Loughlin in a Rat-a-tat-tat

There seemed to be something different about the pacing of Newsmakers, last week, when Rep. John Loughlin was on. The questions came at a rapid-fire-pace. I think John did well, in that environment, although his answer didn't quite address what I would have liked to hear on the (now moot) question of delaying the financial town meeting in Tiverton.

The second segment of the show was instructive, as well. Republicans and Democrats in the public light seem to come from different places — especially, but not only, in Rhode Island. Republicans don't appear to be in it for the career prospects created by the political process in the sense that those prospects were their primary motivation; they're either fed up, unable to watch the world go in what they believe to be the wrong direction, or looking for ways to do something different with their own lives. That's not to say that Republicans don't get caught up in the political game or swept away in fantasies of personal importance, but they seem more apt to answer questions as they're asked rather than mentally flipping through a notebook of talking points. Again: at least among our crew in Rhode Island.

Some might say it's a measure of integrity, others a measure of incompetence. Me, I'd recast "incompetence" as "inexperience" and suggest that politics tends to keep integrity and inexperience in correlation.