Congressional Vacationers
It is almost impossible not to be cynical when we think of or hear about Congress, the club with 535 members in the Legislative branch of the United States Government. Over the past months we have been very critical of Congress and we believe rightfully so. Their level of achievements compared to their 2006 campaign promises has been rather pitiful. During the mid-term elections during the fall nearly two years ago, the Democrats promised change and argued successfully that ‘it was time for a change’ and convinced enough ‘fence-sitting’ moderates and so called independents to vote for them and therewith give them a chance at running Congress as we all know.
In retrospect, the most significant change we got was the first ever-female Speaker of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi. Her promises of change: Openness in governance, bi-partisanship, ending the Iraq war in short order including the start of immediate troop withdrawal and so on were exactly that: Promises and we have to say, she has not kept any of those promises! This Congress has achieved so far (and it is almost over) nothing of significance and it is reflected in the low approval ratings of Congress, ranging from 9 to 17 percent and that is half of the low approval ratings President Bush ‘enjoys’.
Congress has so far passed the lowest number of laws when compared to most other previous Congresses. As a point of interest, more than a quarter of the laws dealt with the naming of Post offices around the country. Since Ms. Pelosi is representing a very liberal district in San Francisco and does not have to fear not being re-elected time and again by her constituents, she has shown almost dictatorial traits when she makes decisions single-handedly as to what gets voted on and what does not.
The most recent example of showing her power was her decision to adjourn Congress in early August for a five-week vacation in spite of strong opposition by the American public who had clearly stated in numerous polls that they wanted some Congressional action on removing the moratorium on offshore drilling to increase domestic oil production. The Republicans wanted to have that chance to vote but Ms. Nancy did not allow such a vote and proceeded with the five week long summer recess. When some Republicans stayed on in Congress for several weeks to protest the Speaker’s decision, it received very little notice in the media to no ones surprise knowing the liberal bias by America’s media.
Congress will now reconvene on September 8 or 9 and will have its work cut out for itself in that the 2008/2009 budget packages will have to be voted on aside running for re-election in early November, we are talking about all 435 member of the House of Representatives and about 25 Senators. We doubt very much that any meaningful legislation will be dealt with, let alone voted on, when it comes to an energy packages that will among other things allow limited offshore oil drilling. We here at Common Sense Politics firmly believe that this Congress will live up to its well-deserved reputation of being a do-little two-year Congress and we are being generous when we call it do-little.
Now then, what are our proposals for this situation; there is among the many things, we, the American voters could do that would change things effectively only one truly viable option: When voters in any given district are honest and evaluate its Congressperson’s record and find it not satisfactorily based on true achievement, simply vote them out of office! In reality, the major reasons for re-election of Congress members is the ‘pork’ they bring home each year and not what they do for America as a country and of course also partisanship. As we know, there are many people who will only vote for one party all their lives whatever their reason and that is a reality we will never overcome.
Another possibility is to give Congress longer vacations. Why should we have Congress in session for over forty weeks every year when they do so little in all that time? Why not cut that number in half? It makes no sense to have them in D.C. for forty weeks, besides, looking at it from the other side of the spectrum: The less time they spent in Washington D.C., the less damage they do to our country and our constitutionally guaranteed liberties and freedoms!
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