Effective Leadership! (Sarcasm intended)

The voters spoke for Congress to get something done! I'm sure that going forward we are going to see a tremendous amount getting down and dirty to get things accomplished! I'm sure that those that were re-elected will start during the lame duck session to really show voters that we elected the right people for the Senate and House of Representatives!

I'm sure that the big things that are on the peoples' minds will be the first priority. I'm sure that tax cuts will be addressed immediately. Job's and unemployment benefits will be addressed immediately. After all, there is only 2 weeks left in this session of Congress and we need to get right to work. I'm sure the leadership will want to start on day one with an agenda and an inspirational speech to pump up our Senators to get things done quickly!! GO TEAM!!

All the attention is on Harry Reid to set the tone for this, perhaps, the most important lame-duck session of Congress in decades. Will it be agenda setting? Will it be a message of bipartisanship and Senatorial work ethic? I know it will! After all, this race for Harry was a little too close for comfort, and he won only because his opponent was less than formidable. Surely Harry got the message!

Sorry, Nevada voters. The big opportunity to change things up has gone to hell and your native son has screwed you (and the rest of us) over yet again. Harry's six minute snoozer to start arguably one of the most important lame-duck Senatorial sessions in decades was to waste the peoples' time talking about a football rivalry between Boise State and Nevada. I guess once you've secured another 6 year term in the Senate, your sense of urgency on behalf of the people is minimized. Sharon Angle, at least wouldn't be setting the agenda for Upper House of Congress.

This is just an example of the fundamental problem with the leadership in Congress. A problem that is too abstract for the voters to actually be able to address. Only our elected officials can really fix it, yet they refuse to go against the power structure. Why is it that just because a member has been in Congress has been in office the longest (and perhaps has been corrupted the most) that he or she should have the most power. Cases in point - Speaker Pelosi, Leader Reid, Leader McConnell, Speaker-Elect Boehner, Hoyer, etc.

None of these people are hearing our voices. Pelosi is governing our country and setting the agenda as if the entire country has the demographics and ideology of San Francisco. As long as the House continues to elect her Speaker or Leader, there is no chance that this will ever change. It is nothing more or less than cowardice in the ranks of the Democratic House Members. The lone standout was the bravery of Congressman Schuler.

Another example is Steny Hoyer. Congressman Hoyer is completely out of touch and is now advocating to reduce the pay for our fighting men and women in the armed forces. He obviously can't tell the difference between overpaid federal bureaucrats and the brave men and women putting themselves in harms way. Dear Mr. Congressman - you can freeze federal employee pay raises without freezing the men and women's raises that are dying for us overseas. WAKE UP!

Mitch McConnell, Republican Minority Leader in the Senate, who is not able to articulate any argument and continues to give fodder to the far left by stating his only goal is to make sure that President Obama is defeated in 2012. Sounds like a partisan hack who is unable to work across the aisle for the American Peoples' goals. WAKE UP! Your number one goal is the economy and jobs! Did the election mean nothing to you, either?

What could have been a great start to a historic Congress is what we hoped it would not become - a quagmire led by incompetence on both sides of the aisle.

mR

Here's a 2 min clip of the 6 minute speech. At least with Sharon Angle, this could have been entertaining. Wake me up when this is over. On second thought, wake me up in 2012.

Photos courtesy of AP, Alex Brandon and Manuel Balce Ceneta

YouTube Video courtesy of Harry Reid, US Senator for Nevada

No Mandate on the Left, No Mandate on the Right

I thought this would be a good moment to interject an Almost Average American’s perspective into the current game of politics. I thought someone needed to inject some clarity into what the election of Scott Brown (photo: AP) in Massachusetts actually means. I’ve seen Democrats dismissing how huge the election of a non-liberal is in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and Nancy Pelosi (photo: AP) is still promising business as usual. What they don’t realize that their “lock -n-step” army has deserted them. The people get it, but those in power do not.

I hear Mitch McConnell and the rest of the Republicans taking credit for Brown’s win as if it was some brilliant political strategy and that they have now awakened the liberal voters of Massachusetts into believing the conservative ideology of the Republican Party. Hallelujah, there has been a mass conversion in the Bay State! They have almost convinced themselves that it was their incredible ideals and stand-up performance that lead to the electorate in the Massachusetts to suddenly change their mind and support the Republican party. Again, those in power are misreading the voters’ motives.

How sorry all of them are going to be in the fall. The complete disdain that is being demonstrated by the people of Massachusetts is not with Obama, it is not with the Democrats. Nor is it an awakening of biblical proportions to the ideology of the party of the religious right. The people of Massachusetts, as it is in the rest of the nation, is disgusted with the establishment of Washington, DC regardless of ideology. The closed door deal making, the bribing of the Senators from Nebraska and Louisiana, the special interest of Organized Labor as well as the Rx and Insurance lobbies have collectively turned the voters stomach. The disgust is not just with the Democrats, it is with any establishment regardless of party affiliation.

The death blow to the Democratic candidate wasn’t the elitism of Coakly, it was her promise to be a faithful Democratic soldier in the Washington game. It wasn’t the down to earth, truck driving, good ole boy, Scott Brown that won the election. It was simply that he wasn’t part of the establishment. The voters learned that lesson over the last year when a “change” or establishment candidate promised he was above it all and has miserably failed to deliver on anything.

This has been caused because the Democrats have overplayed what they thought was a mandate. It turned out to be a vote for change from the political machine of the Bush years. It has turned into a change to the bigger political machine of the Chicago based Obama machine.

The Democrats have ruined their chances for a successful 2010 election cycle. If the Republicans refuse to learn from this, 2010 may be the year for the Independent. The nation is sick and tired of being told what it needs. Congress, and the president may find out what we need is something, anything, but what is currently in Washington.