House hopeful Kevin Powell might have a plan, but he doesn’t have a clue, according to the incumbent Rep. Ed Towns.
After The Brooklyn Paper handed Towns a copy of Powell’s 58-page policy primer — titled “The Plan: A New Way for the 21st Century” — the 26-year incumbent dismissed his rival’s vision for the 10th Congressional District as sophomoric and ignorant of Washington’s ins and outs.
“Being in Congress is more than abstract ideas and buzzwords,” Towns said about the document that details the former MTV “Real World” star and community activist’s stances and legislative agenda.
“It’s about measuring the impact of policies over time,” he added. “How you effect change in Washington is grounded and rooted in tangible action steps, consensus building and understanding how government works. If you don’t understand the process, how can you develop a plan?”
Powell released the long-awaited and long-delayed document — which is available for download on his Web site, kevinpowellforcongress.org — on Sept. 5, just five days before Tuesday’s Democratic primary to represent a district that spans from Brooklyn Heights and DUMBO, through Fort Greene and Clinton Hill and into East New York.
And the Towns campaign wasted little time before deeming Powell’s ambitious document naïve.
“This is something that a freshmen member [of Congress] would do,” said Towns spokeswoman Lupe Todd. “His ideas are so grandiose and he’s not expressing any way to do them. It is idealism — at some point you have to take off your rose colored glasses and become a realist.”
As reported in The Brooklyn Paper over the weekend, Powell’s “Plan” calls for repealing the Patriot Act, President Bush’s signature “No Child Left Behind” act, and the Rockefeller Drug Laws; drafting a bill shortening the credit reporting terms for individuals affected by the subprime mortgage crises; creating incentives to keep students in school such as paid internship programs that would provide experience, college credit and cash; and crafting a city-wide resource guide detailing all of the social service programs available to constituents, among other things.
The policy outline also makes explicit Powell’s stance against the Iraq War, and his dedication to abortion rights and the creation of a universal single-payer healthcare system.
Two days after Powell gave voters some heavy reading, Towns, 74, struck back by assembling a who’s who of influential Dems to sing his praises at his home church, Berean Missionary Baptist Church on Bergen Street in Bedford-Stuyvesant.
Reps. Yvette Clark (D–Park Slope), Anthony Weiner (D–Sheepshead Bay), Charles Rangel (D–Manhattan), Maxine Waters (D–California), and G.K. Butterfield (D–North Carolina), joined Assemblyman Darryl Towns (D–Bushwick), Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries (D–Prospect Heights) and Comptroller Bill Thompson for the ecumenical service urging some 150 worshippers to vote for Towns on Sept. 9.
Just before his merger of church and state, Towns said he wasn’t stressed about the primary.
“We feel really comfortable — everything is going to be all right,” he said.
