The Cuccinelli / Oleszek Letters

August 5

Dear Ms. Oleszek,

A third party brought to my attention your recent ‘open letter’ that was nominally addressed to me, but which you seem to have forgotten to actually send to me. Next time, you can simply contact us through our website at www.Cuccinelli.com or at Ken4Sen@Cuccinelli.com.

With respect to your letter, you seem somewhat confused on all of the issues that you raised, namely, transportation, taxes and the abuser fees. You also seem to have many questions, so, why don’t we have a debate? You can ask all of your questions.

I would propose opening and closing statements of whatever length you want. We’ll flip a coin to see who goes first for the opening statements and that person will also go second at the closing statements (or some other arrangement that you would prefer). Then we can ask each other questions, say, 45 seconds to ask a question, 3 minutes to answer the question, 1 minute for the question asker to comment, and the candidate being asked the question gets to go last for 1 minute (if the question asker does not comment at all, then the answering candidate does not get an additional minute to talk). We’ll just take turns asking each other questions for an hour or two or longer if you like, or we can set a number of questions that we’d ask each other, 5, 10, or whatever you would like. Then we’ll have our closing statements, shake hands and be done.

All we would need is someone to act as the timer to cut each of us off after our allotted time periods for questions, answers, statements, etc.

We can do this on blog radio, we can do this in a venue in the district, or somewhere else. There are plenty of options. I am wide open to your suggestions as to where to hold our first debate.

It has always been my habit to try and talk about issues in a way that conveys useful information to my constituents. A debate where the candidates get to declare, through their questions, what issues are important to them, is one of the best ways to address the important issues that confront the 37th district.

I look forward to hearing from you as to whether you are willing to step up and debate the issues that you have raised in your recent letter.

Sincerely,
Ken Cuccinelli
Virginia State Senator
37th District

August 8

Dear Ms. Oleszek,

As you know, I sent you and your entire campaign staff a letter Sunday night responding to your recent ‘open letter’ to me about transportation, taxes and abuser fees. While we first saw your letter last week when a copy was brought to our attention by a third party, I did eventually (this week) receive a snail mail version of the letter that you sent several days after your copy to the public. In the future, I would appreciate it if you would provide me with the courtesy of being the first recipient of letters that you are sending to me.

In turn, I will be sure that I always send you the first copy of any letter that I am sending to you, even if I also send it to others for public review. Three days ago, when I sent you my letter, you were the first person to whom I sent my letter (along with your campaign staff). I am doing the same thing again tonight.

It has been three days since I invited you to join me and ask your questions in person in a debate, and I have not heard back from you yet. I think my constituents could benefit greatly by a direct and civil exchange of questions, answers, positions and ideas between their candidates for the Virginia State Senate. As you know, there will be some “cattle call” candidate events in the fall, but none of those will allow us much time to dig deeply into such important issues as taxes or transportation, etc.

It would be a great service to the voters of the 37th Senate District to have the benefit of an open exchange between us, perhaps the first of several, and I would appreciate hearing from you via email as to whether you will join me for such a debate in the near future, if ever.

You have in this email both my personal email address and that of my campaign manager, so reaching us is easy. I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Sincerely,
Ken Cuccinelli
Virginia State Senator
37th District

p.s. For your convenience, I have included my original letter below, which was sent to you both via email and via the “contact us” page on your website.

August 9

Mr. Cuccinelli:

Thanks for your email and I’m glad to hear that you received my letter regarding your support of the abusive driver tax. I am sorry there was a delay in your receiving the letter- maybe the Post Office has as much trouble as we do with the transportation mess in Virginia. The transportation problems we all face will be my number one priority in the legislature.

I am a strong believer in debates and appearing in front of community groups to discuss my views. I see a number of those appearances either on my schedule already or in the process of being scheduled. I hope that you are also able to attend them. Additionally, I look forward to participating in a number of events hosted by groups who always sponsor debates and forums. As you know, organizations such as the League of Women Voters traditionally host debates every election season. I’m sure some of these worthy organizations would be disappointed to hear you refer to their events as “cattle calls”.

Again, I am glad you are willing to try to explain your actions and votes in the legislature. Let me suggest that we have our staffs work out the details. Please have a member of your staff contact my Campaign Manager, Jonathan Murray, at jonathan@janetforfairfax.com.

Sincerely,
Janet Oleszek

August 9

Dear Ms. Oleszek,

Your email tonight was somewhat unclear. At first you seemed to emphasize the existence of various events in the fall to avoid agreeing to a debate, but you close by suggesting that our staff “work out the details.” This sounds like you are willing to engage in a debate. Are you willing to engage in a direct debate with me or not?

If you choose to avoid a direct debate and simply rely on the events in the fall, typically with 8 or 10 candidates for a variety of offices at the same event (thus my term “cattle call”), then there will be no opportunity for you and I to ask each other questions directly and there will be very limited (if any) opportunities for in-depth debate on issues. That’s just the nature of the beast when there are 54 offices up in Fairfax County in the same election cycle, with 14 offices on the ballot in each precinct in Fairfax County. If this is the kind of limited exchange that you prefer, then that is lamentable. I believe that the voters of the 37th District deserve better.

While I will have a member of my staff contact your campaign manager, I would still appreciate a direct answer from you – will you agree to a direct debate, i.e., no other candidates, just you and me, where you and I can ask each other questions? Yes or no? I understand that there may be little details to work out, for example, when, where, who is the timer, etc., but I would appreciate a direct answer to my direct question.

I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Sincerely,
Ken Cuccinelli
Virginia State Senate
37th District

August 10

Mr. Cuccinelli:

It again seems you have allowed political posturing to get the best of you by ignoring the text of my email. From my original email:

“Additionally, I look forward to participating in a number of events hosted by groups who always sponsor debates and forums. As you know, organizations such as the League of Women Voters traditionally host debates every election season.”

I think I clearly stated my interest in debating you.

Please have a member of your staff contact my campaign manager to work out the details.

Sincerely,

Janet Oleszek
Candidate for State Senate
37th District of Virginia

August 14

Dear Ms. Oleszek,

As you requested, we contacted your campaign manager last Friday to “work out the details” of a debate between the two of us.

Curiously, he was running out of town for the weekend. He said he’d get back to us on Monday. That did not happen.

So, I am back asking you directly (again): will you engage in a one-on-one debate on the issues addressed in your (now old) open letter of last month? Or will you continue to hide behind the cattle call “debates” (i.e., unchallenged 5 minute speeches), such as the one you referenced in your email of August 10th?

As a side note, I may have an imperfect memory, but I don’t recall the League of Women Voters ever hosting a one-on-one debate (or even a candidate cattle call) in either of my previous elections in the 37th district. But it is interesting that you have chosen an organization that tends to be solidly left-of-center on issues for your model of a forum host. Is there some reason that you and I can’t just ask each other direct questions? Or do you feel some need to be shielded from direct questions? That is certainly the impression that I’m getting.

You stated last week: “I think I clearly stated my interest in debating you.” Yet you made no commitment to anything aside from attending candidate cattle calls, thus, so far, all that I can conclude is that you will only “debate” in a situation where there is virtually no opportunity for us to question each other directly. I hope that I am wrong. If so, please let me know that you will in fact debate me directly, and when whomever you designate as your campaign’s point of contact gets back in town, they can work out the details with us.

Sincerely,
Ken Cuccinelli
Virginia State Senate
37th District