Say, did you hear the one about the congressman who was asked to do his job? Talk about funny - this will crack you up!
Well, maybe it won’t. But Steny Hoyer thought it was hilarious.
Hoyer, a Maryland Democrat, is the majority leader in the House of Representatives. At a news conference last week, he was talking about the healthcare overhaul being drafted on Capitol Hill, and a reporter asked whether he would support a pledge committing members of Congress to read the bill before voting on it, and to make the full text of the legislation available to the public online for 72 hours before the vote takes place.
That, reported CNSNews, gave Hoyer the giggles: The majority leader “found the idea of the pledge humorous, laughing as he responded to the question. ‘I’m laughing because . . . I don’t know how long this bill is going to be, but it’s going to be a very long bill,’ he said.’’
Much like the Porkulus abortion, the Healthcare Demolition Act will be a very, very long bill. No one, I repeat, no one had time to read the final version of The Porkulus Package before voting. Ditto for the Climate Change Travesty Act of 2009.
Yes, The Teleprompter Jesus has pledged that all legislation will be posted online for a full five days before he signs it. Yes, he has broken that promise at almost every opportunity.
Is there anyone out there who 1) doesn't work for government, or 2) who is not a mainstream media hack, or 3) can read without moving his lips - who has a good reason for continuing to support this den of thieves?
Here's the reason no one has time to read what they're voting for (or against) any longer:
At the last possible minute, Pork is shovled into legislation with draglines, backhoes, front-end loaders, and illegal immigrants with shovels. Our futures are in the hands of Chicago machine politicians who are larding out favors to their buddies as quickly as possible before the citizenry awakes. Since most of the citizenry have been promised that they won't have to pay for any of this mess, the citizenry is going to remain asleep for a long, long time.
I've noticed that a lot of my friends from work, the Tarrant LP, church, guitar pickin's, or elsewhere think that I'm a rabid anti-tax nut.
Not really.
I'm in favor of everyone in the U.S. paying for all of this crap within 20 years.
I think everyone should have to write a check every month, with no witholding by employers.
Graduated scale. Streetpeople pay $1.00 per month. Bill Gates pays up to 50% of his income. Everyone else pays between 35 - 49% until we're out of debt.
If that were to happen, in the words of my friend Stephen Smith, the hardware stores would already be sold out of torches and pitchforks.
WAKE UP !
Picture of the Archie McPhee "Angry Mob Playset" came from here.
6 comments:
Hard as this may be to believe, I'm actually going to agree with several of your points.
1 - Omnibus bills are a bad thing, as are riders, and all matter of last-minute add-ons that sneak shit onto a bill.
2 - People ought to read this stuff before they vote on it.
3 - We ought to pay all of this off in 20 years. I'm delighted you say a progressive tax code is appropriate here.
Things I take some exception to:
Continuous use of the phrase "Chicago Machine politician." Oh please.
As a former resident in the Chicago area, let me say one of the reasons the machine stays in power is that it gets stuff done. Say what you will, it has a pragmatic efficiency - and is self-correcting up to a point. Contrary to what you may think, the Blago comedy is a perfect example of that self-correction (remember, he's gone now).
Compare that to Governor Blow-Dry and his predecessor. They are the real jokes.
The other thing: if I'm concerned with how much I'm paying down the stimulus, I can look at the withholding on my pay stub any time I want to. Add another field (call it whatever) that lists just the stimulus paydown if you feel the need. I'll pay the bill -- I just don't like writing checks.
Dr Ralph,
You say the machine "gets things done" as if that's a good thing.
Also, I think there's a little reminder that goes into effect when you have to write the check. A reminder that elections have consequences, and that we haven't done our part to Face The Music on the latest one yet.
Witholding or not, we're not doing our part to pay for the gigantic mounds of slop that Owebama is ladling out to his supporters. I think it would be a GREAT idea to require instant payment on all wars, bailouts, stimuli, etc. Nobody likes writing checks. Especially when the money is generally going elsewhere.
Perhaps the electronic tax software we all use now could generate a pie chart that shows what we're paying for, with the ability to drill down deeper and deeper into each category.
"What? I paid 0.24 cents for some hippy dance troup's funding? Outrageous!" followed by, "What? I paid $4,124 to The Mercenaries Formerly Known As Blackwater to kill civilians in Iraq...oh wait..."
I think that might actually be more educational in the long run. People could see what they really should be bitching about.
Yeah, but imagine the bickering over how these line items are phrased.
The reason I think it would be just freakin' GREAT if everybody had to write a check every month:
Come tax time, my Dockworker/Truckdriver munchkins start talking about "Are you going to have to pay any?"
The mindset is that the money witheld from the checks isn't real, at least not in the same sense the money in their pockets is real.
I think that if people had to pay for bailouts, schools, overseas adventures, and Algorean Perpetual Motion Machines in the same way they pay for Bic Macs, mortgages, weedeaters and paper towels, we'd be getting a lot less government.
Yeah, but imagine the bickering over how these line items are phrased.
The reason I think it would be just freakin' GREAT if everybody had to write a check every month:
Come tax time, my Dockworker/Truckdriver munchkins start talking about "Are you going to have to pay any?"
The mindset is that the money witheld from the checks isn't real, at least not in the same sense the money in their pockets is real.
I think that if people had to pay for bailouts, schools, overseas adventures, and Algorean Perpetual Motion Machines in the same way they pay for Bic Macs, mortgages, weedeaters and paper towels, we'd be getting a lot less government.
Well, it all comes down to the purpose of the exercise:to roil people up or to educate them?
Simply saying "You have a big fat check to write" with no more explanation succeeds at the former but hardly the latter, unless (as I suspect) you think roiling them up is a lesson successfully taught.
I'm more inclined to inform them as to what they are paying for. People will no doubt bitch about some of the expenditures, but (I predict) everyone will bitch about different things.
Post a Comment