Congress in race for worst ever

[babylonsister]

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8605

December 10th, 2006 10:31 am
Congress in race for worst ever

By Scott Shepard / Cox News Service

snip//

"The 109th Congress vies for the title of the all-time worst Congress," said Thomas Mann, a political analyst at the Brookings Institution and co-author of "The Broken Branch" with Ornstein. Mann's indictment of the 109th includes these charges: "It spent little time in session, it failed to pass budget resolutions and appropriations bills, there was no serious oversight of the disaster in Iraq, there were no major substantive policy achievements and corrupt members were forced from Congress."

The 109th Congress left undone nine of the 11 annual appropriations bills required to fund government agencies, adopting "continuing resolutions" instead to keep funding at current levels until the 110th Congress can address the funding requirements in January. Such resolutions are unusual when control of Congress is changing hands.

The 109th Congress also failed to act on a comprehensive immigration reform bill that President Bush and a bipartisan majority of senators supported. It also refused to enact sweeping ethics reforms even after the resignations of House Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Texas and Republican Reps. Randy "Duke" Cunningham of San Diego, Bob Ney of Ohio and Mark Foley of Florida.

Overhauling the Social Security federal pension program to include private investment accounts, which was the president's top domestic priority when the 109th Congress convened in January 2005, never got off the ground.

And the 109th never fully addressed the controversial warrantless domestic wiretapping program the president secretly approved in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Perhaps the biggest shortcoming of the Congress, said one of its former members, was its failure to provide oversight to the ongoing war in Iraq, where 2,900 U.S. troops have died, 22,000 have been wounded and the price to taxpayers has topped $400 billion.

snip//

[LiberalFighter]

1. And who controlled both Senate & House??? REPUBLICANS

[tridim]

2. The 108th and 107th weren't any better

This article should have been written in 2002.

[Crap_in_a_Hat]

3. Reminds me of this

Just sayin'.

[Printer70]

4. Tuesday at 4 PM to Thursday noon

This was their schedule. They worked one and a half days a week. I guess all the problems in the US have been solved, so they didn't need to show up.

[IWantPeace]

5. They were the worst ever

but now is our opportunity to turn things around. We must hold our Democratic Congress' feet to the fire. We must force them to act in our behalf and impeach the criminals that have been destroying our country.

If we allow the Democratic Congress to let Bush off the hook, the Republicans will be happy to blame US for the state of the country and then take over again 2008.
I agree with David Swanson...
"When the Democrats held back from impeachment during Iran Contra, they lost the next elections. And many of the people they failed to go after came back in the form of the Bush Jr. Administration to make life hell for the Democrats and the rest of us. When the Democrats led the effort to investigate and impeach Nixon, they won big in the next election"

[vireo]

6. DU today's CSPAN poll

http://www.capitalnews.org/

[proud2BlibKansan]

7. It's tied!

42% A

42% F

[bobthedrummer]

8. They merely retain the title and form of Congress-they have been

directed/corrupted/silenced by their BFEE masters--not the people.

That's worth fighting about.

All power to the people.

[bigtree]

9. they stand alone in this