The new Democratic leadership has officially taken control of Congress and the big headlines, other than whether Hillary Rodham Clinton or Barack Hussein Obama will top the Democratic presidential ticket in ’08, is that the first 100 hours of Congress will change the course of American history.
By 100 hours, they really only mean 100 hours when they are actually in chambers during their newly extended four day work week. And by first, they really mean starting next week. So really, instead of saying first 100 hours, they should say, “first month in office including the week we don’t really do anything except talk.”
According to Steny Hoyer’s office (as a side note, I have always really liked Congressman Hoyer in a non-Mark Foley sort of way) there is a calendar of historic congressional actions events happening between the 9th and the 26th of January.
The rundown is like this:
January 9th: Enact 9/11 Commission Recommendations
January 10th: Increase Minimum Wage
January 11th: Allow Stem Cell Research
January 12th: Negotiate for Lower Prescription Drug Prices
January 13th: Saturday
January 14th: Sunday
January 15th: Monday (Doesn’t everybody have Mondays off?)
January 16th: Votes postponed until 6:30pm (to recover from Monday hangovers)
January 17th: Cut Interest Rates on Student Loans
January 18th: Cut Subsidies for Big Oil and Invest in Renewable Energy
January 19th: Votes
January 20th: Saturday
January 21st: Sunday
January 22nd: Monday (You mean to say, You work on Mondays?!)
January 23rd: State of the Union Address (Maybe President Bush will solve this silly problem of working on Mondays)
January 24th: Votes
January 25th and 26th: Republicans Vacation after an exhausting “100 hours”
What is not on the calendar is that immediately afterward, the Pelosi Congress will solve world hunger (food instability), earthquake-proof California, find Osama bin Laden, pay off the national debt, make peace with Iran and North Korea, and still find time to keep declare Mondays a national day of rest for those of us that are not Members of Congress.
Seriously, why do we have to work on Mondays?
Showing posts with label Steny Hoyer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Steny Hoyer. Show all posts
Thursday, January 04, 2007
Thursday, December 07, 2006
All Work and no Pay
In case you haven’t been keeping up with Congressional politics, the Dems are heading out of the gate at full speed. The interesting part is that they aren’t screwing up their lead at all!
First, Steny Hoyer announced that he will expect members of the House to actually show up and work most days. Commonly referred to as the “Tuesday-Thursday Club,” members of the House are known to work approximately 3 days of the week in DC, then leave to spend time with their families, constituents, donors, and lobbyists. What has resulted is a culture in which members don’t actually schedule House meetings often enough to actually accomplish anything. The 109th Congress may go down in history as being one of the laziest in US History.
Hoyer has suggested that the House meet five-days-a-week for the first part of the new session in order to take care of many items that were neglected this year and last. As you might expect, this has caused some buzz. Republicans are claiming that this is a ploy on the part of the Dems to hurt families. In reality, those Republicans are lazy bums that are worried about being over-worked with a (gasp!) 40-hour work week!
Now it looks as if the $3,300 pay raise members expected to start getting next month is in jeopardy. Pelosi and Reid have announced that they intend to block the pay increase, claiming that it is unconscionable to increase their own pay when the national minimum wage continues to be locked at $5.15.
Really though, the Dems are sounding more and more like the fiscal conservatives that I hoped they would. They are hoping to increase the productivity of Congress without raising the already high pay for members. When did the Democrats become responsible?
First, Steny Hoyer announced that he will expect members of the House to actually show up and work most days. Commonly referred to as the “Tuesday-Thursday Club,” members of the House are known to work approximately 3 days of the week in DC, then leave to spend time with their families, constituents, donors, and lobbyists. What has resulted is a culture in which members don’t actually schedule House meetings often enough to actually accomplish anything. The 109th Congress may go down in history as being one of the laziest in US History.
Hoyer has suggested that the House meet five-days-a-week for the first part of the new session in order to take care of many items that were neglected this year and last. As you might expect, this has caused some buzz. Republicans are claiming that this is a ploy on the part of the Dems to hurt families. In reality, those Republicans are lazy bums that are worried about being over-worked with a (gasp!) 40-hour work week!
Now it looks as if the $3,300 pay raise members expected to start getting next month is in jeopardy. Pelosi and Reid have announced that they intend to block the pay increase, claiming that it is unconscionable to increase their own pay when the national minimum wage continues to be locked at $5.15.
Really though, the Dems are sounding more and more like the fiscal conservatives that I hoped they would. They are hoping to increase the productivity of Congress without raising the already high pay for members. When did the Democrats become responsible?
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