HOYER: Breaking the congressional deadlock

The leadership in the Senate and House is not listening to the people. No amount of piffling accomplishments is going to change that. They were not listening on the Immigration debacle and they were not thinking on the Biofuels mess. Now they are not listening to the demand of the people for drilling. We need an energy policy and they give us an environmental policy. The 110th Congress won't be ranked with history's rubber stamped, no, they will be arrogant and elitist and corrupted by blame and the inability to understand the difference between consensus science and real science.

Raising the mininum wage costs thousands of jobs and raises prices Raising the fuel stanards costs me thousands of dollars for a new car with a small payback in gas Raising college aid sends thousands of unqualified youth to schools that they will drop out of. With my money. Ethics reform, don't make me laugh There are more holes in it than my 10 year old underwear. A housing bill to undo the damage done by pressuring lenders to accept more unqualified minority borrowers again at my expense If they did NOTHING they would have had a higher approval rate than they do now.

Steny Hoyer! From Maryland you say? Oh, that explains it. The Demorats have nearly ruined that state. Businesses are fleeing left and right for Pennsylvania and Virginia. Their last hope was Gov. Ehrlich and Lt.Gov. Michael Steele.

So you raised the minimum wage by what, 20%? Now a year later we have more unemployment (especially among teens)and even more inflation. Both were predicted. Less teens at work has even led to lower household income. Great job there. We only have 1.5% (or 3% depending on which Democrat is talking) of the world's proven oil reserves because we don't drill where the oil is. Another Democratic mission accomplished. Stem cell research blocked? Mr. Hoyer, exactly how then have we made progress in creating stem cells from ADULT skin cells? And now from the cells in wisdom teeth? You seem to believe that the only way to accomplish anything is for the US government to do it or to at least pick what gets done and to have taxpayers foot the bill. Do you really think the big drug corporations, as evil as you believe they are, would forgo the huge profits involved in the myriad of breakthroughs you say Republicans are blocking simply because they don't want to spend tax payer dollars on research private drug companies are expert at? And I love this. Gas cost "$1.46 when they [Republicans] took control of Washington". Mr. Stoyer, gasoline was $1.86 when Democrats took control of Congress in 2006, 14 years later. Less than two years later gasoline topped $4 a gallon. Apparently the Democrat's "common sense" energy legislation promised in the '06 election is working as planned. I didn't notice anything about reforming the college school loan industry. Don't you want to take credit for capping the fees and rates private lenders can charge "to lower college costs" in the bill passed in 2007? Could the reason be that since Congress cannot compel private business to make non-profitable loans the changes have created an exodous from the college loan business to the point where private loans are almost non-existent? Was that part of the plan or another dumb idea that backfired? And now that you have managed to drive out the private lenders we should all praise Democrats for the "biggest boost to college aid in 63 years"? Now that I have read all that you and your party have accomplished I have only one question. Just how did the Democratic Congress manage to even get a 9% approval rating?

Mr. Hoyer: The contributor below, stevedeery, gave a succinct and worthy reply. I'm not going to be as succinct but I won't be as verbose as you are. First, invoking Thomas Jefferson, et al, isn't impressive but foolish. We live in a radically different time, a flaming market economy which you and your Democrats friends try to foil at every opportunity. It's not the minimum wage though Stevedeery is right. It's the service economy, where millions and millions of Americans are employed only in part-time capacity and can't get full-time because the business doesn't want to pay for a health plan. As for gas prices, you've been in the House for 27 years and never had the foresight to see the energy crisis coming, and now you want to give the back of your hand to oil drilling. Your ethics reform is a joke. Political corruption is so vast and deep that the section in the FBI that handles this concern is absolutely overwhelmed by the case load, more than a 1,000 cases around the U.S. It's a bigger problem than domestic terrorism, which to the FBI's credit, it has been on top of. Some resources going to terrorism ought to be diverted to investigating political corruption. As for Iraq, you and the Democrats have been wrong for years. The surge, which you and your friends opposed, turned things completely around. As for Washington providing aid to low-income children, my grandson has muscular dystrophy, is bedridden and the government took away the funds for the food he's provided though his mom and dad only work part-time now. I could go on but I won't. Those are some of the reasons Congress's approval is at an all-time low. In short, what you represent in Congress, Mr. Hoyer -- which is more government and higher taxes -- is sheer idiocy and actually, most of what is wrong with this country. Incidentally and last, Obama, another crazy move by Democrats, is going to lose in November.

What is "Steny" smoking these days? * If the minimum wage is such a great thing, why not raise it to $150 an hour, and make everybody RICH? * If arbitrarily raising mpg goals were the answer, the simple solution would be to raise it to 100mpg, effective tomorrow, and including all PRESENT vehicles? Think how fast the price of gasoline would drop if that were to happen. * If 'fossil fuels' are so evil, WHY is it that the WORLD uses them to produce 75% of its energy? Is it because there is NO VIABLE, EQUALLY CHEAP ALTERNATIVE, or just because Steny and his nutty leftist friends SOLD OUT to the STONE AGE CROWD, and thus don't give a damn how badly the stupid peasants get to suffer when energy prices double, triple, or even quadruple with the grossly overpriced alternatives they offer. I think old 'warhorses' like Hoyer are no longer in touch with reality, and what they really need to enact are STRICT TERM LIMITS so we can put somebody in the Congress who has at least half a brain!

It's time the Folks elected to Congress began to realize that once they are elected by the people in their districts the "Party" , party is over. It has then become time to conduct the peoples business. The fact that they may be Republican or Democrat or Independent becomes irrelevent. Work must be done and things must be acomplished. Get off your Jackass and your Elephant and stop Horsing around. HW

Steny Hoyer, its time to retire. Anbody else want him? I don't. Maryland has suffered enough.