McGrath's farm ties rankle some

Politicians tend to wax poetic in their television ads, making claims that may not entirely hold up to scrutiny. We ran a story a couple of weeks ago about a Bill Owens ad that painted his opponent, Matt Dohey, with a wash that wouldn’t stick.

Now, Democrat Brian McGrath, the young Lowville native seeking election to the 122nd District Assembly seat being vacated by DeeDee Scozzafava, is coming under some fire in his home county for an ad that tells people he grew up on a farm as a way to show he understands rural issues. For some people in Lewis County, especially in the ag community, this has become a sharp burr under the saddle. They say that young McGrath’s father is an electrician and a Surge dealer, and that his exposure to farming, at least as they know it, was minimal at best.

I asked Brian McGrath about this, and he sent me back an e-mail that said that in his early years, his family lived on a former dairy farm and raised heifers and pigs and harvested hay to sell to the neighboring farms. “This farm business provided much needed cash for our cash strapped family,” he wrote.

And while he admitted he didn’t hook any cows up to Surge machines on his own farm, he said he was never far from agriculture — a statement that is true for anyone in the north country. “Though we left that business as I grew older,” he wrote, “ I continued to learn about and stay connected to the dairy business from our friends and through our dairy installation and service business.”

And from my own experience, growing up in a county whose largest industry was agriculture, and graduating in a class of 30 that included six sons and daughters of farmers, I know that you cannot be unaware of the successes and travails of the ag industry. I learned early how to wash teats and hook up a milking machine when I visited my buddies at their farms. I slung hay, and helped spread, er, manure. If you live in a rural area, it’s hard not to know, at very least, what your farm neighbors are going through.

“The commercial is 100 percent accurate, and I stand behind it completely, including its central theme that we need to turn the north country economy around...” Mr. McGrath wrote in his e-mail.

And while I agree that the north country economy needs some attention, and that understanding agriculture is central to that goal, I do understand where some of Mr. McGrath’s critics are coming from — especially those who are or were dairy farmers, who gave up most vacations and sleeping in and being warm in the winter and cool in the summer to take care of their herds. They don’t really want to hear the term “gentleman farmer” bandied about.

So Brian McGrath would have been better off to emphasize his empathy with the agriculture community, and perhaps downplay his being a part of it. Not everyone can be a Darrel Aubertine, who couldn’t be challenged on a claim that he was and is a farmer. Brian is no Darrel, farm wise. But maybe his critics could ease up a little, and judge him on whether or not they think he’ll carry their interests into the Assembly. If they consider that, and decide he won’t — well, there’s your answer.