Peter Welch made his debut as a Congressman on VPR's Switchboard program last night, and wouldn't you know it: A caller to the program brought up the business about his smiling exchange with President Bush on the floor of the House last week after the State of the Union speech.

The exchange has been bandied about on Vermont political blogs, including this one, ever since. Some think the incident is proof Welch will bend to the ways of Washington instead of sticking to his principles; others think it shows he knows how to put aside partisanship and get along with with political opponents when the occasion arises.

Here's a shortened version of the Switchboard exchange:

MICHAEL, FROM WORCESTER: To see you basically reduced to a schoolboy cheerleader, clamoring to get his autograph and slap his back and then, to add insult to injury, to not see you show up at the peace rallies in Montpelier, not show up at the peace rallies in Washington D.C. last Saturday, and worse, not put your name on important pieces of legislation ... which offer specific targets in reduction of troops and truly oppose President Bush."

CONGRESSMAN WELCH: My voting record so far is very clear. I've voted on all of the legislation that's been in direct conflict with the Bush positions ... I've also joined with the many other members of Congress who are opposed to the war and are taking concrete steps to try to bring that war to an end.
On the question of President Bush, the first time I net him was at the Congressional orientation... I had a chance to interact with him as the rest of us did ... I asked him about Vermont farmers and could he help and then he asked me about a friend of his who lives in Burlington and who is somebody he when to high school and college with, Jack Sartore. He asked if I would call him and say hello, which I did. And it was President Bush, when he was leaving after the state of the uinion, he saw me -- the man has a memory -- and he asked me if I had called Jack Sartore and I said I had... and he asked me if I would let him know he was asking about him again at the State of the Union and so I did that.

So does any of this change your view of Welch, or what you think of his exchange with the Prez that night? One final note, the video of the exchange does not show that Welch slapped the back of the president during their chat. It was actually the other way around.

-- Sam Hemingway