Fishing her entire life, and going with the “Fish, Family, Freedom” motto on her campaign, Rep. Mary Peltola still hasn’t figured out how to hold the rod and reel.
In doing it all wrong, maybe she’s actually saving fish, because she sure isn’t catching them using the “upside down” fishing technique.
After being gone from Alaska for weeks, Peltola hurried back to the state Monday and quickly posted social media photos of herself on the banks of a stream, fishing with some women friends, as if she has been here all along.
But she was holding the rod and reel upside down, a classic rookie mistake.
Her trip to Silver Salmon Creek in Lake Clark was filled with late-night card-playing, beading, and hanging around with some women friends and her ever-present campaign manager Anton McParland, resulting in photos he put into the social media universe.
The other fishing mistake Rep. Peltola made is she kept her distance from the stream she was casting into. Normally, a fisher gets as close to the water as possible, but she is standing back.
What is extraordinary is that no one on Peltola’s staff — her photographer and her campaign manager, included — saw that she was doing it wrong. They were not experienced enough to spot the mistake.
Her faux pas didn’t go unnoticed by the public. On Facebook, one reader wrote: “Who stands that far away from the waters edge when fishing, and holds a spinning reel upside down? Answer, a democrat politician who has never fished before, and is just out for a photo op to appear to be what she’s not.”
Another wrote, “You’re holding your rod upside-down!” Someone wrote, “How embarrassing that an Alaskan can’t even hold a dam fishing rod.”
We found a tutorial on the proper handling of rod and reel, which is something that her non-Alaskan campaign manager may wish to review:
