete words, could say the name Paolo Bettini in perfect Italian, Paolo was the World Champion in 2006 and 2007.
I saw doping first hand. Racing on the German – Austrian border I recall seeing two Czech development riders for team Banesto take out syringes during a race and shoot up. What as amazing about this was not the openness, but the herculean speed they had about twenty minutes later. My team had four riders at the Olympic trials that year. We were not the strongest, but certainly a team deep with talent and these two dopers dropped us.
In all the reports from that era, doping was really getting widespread and more sophisticated than the rumored amphetamine use during the 1970’s. Greg LeMond, a three time tour winner, first American game changer and gun shot survivor, commented in the early 1990’s, in the waning years of his career, how cyclists were gaining incredible strength. He was openly criticized for being grumpy and past his prime, but I believed him. LeMond was a man God designed to win bike races. Even in his late 30’s, someone as good as him just does not get dropped.
Lance Armstrong and Marco Pantani
My sport has widespread doping scandals, but I remained true. The Festina mess, then Marco Pantani, “the Pirate.” I have always given the benefit of the doubt, because unlike American team sports where people are elevated with gigantic professional contracts and grow enormous egos based on them, Cyclists rarely make over $100k ($45k for a domestique in the 1990s) and in order to reach those levels cyclists spend years of countless miles training alone. Cyclist loves their sport deeply like few athletes in other sports do. There is never an off-season.
I was hit hard when Pantani was found dead in his hotel room after an overdose. He and I were almost the exact same age. I had seen him race. He was amazing. After the scandals he left cycling and fell deep into depression. I felt for him as a depressed man looking for redemption.
When the allegations surrounding Tyler Hamilton surfaced, I was among the first to sign his web-site’s
Tyler Hamilton
comments section and encourage him to stand strong. More than his Olympic victory, his solo win in the mountains during the 2003 Tour de France with a broken collarbone was perhaps the greatest testament to mind over pain and the love of cycling I had ever seen. When he made his comeback winning the US Championships by a hair’s breath, my son and I were yelling in victory at our TV.
Last night, some of the shine rubbed off as Hamilton came clean on 60 Minutes. It’s another sad day for the sport I love and will again be a necessary cleansing agent. Other sports and their heroes – with far more money in play – are protected, but professional cycling is unique culture around the world and needs to be cleansed.
We Americans marvel and do not quite understand all the hoopla surrounding World Cup Soccer and why the teams and countries are exalted over individual players and multimillion dollar shoe contracts. In the same vein, we don’t fully appreciate professional cycling either. That is why it is hard to grapple with Lance Armstrong.
Like I have, I will remain true and give the benefit of the doubt to Lance Armstrong. I want to believe Lance did not use banned substances. I want to believe in cycling. The 60 Minutes piece was hard for me to watch, and we will all focus on the individual hero, but that is not the sport of cycling.
Five feet away, across my desk – hanging on the wall of my office – is a photo of Governor Schwarzenegger, Governor Kulongoski, myself and my son signing legislation to protect a river that my little boy is the fifth generation to grow up on. I was so proud that day and had the picture made to give my boy when the responsibility to care for the river becomes his. Just like cycling, how do I look at the picture now?
Cycling will still need its heroes next year. My river will still be there in thirty years and will still need her champions. All we want is for both to be clean and protected.
By Jason Atkinson, on Mon May 2, 2011 at 2:15 PM ET
Today is reopening a wound for many yet we as Americans know this is healing. Today will be history tomorrow. Ten years later, we can start to walk away.
I find it difficult to be happy today, however, my thoughts are heavy with the families who lost loved ones at the hand of this wicked man. He embodied pure evil.
Late last night our forces embodied pure courage. We Americans are proud of justice and our collective resilience. Like the unity that swept the county right after 9-11, today we stand united again as Americans.
As we begin to celebrate a series of 150th anniversaries of the Civil War and its aftermath, we flash back just four years to a Presidents’ Day commemoration on the floor of the Oregon State Senate.
There, our very own Contributing RP Jason Atkinson does his best — and funniest — Abe Lincoln imitation, in a debate with a scary looking “George Washington.”
If you can suffer through the poor video quality, it is worth the punch line to Jason’s masterful oration. Enjoy:
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