Mr. Coyne Goes Back to Paris

Finally, Overseas Americans Week is over and Mr. Coyne is going back to Paris.

I think that we had a very successful week, although we’ll know for certain in coming weeks and months as we see how many new Caucus members we have and how much support we get on our voting and tax legislation. Keep your collective fingers crossed. Seven million people have a lot of fingers to cross, but don’t forget to do your part.

Overseas Americans Week is always an uphill battle (please don't miss my puns, folks; up-Hill, get it?) because even though we are 7 million strong our issues are not at the top of the national agenda. We have to be here every year making our presence felt and our voices heard just to stay as far from the bottom as we can.

In so doing, we are contending with an unimaginably long list of competing interests. When I was in Alexandria writing my talking points at the Hard Times Café last Sunday, I got a good laugh on my way back to the King Street Metro station when I passed by the offices of the National Stone, Sand and Gravel Association (its friends call it the “NSSGA” for short; I'm serious). When I saw that, it hit me that there’s a lobbying group for everything. Now that I have spent another week on the Hill crossing paths all day with hundreds of other such groups, it’s actually a wonder that the people behind stone, sand and gravel were able to heal whatever wounds and friction there may be among their three different industries (stone-throwing, if you will) and join forces to enter heated political battle against the forces of evil representing, say, paper and scissors (in the eternal clash among paper, rock and scissors) or, perhaps, the unholy forces of asphalt, cement and that snootiest of all building materials, marble. Then in the midst of this ongoing melee we the overseas Americans enter the fray. Even with the likes of cutthroat, arm-twisting lobbyists like Mary Adair Johnson, it’s an uphill battle to be heard.


And even when we can get in there and be heard, sometimes we’re not even sure what people on the Hill are talking to us about. But we learn on the fly, picking up the lingo as we go. Even the aforementioned chimp-level staffers know the terms we have to master to be effective. Say NSSGA, UOCOVA, HAVA, RHOB, CHOB, LHOB, TIPRA, GAO, CRS, JCT, OMB, and JEC five times quickly, tell me what they mean and you’re ready to sound just slightly less informed than the chimp-level staffers.

Sometimes the attention of the Hill is even focused into the distance out into the wider world, like down the street where the Pope was in town visiting with the President (I just watched his St. Patrick’s Cathedral service, after which he was escorted out of the cathedral by over-protective guards shoving dozens of tenacious nuns back into the crowd to keep them from touching the pontiff a yard away; I don’t know if those guys were NYPD, but they should be gentler with the nuns!). During the time that we were in Washington, there were also World Bank meetings, an earthquake in Illinois of all places and an endless list of other issues and events on the television. Is it any wonder that we’re not in the papers all that often?

And yet we are at least occasionally on the radar. We were in the Wall Street Journal just before OAW began and then had several members of the press at our reception on Wednesday, which may at some point lead to some interesting and helpful coverage for us and our issues.

It’s too soon to say how well this week went, but it certainly feels as though we accomplished a lot. Instead of meeting with fifty or so offices as usually, we made our way into an unfathomable number of offices—all told it was about 250 offices. Even if only 10% of those offices find us more interesting than the National Stone, Sand and Gravel Association and decide to help us out, then this was all worth it.

I have had a great week working with the rest of the OAW delegation. Joining me from AARO were our president Kathleen de Carbuccia, the dynamic duo Don and Mary Adair Johnson, James Kigin (to whom I owe a special thanks for his photos that I have included in this blog), Barbara Stern, Margaret Lebreton, Mark Habeeb (providing local lobbying assistance, advice and coordination), Janet Steinmetzer, and Kathleen Mistry (an AARO member who recently returned to Virginia from Paris and who joined us on Friday). From ACA, we worked with Jackie Bugnion, Gregory Smith (who prepared a great deal of documentation for OAW) and Berengere Parmly. From FAWCO, we had their president Celeste Brown, Lucy Laederich (FAWCO’s US Liaison, a title that means that she has the distinction of carrying around Cheez-Its in her purse for our general consumption), Eric Way (my roommate at the illustrious Hotel Harrington, Washington’s premier roach motel; catch your own rats in the dining room and get a discount on dinner!), Dale Koepenick, Michelle Miller, and Mary Stewart Burgher. Also joining us was Paula Lucas, who is working hard on issues affecting American women overseas who are subjected to domestic abuse; this was her first time working with us. We also of course worked with Susan Suinat and others from the Overseas Vote Foundation on the voting issue. I also have to send a very special thanks to AARO Office Manager Alice Grevet, AARO Intern Brittany Healey, Grace Teshima and Dianne Henning for all that they did on scheduling, technical assistance and other coordination from Paris to make all of this possible.

Signing off from Washington. It’s time for Mr. Coyne to go back to Paris.