Posted on 10/05/2010 10:41:46 AM PDT by neverdem
The Fired Congress
In December, more than a dozen senators will come back to Washington and decide how much more tax money to take from Americans, without being accountable to any of them.
Some companies have a policy that once someone is fired, they aren’t allowed back on the premises out of fear they might do further damage to the company. It’s too bad Congress doesn’t have the same policy. Because before they’re replaced in January, all of the Democrats who are put out of a job in November will be able to come back and rob the nation blind.
More than a dozen senators will come back to Washington and decide how much more tax money to take from Americans, without being accountable to any of them. Higher taxes, cap-and-trade, amnesty, and card check will be top-priority items for the Fired Congress, otherwise known as the lame-duck Congress. They’re also likely to roll unfinished appropriations bills into a massive, pork-stuffed omnibus to snag every last possible earmark on their way out of Washington.
This must not happen. The only acceptable outcome of the lame-duck session is a continuing resolution to keep government operating at current levels of spending and taxation, as I pushed the Senate to do in 2006 after Republicans lost the majority to the Democrats. No last-minute earmarks, no add-ons, no tax increases, and no big deficit spending.
By simply passing a continuing resolution that kept the government funded at current levels until February 2007, Republicans stopped more than 10,000 earmarks from being enacted and prevented big spenders in Congress from wasting billions of dollars on pork-barrel projects. Then, 2007 became the year without earmarks, because when that temporary continuing resolution expired in February, Congress extended it for the rest of the year. We should adopt the same approach during the 2010 lame-duck session.
To stop a wasteful omnibus and instead secure a continuing resolution, Republicans must hold together. Fortunately, the GOP may have a few reinforcements on the way. Three new senators will take office immediately following the midterms — one each from Delaware, Illinois, and West Virginia, where special elections are being held to replace temporarily appointed senators. And the Republicans running in these races are eager to help.
Illinois Republican Senate candidate Mark Kirk has promised that if he wins, “I will become the 42nd Republican senator, with the opportunity to put the brakes on any lame-duck overreach.”
Delaware Republican candidate Christine O’Donnell has made it part of her pitch, too. “Who do you want serving in that lame-duck session?” she has said. “Someone who’s going to promote that very liberal agenda that can’t even get enough Democratic support, or someone who is going to push back against the establishment?”
West Virginia’s Republican Senate candidate, John Raese, who is up in the polls, has stated unequivocally that he would oppose the Democrats’ lame-duck agenda. He has said, “It is completely inappropriate for House and Senate Democrats, who would be in cahoots with President Obama, to take up any legislation that would significantly affect the country after an election that will considerably alter the political landscape of Congress. Any attempt to do so would be a slap in the face to all Americans who voted for a change from the liberal status quo.”
More candidates should go on the record with such statements. There’s a whole month of campaigning left before the midterms, and voters can extract promises from their elected officials not to let the Fired Congress pass major legislation. This is a reasonable request that even the Democrats should be able to support. Colorado Republican Senate candidate Ken Buck has called on Democratic senator Michael Bennet to promise to oppose any tax hikes Harry Reid may try to ram through during the lame-duck session. All Senate Democrats up for election this year should be asked to do the same.
Getting more elected officials to speak out against a spendthrift lame-duck session can help deter the Democratic leadership from cramming it with votes. It’s been reported that Democrats are considering as many as 20 pieces of legislation to bring up for a vote. After failing to get the New START Treaty (an agreement that hurts America’s missile-defense systems) ratified, to repeal “don’t ask, don’t tell,” and to pass legislation to give amnesty to illegal aliens, Democrats see opportunity after the elections, when a number of their members won’t have anything to lose.
Democrats are also hoping that the pressure of a Christmas deadline will get some Republicans to break their way. White House senior adviser David Axelrod recently said he thinks Republicans will “blink” and help Democrats raise taxes as the end-of-the year deadline approaches. Republicans must not cave.
Democrats are playing political games and Americans are going to fire them for it in November. When the Democrats come back in December to box up their personal belongings, Republicans must make sure that’s all they take with them.
— Jim DeMint is a U.S. senator from South Carolina.
From your lips to the voter’s ears.
God help us, we cannot let them win.
ping
Once they get voted out, THAT'S IT!!
I think even if we clean house this Nov- we will have to do it again at least 2 or 3 more times for the message to get through.
We can never underestimate the arrogance and corruption levels politics requires of its players in this era.
The GOP will do everythign to stop this, but oddly enough, the firewall will be the Dem senators who are up in 2012..no way they vote for any of this stuff..
Maybe Harry Reid or (lame duck) Harry Reid won't be able to count on lock step Democrats in November and December.
In the mean time many raising kids or trying to save for retirement will have dead money for 10 years. Ditto that all those unemployed, and our troops living on a shoe string.
My guess? Their teet is K Street, and if they muck it up for the GOP and try to subvert them, my guess is the Tea Party makes an Issue out of them (K Street) next...
Lave duck Democrats will do everything in their power to sabotage America before they leave. Count on it. These are the same people who graffitied the White House before Bush arrived. This the party that hired Al Franken, Pelosi and Biden to lead our nation. It’s a big joke to them.
Let us make a list of all the RINO’s and Dems for 2012 in the Senate. We start Nov 3rd getting rid of them too...
“Where is Mitch???? - why isn’t he the one taking the lead on this??? “
Mitch is a globalist squish, that’s why. His voting record isn’t that good, but what’s worse is his wife, Elaine Chao , used to be head of the labor dept. and LOVES outsourcing, illegal alien labor...all that ‘we are the world’ crappola.
Jim DeMint BUMP!
As the Framers advised over two hundred years ago, BE FOREVER VIGILANT! Good work DeMint.
We should all do everything in our power to encourage DeMint to really start flexing some political muscle in the next Congress. He will be the ‘shadow’ majority leader by dint of his strong support for so many Tea Party GOP candidates who will be in the next Senate. He’s the real deal and if the old GOP war horses don’t get behind him and support our conservative agenda I hope he’ll have the courage to step outside the party and look at starting a new conservative alternative to the GOP.
Let us make a list of all the RINO’s and Dems for 2012 in the Senate. We start Nov 3rd getting rid of them too...
Rush and Dale Peterson have already started warning about this! And I myself have been warning of this right here on FR for months now even though there are many on here that nay say me over it!
To many seem to think that I was looking at the ‘glass’ and calling it half full when I should have been looking at it as being half full. But look at what they are saying they will not look at a Republican victory come November as the warning so many seem to think. They will not be near as fearful as you imagine they shall be and should be. They think of themselves in the same way as teenagers do, that they are ‘bullet proof’ it happens to others, but itcan’t possible happen to me! Some are so delusional they don’t even believe that they are going to lose dispite all the signs being against them. They will call voter fraud and ‘stolen’ election as the cause of their loss before they say that their actions caused it!
Everyone seems to think that the great ‘tsunami’ that appears to becoming in November for the Republicans will change everything and I agree just not in the way they think. I think that such a great victory will be equal to South Carolina’s firing on Fort Sumter. The ‘Demoncrats’ and the leftist will ‘go to the mattresses’ and ‘war’ will breakout
Does Obama/Pelosi/Reed or the people over on DU seem like people who can take a loss gracefully? Do they seem like people who will learn from a loss and correct their course accordingly? Or do they seem more like people who will go to any lengths for revenge?
So many seem to think that November’s elections are some ‘Magic Wand’ that will wipe away our troubles! Let me tell you after such a win (if it happens) the REAL TROUBLE WILL BEGIN!
Yes the Republicans will more than like scored big this November, but will the ‘DemonRATS’ learn anything? Hell NO for that matter will the RINO’s learn anything? Just read from any number of articles on O’Donnell win, look at what Rove and Snowe have said, look at what Murkowski and Crist are doing, look at how the Republican Leadership of RINO’s allowed Murkowski to keep her committee positions! Doesn’t these acts show you what will be learned from such a victory, LITTLE if anything! The Elitist Jerks of both parties are scrambling for their political lives and they know it!
Look about you it’s not only the ‘DemonRATS’ but the RINO’s as well who refuse to see that they have brought, supported and passed an agenda that the American People have rejected. They still feel that they know best and any defeat will only come about due to the ignorance of the electorate.
I have posted this before and I will keep posting it because I know in my heart that I am right about this, to many think that the upcoming November elections are going to reset everything. And I say that NO matter how bad November is for the ‘DemonRATS’ you can bet that ‘Zero’ and his erk will not only press on with their agenda but DOUBLE Down on it! And now it looks as if there will be RINO’s looking for their revenge that will join them.
I don’t believe that the November elections will immediately change a thing! The Washington creatures both Democrat and RINO still believe that they know best and will act accordingly.
Even if there is the BIGGEST turnover in history this November the Obama/Pelosi/Reid are such a pack of narcissist that they will come back during the ‘lame duck’ session and pass every far left-wing bill they can think of!They will burn the house down before they surrender it! If they can’t drink from the well they will poison it for all! They can’t keep it they will surround it with mines and keep anyone else from getting to it.
Even after the ‘lame’ duck session you will see the the greatest attempt by any President in our history to rule by executive order! ‘Zero’ KNOWS BEST what is good for us and he will act accordingly. No mere election won by a bunch of peasants or as ‘Zero’ describe us: “And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.” To ‘Zero’ such a election will hold no meaning and only be the ‘peasants acting out’ and he knows what is best for those ‘bitter clingers’ and he will do it to save them from themselves!
If anyone thinks that a big loss in November will make one iota of difference in Obama and the ‘Demonrats’ leftist agenda you need to seek professional help immediately, because I assure you that the sounds you will hear coming from them after such a lost will not be the ‘wailing and gnashing of teeth’ it will be the notes of El Degüello.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKD5TgHWyxM
IMHO the November elections will NOT provide the immediate relief we think, but will instead it will be the ‘dropped gauntlet’ the slap across the face the challenge that will bring us to what I call a National ‘Battle of Athens’ moment ( http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~tnnews/kns001.htm )
A time in which it will require much more action that punching a ballot to save the Republic. There is so little ‘middle ground’ left and what there is, is shrinking everyday. There will soon be a time of great choosing and you will be required to make a stand: Choose this day how you will serve; Will you serve unwillingly and at the bidding of others wearing the yoke of socialism or will you hold true to the course of our forefathers’ standing tall and serving freely? As for me I choose to SERVE THE REPUBLIC!
Might be the right time to propose a constitutional amendment to eliminate lame duck sessions. There is no reason for them these days.
He’s right .... But the MSM’s ABCNNBCBS are going to reward the lame-stream lame-duck democrats as “courageous heroes” for their treachery!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.