What’s up with the US congress nowadays? It seems that they have a new job. That job is establishing committees; what a great idea! I guess one can’t blame them for revisiting this facet of their job, sort of reinventing it, elevating its importance and looking at it as a new job… sort of. After all, they have spent the last few years doing nothing and everybody gets tired of that, don’t they?
They have grown weary of battling this public image of being a ‘do nothing’ congress. So fortunately, one day out of the clear blue someone came up with a brilliant idea. Let’s put an end to this crazy perception by the public of us being a do nothing congress and establish committees one of them must have suggested. Other members in the group must have thought it was a good idea too because that is what they are doing now.
Yeah, that group that was swept into office in 2010 and 2014 is really making things happen. It’s hard to keep track of how many committees they have established, how many investigations they have conducted, what those investigations were conducted on and how long they lasted. I think that it was Rachel Maddow who suggested, tongue-in-cheek, that maybe they should establish a select committee to investigate select committees. I hope that none of these congressmen were watching her show that day because a light bulb might have flashed on inside their heads and we might soon see a select committee to investigate select committees. If that happens, blame Rachel.
On the serious side, I am really tired of hearing about all of these committees that are investigating some group or someone. There are plenty of more serious problems that America is faced with that would keep congress busy for a long time to come if they would start governing instead of trying to figure out what committee they should establish next.
Think about this. Since President Obama was elected Republican leaders have cast doubt on whether he was born in the US and is a ‘legitimate’ President, we have had an elected member of congress yell out ‘you lie’ during the President’s State Of The Union address, had 47 US senators write and sign an open letter to the leaders of Iran warning them not to negotiate with the US President because he might not be able to follow through on his commitments to them, invited Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – against President Obama’s wishes – to speak before a joint session of congress to contradict a foreign policy decision that President Obama made, publicly label President Obama as a weakling compared to Russian President Vladimir Putin and his great strength as a leader, label him time-and-again as a lawless President and threaten to sue him for decisions that he has made and the list goes on. Surely no other US president has endured such disrespect of himself and the office.
Unfortunately, since those who were elected to office in the 2010 and 2014 elections entered congress, it appears that congress’s ability to actually govern has become worse. It also seems that some Republicans have come up with their own definition of the word ‘lawless.’ It seems that their definition is that it is anyone who disagrees with them on any issue.
For example, President Obama has been labeled as lawless for implementing Executive Orders that he has every right to implement as President and the Supreme Court Justices who supported same sex marriage have been labeled as lawless for rendering that majority decision. Some Republican leaders have even encouraged Americans to ignore the Supreme Court’s ruling.
What is happening to us? Why are our lawmakers acting this way instead of working with one another to solve this problem and all of the other pressing problems that we are faced with? What has caused them to decide that they would rather waste America’s time and money establishing politically motivated committees that spend years and large amounts of money on investigations that lead to nowhere? Why do they refuse to govern? Could it be that they just do not know how? That is a scary thought but it appears that this could actually be the case.
If things continue to go the way that they are currently going I hope that voters will come to their senses and begin to clean up this terrible mistake that they made in 2010 and 2014. I hope that after witnessing how this gang of inexperienced, young uninformed politicians have come in and been instrumental in bringing about the demise of top Republican leaders in the House and perhaps focusing on trying to do the same thing to top Republican leaders in the Senate, that voters will put a stop to this nonsense.
What makes the situation even worse is that they have no idea of who they will replace these lost leaders with and how those that replace them will perform in their new positions. Kevin McCarthy is projected to be the new Speaker; have you heard him speak? If you have, what do ya think? If you haven’t, oh well…
Wait; newsflash! In the event that you have not already heard the news, based on an article by The Washington Post’s Mike DeBonis entitled ‘Kevin McCarthy has dropped out of race for House speaker’, Kevin McCarthy is no longer a candidate to replace Speaker John Boehner. As of Thursday, 10/8, every well-known news show and likely most of those that are not so well-known have verified this. Wow! The situation is even worse than I thought; it’s back to square one.
Eulus Dennis