Walden Fields Questions at Bend Town Hall

Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., was busy in Bend Tuesday.

First he appeared at the Bend Rotary Club meeting at The Riverhouse. Walden spoke to Rotarians about the country’s debt, healthcare and on his efforts to get Congress to extend county timber payments.

“We can create 3,100 jobs, $100 million in revenue to the counties if Congress adopts our plan,” Walden said.

By the end of this week, Walden will have been to 15 of the 20 counties he represents, and he says it’s only the first part of April.

“I think we are in six days, nine counties and 29 meetings over 953 miles,” Walden said.

Before the Rotary talk, Walden toured the Bend Broadband data center, called the “Vault,” where we were unfortunately unable to film inside.

Walden serves as chairman for the House Communications and Technology subcommittee.

“Chairing the committee, you have a lot of say of what those federal public policies are,” Walden said. “You can hear first hand what’s working, what’s not, what’s the cutting edge. Clearly we are seeing it here at BendBroadband.”

Walden then headed for the Bend Senior Center for his town hall, answering questions from the audience, such as one about voter fraud.

“I think we all need to be on guard, regardless of party. We all want to know the outcome, and we believe in it,” Walden said.

While Walden says the economy seems to be improving somewhat, if there was one thing he wanted to get across to Central Oregonians Tuesday, it was this:

“This country is coming back. This community is coming back. Central Oregon is going to come back and be strong again,” Walden said.

Of course, jobs and the economy were major issues that Walden addressed to the town hall crowd of about 100 people. But he also was asked about a variety of topics at the town hall, such as whether he supports Rush Limbaugh’s recent remarks.

The very first question was whether Walden would sponsor or vote for an amendment to overturn the Citizens United U.S. Supreme Court ruling, which allowed the growth of corporate-sponsored Super-PACs that can donate an unlimited amount to candidates and are having a big impact on the GOP presidential primaries, and no doubt will in the fall election as well.

Would he back a move to change that through new legislation?

“I’m really cautious about trying to amend the First Amendment, which is what this would do,” Walden said.

As for the impact on the campaigns, he said, “It’s intriguing to me that some people have written enormous checks to help some candidates who have frequently flopped.”.

Walden was referring to former House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s campaign (Walden endorsed Mitt Romney several months ago).

Another questioner asked about Walden’s current take on a possible war with Iran.

“Our men and women in uniform get put in places to try and stop genocide, try to stop annihilation of populations,” Walden said.

Walden said while we can argue about how much nation-building America should be doing, “We’ve got a lot of nation-building to do here” at home.

But the congressman said a nuclear armed Iran is one of the threats that we have to worry about.

Another question that got a lot of attention was Walden’s view on conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh’s controversial remarks about a woman discussing birth control.

Walden noted that he and his wife were in the radio business for 22 years and had a morning talk show.

“I would not have tolerated a host of my talk show saying about an individual what Mr.Limbaugh said — I just wouldn’t,” Walden said. “I’ve said that publicly. I say it here. I don’t think it’s appropriate. But I also don’t think its appropriate what some of the liberal talk show hosts have said.”

Walden wraps up his three-day Central Oregon visit with a Jefferson County town hall at 9:30 a.m. Wednesday at Great Earth Natural Foods in Madras.