Billy Kennedy for Congress

Background:

Billy Kennedy is the host of WATA-AM’s call-in show, “Watauga Talks.” He’s also the son of a minister, and later mayor of Black Mountain, NC; a farmer; a father; a carpenter; and is active in community service.

Kennedy was born to Will and Frances Kennedy in 1957 in Richmond, Virginia. He started school in Richmond, and when he was 12 years old, his father was called to Switzerland to serve the church.

Kennedy finished high school overseas and returned to the states as a freshman at Southwestern at Memphis (now Rhodes College), and graduated with a double major in International Studies and Foreign Languages.

Following college in Tennessee, in 1980 Kennedy moved to western Watauga County. Billy became skilled at carpentry; worked as a maintenance man and furniture-maker; owned his own home remodeling business. He remodeled and updated an existing 110-year-old farmhouse on his property, and later built a new home for his family. He began raising livestock in 2000.

Kennedy has become increasingly involved in his community since he began co-hosting the radio show. For the last three years, Billy’s show has featured guests from community groups as well as visits from elected officials and candidates for office. He knows the issues important to working people and he is ready to tackle our country’s greatest problems.

Billy is married to Rebecca (“Becka”) Saunders. They have three children: Amber Grace; Jessica; and “Willis”.

Goals:

Ever since 9th Grade civics, we’ve all known the way Washington is supposed to work. We elect representatives who go to Congress to pass laws for the good of the citizens. But as adults, we’ve all learned why things have gone terribly wrong and aren’t working.

Washington isn't working, and, as a result, neither are Americans.

Partisan bickering, Wall Street bailouts, and the people who were elected to do the people’s business are spending their time, instead, hobnobbing with wealthy CEOs and paid lobbyists while trading our futures for campaign contributions. This is a major reason why Washington was unable to get a much-needed health care bill passed in spite of the fact Democrats have a President in the White House and strong majorities in both the House and the Senate.

The same people who give politicians millions of dollars in "campaign contributions" are the very folks Congress is supposed to be keeping an eye on so they don’t continue to steal the country blind!

Washington isn’t working because people there are greedy. They’ve forgotten what real Americans learn every day of our working lives ~that we expect real value for the money we pay. So we’re paying taxes, and not getting value back for our dollar. Instead of working on real reform in banking or health care or farm policy, Congress wastes time debating toothless laws, written by lobbyists, for the very industries the laws are meant to regulate.

I believe we must replace the culture of corruption in Washington with a renewed culture of service.

I’ve worked all my life. I haven’t spent time rubbing elbows with celebrities and paid lobbyists, and I don’t intend to start now. This country has real problems that affect my family and my neighbors’ families, and I want to go to Washington to work on real solutions.

Issues:

(1) Corporate welfare and corporate interests are being placed above the interests of the people of the 5th district and the interests of all Americans. Washington voted for free-trade agreements that sent American jobs overseas, and then politicians gave those same corporations tax-breaks to sell us the very products we used to make. My opponent has voted for those free-trade agreements and votes consistently for corporate welfare for the largest businesses in America while small businesses and working people continue to struggle with no help from Washington.

(2) As a small businessman, I remember when small and mid-size businesses had a fighting chance in our economy. Big banks and large corporations have gotten record bailouts paid for by taxpayers, yet there is no help for working people and small businesses. Unemployment is at record highs, our debt is growing bigger & bigger, and the lack of good health care reform is dragging down both individual Americans and small businesses. It used to be Americans would go to work because they had a career and a chance at hope for the future for themselves and their children. Now all we have are hourly jobs or no job at all. My opponent won’t extend a helping hand to out-of-work people in the 5th district, and she votes with big banks, which have taken advantage of us and have taken more money from our pockets.

(3) I remember when Education was a priority in America. Public education has made America strong, but as we continue to send jobs overseas, our government has failed to equip Americans with adequate education to replace those jobs. Our current representative says “government has no place in education” even though she came to our state from New York and took advantage of one the best public education systems in the world. She has made her living off our tax dollars and education system ever since. Now she votes against education reform and she wants to deny the very same access she had to other North Carolina families of the 5th district and nationwide.

Grassroots Support:

(1) My campaign is taking serious advantage of social networking. We work with Facebook, twitter, a text campaign, myspace and YouTube. We believe this allows more people to become involved at all levels.

(2) We realize social networking is not enough to reach as many people as possible in the 5th District. We have both professional and volunteer staff and plan careful targeting for boots-on-the-ground canvassing in targeted precincts/communities.

DFA Values:

The American way of life is under attack by Washington lobbyists and selfish politicians who are not looking out for working people. We need representation in Washington that looks out for us and not just the privileged few. The Democratic Party I belong to and know is supposed to be the Party of the People. If the last year in Washington is any indication, our Party has lost its way, and it takes those of us who still believe in the Democratic Party of the People to stand up and fight for what we know is right. If that means starting at the bottom and advancing step by step to bring true American values back to Washington, then that is where we must start. I'm game, and so is my campaign.

I am running for Congress because I’m sick of “business as usual” in Washington. My opponent has been a politician for 27 years, and is part of the problem. We need accountability in Washington and in Western North Carolina. We need people not only with integrity, but also the right priorities—priorities that promote American values over greedy corporate values—priorities that promote truthfulness and not shameless grandstanding.

I am running for Congress because the answers to these problems are simple: Prioritize American jobs, help small to mid-sized businesses, improve and expand education, get smart about defeating terrorists, and focus on improving our quality of life.

It is time to bring American values back to Washington, and that movement starts here in Western North Carolina.