Congress Sinks Into The Quagmire Of Unpopularity
And No One Has An Exit Strategy
By Pejman Yousefzadeh Posted in Democrats | Featured Stories — Comments (4) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
When the 110th Congress came storming into the American political scene, it appeared to be a worldbeater of sorts. At long last, 12 years of corrupt Republican rule had been swept away! We had the first female Speaker and a Majority Leader who got one of the Smothers Brothers to portray him on Casino. ('Tis true!) Surely, things were going to be different and this Congress was going to fulfill the hopes and wishes of all those who voted for it.
Eh . . . not so much:
Just 14% of Americans have a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in Congress.
This 14% Congressional confidence rating is the all-time low for this measure, which Gallup initiated in 1973. The previous low point for Congress was 18% at several points in the period of time 1991 to 1994.
Congress is now nestled at the bottom of the list of Gallup's annual Confidence in Institutions rankings, along with HMOs. Just 15% of Americans have a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in HMOs. (By way of contrast, 69% of Americans have a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in the military, which tops the list. More on this at galluppoll.com on Thursday).
Read on . . .
Now, of course, the major reason behind this drop in popularity probably has to do with the 110th Congress's failure to short-circuit the reconstruction effort in Iraq. This angered the Democratic base and caused it to turn against the very Congress that it had elected. But as I have argued in the past, the current Congressional unpopularity also has largely to do with the fact that Congress just has not governed all that well. Maybe it was just a failure to live up to all of the hype associated with the 110th Congress, but at the end of the day, their legislative accomplishments--even in the midst of the famous "100 hours"--weren't all that impressive to begin with.
And so now, it's a race to the bottom of the poll ratings, with Congress and President Bush seemingly determined to outdo one another in seeking unpopularity. President Bush is probably now used to having his ratings in the cellar. Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, however, must look upon the situation with not a little bit of horror. Surely, they expected that they would be more popular than the President by now. Surely, they expected that their political fortunes would be better than this.
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Who said anything about reconstruction we're talking occupation here? We just want to have a government in Iraq to be in power long enough to sign an oil revenue sharing agreement with big oil. Who cares if they have electricity? Who really cares if we ever fix their schools and hospitals? Somehow I don't see that as a major objective of this policy. Heck Haliburton has already stolen all they can from our treasury. So now they have moved their offices beyond the reach of subpeonas and US. Law enforcement. What we have here is the biggest heist of our treasury in history. There were no tax cuts we just redistributed the overall tax burdon to guess who? Congress is enjoying the lowest approval rating in a very long time and it's not because of Democratic corruption or some FORCACAH earmark dispute. It's because they did not directly challenge this president on his policy for fear of more of that "Why do you hate America?" crap and "You don't support the troops" or " You're a bunch of unpatriotic traitors " horsecrap!!! the Dems are trying to save their lives. How much do you think these guys can take.
In Nam! we always worried about ambush all the time it was in the back of your mind constantly. The tour then was 13 months with a lot of R&R then you were out of it. Now we stretch that to 15 months and are looking at 18 months and then home for a few weeks and back again 2, 3 or even 4 times. In Nam we could tell you to the day when we were retuning to the world. I can remember 38 days and a wakeup, 37 days and wakeup, 36 days and a wakeup at least we knew when we were leaving if we didn't get shot. Trust me you all don't even know stress like this we just worry about keeping our jobs they worry about staying alive. This is stress on steroids, urban warfare is just awful there's to much higher ground around you. These guys are in serious trouble. Nothing to show for it either just like Nam take a hill give it back take it again give it back. But Haliburton and the like have done very well.
First:
Quasi unhinged comments like this will make your stay here rather short. Maybe 30 minutes - I'll take the under.
Second:
"We just want to have a government in Iraq to be in power long enough to sign an oil revenue sharing agreement with big oil."
If that was our objective all along (which it wasn't), why wouldn't we have just installed a hand puppet, re-armed the military so he was safe, and then sign an oil deal? Or why didn't we just round everyone up, shoot the young males, put everyone else in internments camps and start pumping the oil? Gah! What a worthless comment.
Third:
"What we have here is the biggest heist of our treasury in history."
No. That would be the "IOU" system for the Social Security surplus that has been in place for 20+ years. You, me and every American has been over paying SS taxes and the surplus has been spent via earmarks and pork. But we have a stack of IOUs from congressmen who are long dead. That's a much, much bigger crime, or "heist" if you will.
Fourth:
"There were no tax cuts we just redistributed the overall tax burdon to guess who"
My wife is a CPA. I can promise you, you got a tax cut. So did my dad. So did I. So did the vast majority of Americans. You are dead wrong on this one.
Fifth and final:
"In Nam!"
This war isn't Nam. Just like the Vietnam war wasn't like "In Korea!" and the Korean war wasn't like "In WWII!". Get over it.
The Fuzzy Puppy of the VRWC. I've been usurped!
This is good news - bad news. Good news of course that incumbents are not safe in the next go round giving GOP perhaps some solace to win back control. However, I suspect that Americans are not necessarily excited about GOP in congress who continue to push through crap like the immigration legislation.