Herman

Cain

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September 3, 2007

Vacation for Congress: Why Stop With Labor Day?

In observance of the Labor Day holiday, let’s pay Congress to stay on vacation for another year.

While Congress has been in its August recess, we have had no new federal spending, no new taxes or regulations, no new investigations by the Democratic leadership and a few less partisan political attacks.

Like most good ideas, they either do not reach Congress or suffer the usual fate if they do, “Forget about it!” But consider for a moment the positive possibilities:

The federal budget deficit would continue to decrease because tax revenues are still flowing into the Treasury at a record pace. This is due directly to the sustained strength of the economy and record low unemployment rates.

Some members of Congress will argue that they have to reconvene in order to approve the fiscal 2008 budget. In reality, only about a third of the budget is discretionary, which requires congressional approval of 13 annual appropriation bills. Since Congress has not yet approved any of these bills, the easy solution would be to approve all of them at last year’s levels.

In doing so, we would avoid the six-year average annual increase of 8.7 percent, which is a cool $250 billion. It would also avoid the annual flurry of appropriation “earmarks”, which generates most of the increase. You know, earmarks are those special projects that get tagged onto an appropriations bill by members of Congress to avoid public scrutiny.

The other main source of that quarter-of-a-trillion-dollar increase is to pay for normal government operations. That sounds like a contradiction of terminology, but in Washington, if a budget or special program stays the same, then it is considered a budget cut. That’s why we do not have a revenue problem in Washington. We have a spending problem.

With an extended vacation for Congress, Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi and other Democratic leaders would not have as many media opportunities to declare that the war is lost, the economy is bad and that most working Americans are suffering economically. This is despite the progress in Iraq cited by those actually fighting the war, although admittedly progress has been slow and cumbersome, and despite the compelling positive facts about the economy.

Granted, some people are in between jobs, some people have been caught in the middle of the sub-prime mortgage mess and some people have been stung by their own bad economic choices. But the last time I checked, millions of people are continuously sneaking into this country illegally. I have not seen the report on people sneaking out of the country due to bad economic conditions.

The Democratic leaders would probably deny that their constant negative and divisive rhetoric has contributed to the generally sour mood of the public. This is according to the latest Gallup Poll on Americans’ confidence in Congress, which is at an all-time low (Gallup Poll News Service, report by Frank Newport, June 21, 2007). If they just stay home, maybe their approval rating would go up, while we save billions!

But the biggest reason Congress would probably turn down an extended paid vacation is its favorite sports of Bush bashing and investigations. This is clearly part of the Democrats’ strategy to increase its majority in Congress in 2008, and hopefully propel a Democrat into the White House.

The public deserves a break today, and all next year. Maybe we should not forget about it.

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