"Please refrain from being obnoxious." Can we support a campaign that said this to a voter?

[Patty]

Jon Arguello just joined many groups on Freedomworks social site, and he is the communications director for Julius Melendez who is running for congress in FL D9. Julius Melendez and he have joined different groups on Freedomworks and instead of announcing that they are a candidate and his communications director, they are sitting silent reading all of the posts without revealing their true identity. Shouldn't a candidate running for Congress be honest and have integrity not acting as a leftist troll pretending to be a Freedomworks supporter? Melendez ( candidate for congress) went so far as to create a false group called D9 voters against Alan Grayson. It’s really his campaign page. He tweeted 209 of his supporters to join “our” group. But Melendez is the administrator and this is NOT a site for free speech to openly discuss all of the candidates, instead my posts exposing Melendez were immediately DELETED. So much for freedom of speech.

But even worse than the deception is the comment that Mr. Arguello, Melendez's communications director wrote to me when I posted the facts that Julius is NOT endorsed by Freedomworks:

"Please refrain from being obnoxious."

I guess he thought twice about it and edited the message but every message gets emailed in full and this comment was sent to me. So now we know the true reaction of Melendez and his staff to any opposing viewpoints if we elect him to congress. Is that the response you want from your representative every time you write Washington?

I am a voter in D9 and this is how I was treated when he needs my family to help him win the primary? If they are this rude now, how will we be treated if he wins and we oppose him on important issues like healthcare, immigration, Medicare, and balancing the budget?

Please send the message to all of your contacts in FL congressional D9. We need an honest man with integrity who will listen at ALL times not insult us. How a man and his staff acts is a reflection of his character. Julius Melendez is NOT the man to represent us in D9.

Mr. Melendez just raised $90,000 yet he can’t afford a social website? Why does he have to freeload off of hard working Americans who donate to Freedomworks when they have not even endorsed him? Other candidates are paying for sites, why hasn’t he? If he can’t handle my true comments, how would he ever handle Alan Grayson’s attacks?

My family will be supporting John Quinones in this campaign. His campaign has always returned our phone calls and answered all of our questions. I am not an “obnoxious” voter to them. When I wanted a yard sign, the campaign manager personally delivered it to my house. And John Quinones has promised to listen to the voters of D9. This is more than I can say for Melendez and his staff who would rather push the delete button on opposing views.

[Mike Yates]

Patty:

Interesting article.  Second attack on Julius Melendez.  But help me to understand please.  How can a Tea Party "Real Conservative" person such as yourself be a John Quinones supporter?  I have been to every debate and forum in D9 in the last two months or so including some Tea Party events.  John Quinones seldom shows up to debate the issues with his contenders, so we as Conservatives, do not know what he is all about as he refuses to tell us.. He IS, however, the ESTABLISHMENT Replublican candidate with the support of establishment Republicans.  As I am sure you have heard, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different result.  John Quinones is nothing if not the quintessential establishment candidate.  Have you been to any of the debates or forums? Have you ever heard this man speak?  PLEASE. Get educated.  We cannot effect the change we need with these kind of non-conservative go-along-to-get-along Republican candidates. As "Real Conservatives" we must do better than this.  Full disclosure, I have decided to support Mark Oxner - please check him out if you have not.  I think you will like THE MAJORITY of what he has to say.  I certainly do not agree with everything any candidate  stands for, but we must, as Conservatives, do better than establishment types like John Quinones.  I hope you do not think I am being obnoxious expressing myself like this.  I just think we must support true conservatives, and that is most certainly NOT John Quinones. 

Warmest Regards,

Mike

[Mike Yates]

Patty:

I'm sorry, I just saw your post to my response on your first post.  I totally disagree with you about Mark Oxner, and I simply will not support an establishment candidate in the Primary simply because he is Hispanic and that  is who the establishment believes can best defeat Alan Grayson.  I am tired of the establishment selecting our candidates for us.  We NEED  true conservatives in Congress like Allen West and Sandy Adams.  I simply do not agree that john Q. is that candidate.  I really believe John Q. is a go-along-to-get-along establishment candidate, and his absence at the debates and forums bear that out.  Again, back to the definition of insanity.  In any case, I respect your choice and if John Q. wins the primary, I will support him, but until then, my support goes to the most Conservative candidate. and that is Mark Oxner in my humble opinion.  Also, after hearing John Q. speak at the one debate he attended that I was at, and he arrived late by the way, I think Alan Grayson will eat him up and spit him out in a debate.  I truly hope I am wrong. 

Mike

[Mike Yates]

Patty:

Patty:

I am very sorry you believe I am angry, I surely did not mean to come across that way and apologize if I did. I was merely sharing my thoughts and opinion. Please reread my comments, I did NOT say YOU were the definition of insanity, I said the DEFINITION of insanity was doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different  result.  That is what we all as voters have been doing for far to long in my view.  As I said, I will support John Q. if he wins our nomination, whether he is the establishment candidate or not.  Any of the four are better for us than Alan Grayson.  Also there is a huge difference in the D9 demographics and the district Dan Webster won when he defeated Alan Grayson, as D9 as predominately democrat, so it will be an uphill slog for any of our candidates. The bottom line is Alan Grayson must not win.  I have spoken at length with Mark and beleive him to be an honorable and sincere Christian man. We will just have to agree that we disagree on this.  That is the beauty of our country, we still, for the time being, have that choice, and I do honor the choice you have made. Take care and best wishes.

Mike

[Patty]

Mike,

I hope you take the time to talk with John's campaign before voting and passing judgement. You have only been on this site for 6 days yet your first statement passed judgement on me about how can I be a real conservative. I am proud to have been on this site from the beginning. I vote people and I have stood with both John and Mark. John is the one who talked with me not at me. John is the one who walked my neighborhood standing beside my husband and I and acknowledged us and let us speak freely about whatever we wanted to say. He walked up to the first door and never asked us what we were going to say, never told us what to say and we never rushed on to the next house. There was no "establishment script" for either him or us - just neighbors talking to neighbors. Mark never showed up when I asked him to walk months ago. And when Mark finally did walk my neighborhood he didn't even come to my front door even though he knew me. John thanked me and Mark didn't. John listened when we talked about our lives and jobs and Mark insulted my husband by sticking to his script and not realizing our point of view. And John is the candidate who looked me in the eyes, shook my hand and made me the same promise that Marco made to me and has kept to this day.

D9 is really an neat district filled with awesome people who WILL work together and send the right person to Washington. I have talked to them and they are fired up to send the BEST conservative to represent them. And that conservative's sign is proudly displayed in many of their yards

And Mark is the candidate along with Todd Long who has promised Herman Cain he will implement and push 9-9-9 through congress after it is written by Herman. Why would you want a candidate who promises to support a piece of legislation before it is ever written and he has never read it? Isn't that what happened with Obamacare? Shouldn't our representative write legislation himself or actually read a bill before he decides to support it rather than making promises ahead of time in exchange for an endorsement?

I respect your decision to vote for Mark. All I was asking was for you to look at each candidate based on their merits and not discard them based on an arbitrary standard of "establishment" that doesn't even exist in this race.

[Mike Yates]

Patty:

FYI:  I am 62 years old and have vetted all four candiates, speaking with three of them personally, before making my decision and chose Mark and that decision stands, especially after my conversation with him today. 

I spoke with Mark Oxner and his wife today regarding your accusation that he had put his family $88,000 in debt in order to run for Congress.  Your accusation is patently false and you should not be saying things you where you do not have the facts.  Mark did loan his campaign money to jump start his campaign as many new candidates do.  But he did so without borrowing one dime from anyone out of his and his wife's personal savings and with her full consent.  As for being on the site for only six days, that is irrelevant.  I was a new member who is extremely conservative responding to your article regarding your allegations that Julius Melendez had misrepresented his campaign finances which I found on Google.  In Julius' case that may have been a simple clerical error and I am willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.  So all of these bombs you have tossed are out there, accurate or not.  In addition, this was the entire text of my first response to your accusation regarding Julius:

 " This is excellent!!  There is a candidate in Florida District 9 that you may want to check out.  His name is Mark Oxner, a conservative businessman who has never run for office before.  If elected, he will be running against crazyman Alan Grayson, and that should tell us everything we need to know.  Check out Mr. Oxner at MarkOxnerforCongress.com.  He has some very cute video's on Obama and his "parrott" Alan Grayson.  You will find them entertaining to say the least.  Thanks again Patty for the great insight."

I said absolutely nothing negative about any Republican Candidate, but merely suggested you check out Mark.  It seems to me you a a "bomb thower" for John Q.'s campaign.  That's fine if that is where you wish to go and it is FACTUAL.  In this case it is most certainly not.  In fact, you stated in your response and I quote:

"My biggest problem with Mark is he has put himself over $88,000 in debt through loans to himself. This is bad business and makes no sense. Yet you want to send him to Washington to fix the debt and overspending?". 

It seems that Mr. and Mrs. Oxner's personal money management has been so good over the years of his business life that they can afford to make an investment in Mark's campaign for Congress.  I personally find this admirable.  They putting their money in something they believe in very deeply, and that is The United States of America.  Further, in the campaign literature I have received, there have been absolutely no envelopes tucked in for donations to Mark's campaign, which is certainly different from one's I have recieved from other candidates in the past.

Finally, I do hope you will check your facts in the future and also do your due dilgence;  I most sincerely hope perhaps you will be honorable enough to retract your misleading statements regarding the Oxner's contribution to Mark's campaign.  You might also give Julius the benefit of the doubt.  I have spoken with him several times and he seems to me like an honorable guy.  In addition, I have also spoken with Todd Long and in fact voted for him in 2010.  I would have spoken with John Quniones as well but he has chosen to not participate in many of the debates and forums and so has not made himself accessible to those of us who attend such functions.  That is what these functions are for, so we may meet the candiates and make our decision.  If he chooses not to attend and hides from his competitor's, I see that for what it is.  I will say the one debate that John Q. attended that I was at in Celebration I was not impressed.  Even the moderator called him out for being "half a vote" on some of the ten questions they were all asked at the end of the debate.  I likened this to Obama's voting "Present" in the Illinois State Senate. 

In any case, I do hope you will do the right thing and check your facts and apologize with a retraction.  It is the honorable thing to do.

Mike

 

[Patty]

Mr. Yates,
My apologies to Mr. Oxner. I had just worked a 12 hour shift and didn't quite get the statement correct. I have deleted my post and rewritten it corrected.
Here's the link to the FEC report for last quarter for Mark Oxner so people can check out the facts:
http://herndon1.sdrdc.com/pdf/543/12952466543/12952466543.pdf#navpa...
And yes I did write the above post about Mark based on a phone conversation. After driving over 30 minutes to meet him on Mother's Day and my son having to spend his day with Mark instead of me, I never got even a Happy Mother's Day or a thank you to my son or even a thank you for all the things I did for him. All I got was a man who wouldn't listen and had no positions except go to Washington to fight everyone. And he spent a lot of time praising the New Orleans school system but didn't have any facts or research to back it up. And he lost my vote when he insulted my husband. Go ask him what I did for him and how many hours I spent at my computer not paying attention to my family or husband. He didn't even stop at my house when he or someone in his campaign walked my neighborhood to ask for my vote or say hello and at that point he didn't know I was not supporting him and had no signs in my yard. I told Mark face to face that he didn't have any name recognition and he still doesn't. Mark's biggest problem is that he thought he had won and forgot to run a primary before taking on Alan Grayson. Mark can have a place in politics but he has to start lower and work his way up. Congress is the 3rd highest position in the country and people don't just trust anyone to represent them.

Here's my repost and sorry again for the misstatement.

My husband and I have been walking for John through our neighborhood. I met John yesterday and he stood in a little office and talked and actually listened to us. First he thanked us for volunteering for him and it was sincere. That's more than Mark Oxner ever did - go ask Mark what I did for him and yet when I finally sat down with him with my family, he never even said thanks, Happy Mother's Day and my husband had to buy the doughnuts. He even insulted my husband's career with his remarks. I'm not angry at Mark, but he doesn't stand for anything except go fight Washington. Go sit down with him for a couple of hours and you will see that he has no ideas. He has nothing he wants to accomplish. And he kept repeating lines from John Stossel and when my husband pointed it out, he wasn't too happy about it.I also critiqued his first debate by telling him that someone running for congress has to act professionally and stop swinging in the chair - he didn't like that by his mannerisms. Mark doesn't listen and he just argues his points if you disagree with him. He didn't even research his ideas on New Orleans schools and admitted it. I think he just got his ideas from listening to Mary Landrieu brag about New Orleans. And do you know who most of the teachers are in New Orleans? Teach for America - sounds like something backed by Obama's programs and it is. RED FLAG!

My 20 year old was there and walked away shaking his head and saying he was not impressed by Mark and could never vote for him. When you end up arguing with the person you are asked to help, then something's wrong.

My biggest problem with Mark is that he has financed his campaign for a total of $80,638.44 in loans made or guaranteed by the candidate. Last quarter he had $16,000 in loans made or guaranteed by the candidate. And last quarter Mark had $1,650.00 in individual contributions from FIVE donors and not one of them resided in D9. Those 5 donors resided in Tennessee, Wyoming, Mississippi, and Maine.This is bad business and makes no sense. Yet you want to send him to Washington to fix the debt and overspending? Mark had over 200,000 hits on his you tube video yet he couldn't turn that into any money. Alan Grayson raised over $850,000 this past quarter. I didn't know anything about campaigns, but the main thing I learned at Marco Rubio's start up meeting in December was it takes money and lots of it to win.

And every house we go to has researched the candidates and the majority feel John is the most conservative. John is endorsed by the NRA and 100% prolife. And look at who Grayson is attacking - it's not Mark Oxner.

Mr. Yates. I have even been followed around the internet by Julius' communications director and embarrassed on this site. I have sat face to face with both Mark Oxner and John Quinones and I know who is the person who is real and can make a difference and WILL listen to us. I am NOT the definition of insanity, I trust my gut and it has been correct with every candidate that I have encountered in this race.

And as far as Sandy Adams, she is my congresswoman and I hope she wins,. But a tea party member showed me her and Mica's voting records and they are only a few points apart. And they are not happy with that.And Sandy Adams is an establishment candidate who held a state rep office just like Quinones did. So why is she antiestablishment but he isn't? You're not making sense.

Mr. Yates, I will sincerely ask you to put aside your anger and look at the candidates thoroughly. Not every businessman is made for congress. Please stand with my family and vote for the candidate who listens and doesn't talk down to us or make us feel like what we have to say is wrong or unimportant. You did not have Suzanne Kosmas who spewed the democratic party line and couldn't even tell us how she voted the day before and her people had to speak for her. I will NEVER stand by and allow someone like that to represent me in Congress again. My family is proud to support John Quinones and if Alan Grayson couldn't eat up Daniel Webster then he won't eat up John Quinones.

[Patty]

Mr. Yates,

If you have taken the time to contact each campaign, why don't you research all 4 candidates before casting your vote? Call John's campaign and ask your questions.

And as far as Julius Melendez goes, I have asked for an apology and I am still waiting. Everyone on Real Conservatives saw the real Melendez campaign after his communications director followed me to this site and ranted crazily about Lew Oliver and me working for him. I had told Mr. Melendez multiple times that I was a real supervoter and to beware but I guess Jon Arguello panicked after they came in third in the Osceola Straw poll. Jon was deleted from this site.. Julius should have fired the man because he acted that unprofessional. The one time Mark's campaign did listen was when I told them to stop writing online and arguing with the left because it is unprofessional so I hope that you have joined as a real person and will take your word for it.

And I am sorry again for my mistake, but I am just a mom writing my opinion. And I hope you get a chance to meet John Quinones because he is a wonderful person and both my husband and I had a great time walking our neighborhood with him. He coaches his kids sports teams and we talked about family, homes, pets and children. He never once spewed a Republican Party line or asked us to do the same. He stood beside us at each door and treated us like people whose opinions matter and he has earned my vote. And he thanked us for helping multiple times.

[Patty]

Mr. Yates,

Let's change the subject to something we can work together on. My family will be attending Super Saturday and I hope yours will as well. If you need the contact person for your local victory office, let me know and I will post it for you.

Super Saturday August 4^th – Get involved and make a difference!

Please join my family this Saturday August 4th. My husband and I are having so much fun making calls and talking to our neighbors! People are so excited about November!! And I have even lost 10 pounds walking!

Election Day is now less than 100 days away and every moment counts as we work toward keeping the House and reclaiming the Senate and the White House. What can you do to help?

This Saturday, August 4th, join Americans around the country for Super Saturday. Join us as we knock on doors and make phone calls to ensure a victory for Mitt Romney and our Republican team. Every conversation counts.

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Every little bit helps, and with your help and the support of your family, friends and neighbors, we will be able to keep this momentum going.