Rasmussen: 71% Agree Congress Sucks

Rasmussen just released results of some polling that has some shocking but not unexpected numbers regarding congress. I'll break them down for you.

• 71% believe congress is doing a poor job
• 10% believe congress is doing a good or excellent job
• 48% of Democrats believe congress is doing a poor job (up 17% since January)
• 70% think congress hasn't passed any legislation that would improve the lives of Americans (up 10% since last month and highest rating in more than 3 years)
• 40% think it's "somewhat likely" that congress will "seriously" address the most important issues facing hte nation.
• 9% say it's "very likely" that congress will address the most important issues.
• 63% say it would be better if "most" incumbents were replaced with fresh blood this November.
• 27% feel their representative is the best man for the job
• 75% of Americans are at least "somewhat angry" at the policies of the Federal government.
• 60% of voters agree that both the Republican & Democratic leaders lack "a good understanding of what is needed today"
• 9% believe that congress is "genuinely interested" in helping people
• 81% believe politicians are more concerned about their careers
  Read More>>>
  

These numbers reveal an interesting trend that Scott Rasmussen talks about in his new book, In Search of Self-Governance, which is available at Amazon.

In it he notes, “Today, Americans are united. United in the belief that our political system is broken, that politicians are corrupt, and that neither major political party has the answers.” ... “Some of us are ready to give up; some of us are ready to scream a little louder. But all of us believe we can do better.”

The Problem with "Hate Crime" Legislation

I just received my all too annoying MegaVote (from Congress.org) email notifying me of upcoming votes in the House and Senate and the first bill listed for the house was H.R. 1913 "Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2009".

The email gave it the very vague description of: This House bill would provide local jurisdictions with funds to prosecute hate crimes.

This bill (and Hate Crime legislation in general) carries with it two obvious problems.

1. The bill seeks to give harsher penalties for the murder of a person because he/she was gay (or Black, White, Asian, Muslim, a woman, or whatever). Thus creating a new 'protected' class of people.

You might wonder, What's wrong with a harsher punishment for the murder/rape/assault/etc of a homosexual (or whatever) because the person is a homosexual? Well, is it more wrong to kill someone because they're a Jew than it is to kill because of jealousy or out of envy? Is it more wrong to kill ... than to kill? It's a non-sequitur.

I believe that crime is BAD, regardless of the motivation of the attacker or status of the victim. Criminals should be brought to justice and made to face the consequences of their crimes regardless of who the victims were or for what reason the crimes were committed.

The murder is the crime, not the motivation. Prosecuting attorneys can still use the motivation to prove the commission of the crime by an alleged suspect, but the motivation shouldn't be what's on trial.

2. The bill will vilify and quite possibly make free speech (especially speech you disagree with) illegal.

I'll quickly add that a cursory reading of the bill doesn't reveal this, but the testimony given by members of Congress allude to it.

HumanEvents.com provides this insight and dialog between members of Congress (debating a similar "Hate Crime" Bill) in their article titled "Is Your Minister a 'Hate Crime' Peddler?":
Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) debated Rep. Artur Davis (D-Alabama) last Congress.

Here is a very telling portion of that exchange:

Mr. Gohmert: Even with your amendment, you still have to go back to the "rule of evidence" at page 15 of the underlying bill. And it says that these things may not be introduced as substantive evidence at trial unless the evidence specifically relates to the offense.

And if I understood the gentleman's amendment -- and I will put the question back to you -- if a minister preaches that sexual relations outside of marriage of a man and woman is wrong, and somebody within that congregation goes out and does an act of violence, and that person says that that minister counseled or induced him through the sermon to commit that act, are you saying under your amendment that in no way could that ever be introduced against the minister?

Mr. Davis. No.

If you parse your way through that thicket of legalisms and double negatives, you’ll find that Cong. Davis was saying that the sermon could be used as evidence against the minister.
H.R. 1913 broadly defines “intimidation.” A pastor’s sermon could be considered “hate speech” under this legislation if heard by an individual who then acts aggressively against persons based on any “sexual orientation.” The pastor could be prosecuted for “conspiracy to commit a hate crime.”

Andrea Lafferty, who wrote the HumanRights.com article, sums it up as:

The question of which “sexual orientations” will be protected is left wide open so a great deal of discretion will be granted to judges and prosecutors to determine what is a “sexual orientation” and which ones will be covered. . .

No reasonable person could conclude that the Founders had any of this in mind when they drafted the Constitution and said which “rights” should be protected and which should be prohibited.

At the least, this bill wastes your and my tax dollars by wasting our Congressmen and Senators' time to push legislation against crimes already covered by our existing criminal code.

And at the worst, it's a way to demonize traditionally held beliefs such as: homosexuality is a sin and it's wrong and people's genders are encoded in their DNA and are NOT subject to 'interpretation'.

Take it as you will and I'll continue to just believe that...
Murder is Murder. Rape is Rape. Crime is Crime.

Congress Demands CEOs Work for Free, but Want More Money

This from The Hill.

... they will get a $4,700 pay increase ... watchdog groups are not happy about it.

“As lawmakers make a big show of forcing auto executives to accept just $1 a year in salary, they are quietly raiding the vault for their own personal gain,” said Daniel O’Connell, chairman of The Senior Citizens League (TSCL)...

Rep. Harry Mitchell ...sponsored legislation earlier this year that would have prevented the automatic pay adjustments from kicking in for members next year... the bill... failed to make it out of committee.

“They don’t even go through the front door. They have it set up so that it’s wired so that you actually have to undo the pay raise rather than vote for a pay raise,” Ellis said...

In the beginning days of 1789, Congress was paid only $6 a day, which would be about $75 daily by modern standards. But by 1965 members were receiving $30,000 a year, which is the modern equivalent of about $195,000.

Currently the average lawmaker makes $169,300 a year, with leadership making slightly more...

Ellis said that while freezing the pay increase would be a step in the right direction, it would be better to have it set up so that members would have to take action, and vote, for a pay raise and deal with the consequences, rather than get one automatically...READ MORE>>

Currently, the way the system is set up is that Congress gets an automatic 2.8% wage increase without even having to vote on it. This needs to be stopped.

I'm a free market guy and as such I feel that job performance should dictate wages (and raises), so do we really think that members of congress are deserving of a 2.8% raise?

With only 20% of Americans satisfied with Congressional performance shouldn't they get a 2.8% pay cut instead?

If you feel as I do, please contact your Congressman/Congresswoman and tell them that you're unhappy about them receiving a pay raise and you'd like congress to pass a bill that requires them to always vote on pay increases.

Happy New Year!

Dang this is the third time at least that I've started a post and lost part or all of it... third times' the charm.

I hope everyone's 2007 went well, and I hope everyone has a great 2008.

Now that it's a new year it's important to start the year off right, by reminding our Senators and Congressmen that they're only in office to represent their constituents.

I thought I'd like to alert you to some of the most notable acts that need to be acted on of 2007.

One of the best resolutions introduced in 2007 is HR 4900 which was introduced just before the winter recess of 2007. It's called, The “Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives Reform and Firearms Modernization Act of 2007".

For too long the BATFE has has been able to make and change it's own rules and has had to answer no-one. Hypothetically speaking if one were to convert a firearm to an illegal machine gun it would be illegal. However, if an employee of the BATFE were to convert a firearm to an illegal machine gun and mail it (illegally) to a private citizen the private citizen would be guilty of possessing a machine gun while the BATFE would be exempt from any repercussions.

However ATF abuses aren't just hypothetical situations, just ask Red's Trading Post (Interviews 1, 2) and KT Ordnance (Alert, Interview, Newstory). In addition to these two businesses many others have been targeted unfairly or even lost their FFL (Federal Firearms Liscense) completely as a result of small paperwork errors.

Among some of the more noteable provisions are:

• Requires BATFE to establish clear investigative guidelines.
• Clarifies the standard for “willful” violations—allowing penalties for intentional, purposeful violations of the law, but not for simple paperwork mistakes.
• Permanently bans creation of a centralized electronic index of dealers’ records (read as a list of who to confiscate from)
• Repeals the Brady Act’s “interim” waiting period provisions, which expired in 1998

While this act isn't perfect, it's a good start.

Please be sure to contact your U.S. Representative at (202) 225-3121, and urge him or her to cosponsor and support H.R. 4900, the “Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives Reform and Firearms Modernization Act of 2007.”


Secondly, there are two other bits of legislation which desperately need to be acted upon and passed so they do not die like in past sessions of Congress.

These two are the Senate S. 388 (govtrack.us) and the Congress' H.R. 861 (govtrack.us), National Right-to-Carry Reciprocity Act of 2007.

I've had my concealed carry permit for several years now.

Like every other legal concealed carry permit holder of The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, I've never been convicted or found guilty of a violent crime or felony; I've never renounced my citizenship; I am a legal resident of the United States; submitted myself to background checks; I am not an unlawful user or addicted to any drugs or alcohol legal or illegal; I've submitted several character references; and I've had the approval of my county's Sheriff in order to receive my Concealed Carry Permit.


However, while my driver’s license that bestows me the privilege to drive (automobile related deaths are nearly twice as high as firearm related deaths, and nearly 5 times as high for deaths of children) is recognized by every state of the union; several foreign countries; and our own federal government the same is not true for my Pennsylvania License to Carry Firearms with legalizes me to exercise my Constitutional Right.

Unfortunately, none of the states which share a border with Pennsylvania recognize Pennsylvania’s License to Carry Firearms; that means that I have to remove my firearm and leave it at home to legally travel to neighboring states.

The notion that I need to be disarmed before I can legally travel to a neighboring state is ridiculous and frankly it discourages me from visiting those other states. After all, I stand a much larger chance of dying as a result of a violent crime when I'm disarmed so why would I want to put myself at risk?

Please read the NRA’s fact sheet regarding concealed carry and these two pieces of legislation.

Please be sure to contact your U.S. Representative at (202) 225-3121, and urge him or her to cosponsor and support H.R. 861, the “National Right-to-Carry Reciprocity Act of 2007.” Also, please contact your U.S. Senators at (202) 224-3121, and urge them to support S. 388, “… to provide a national standard in accordance with which nonresidents of a State may carry concealed firearms in the State.”