Working hard or hardly working?
By: Jake Sherman
October 7, 2009 05:03 AM EST
Like most Americans, members of the House are expected to report promptly — no excuses — when summoned by their bosses for the start of another workweek. One difference: For lawmakers, starting time doesn’t come until about 6:30 Tuesday evening.
After taking control of the House in 2006 — and again when President Barack Obama was elected president in 2008 — Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) boasted that lawmakers would work four or five days a week to bring change to America.
But midway through Obama’s first year in office, Hoyer’s House has settled into a more leisurely routine. Members usually arrive for the first vote of the week as the sun sets on Tuesdays, and they’re usually headed back home before it goes down again on Thursdays.
Since the House returned for its fall session on Sept. 8, it has stuck around to vote on a Friday just once: to approve a 5.8 percent increase in Congress’s own budget.
A Democratic leadership aide vehemently defended the schedule, saying members shouldn’t be kept in Washington for four or five days when work can be completed in fewer.
Two-and-a-half-day workweeks are not exactly what Hoyer had planned.
But while some GOP lawmakers grumbled in 2006 when Hoyer first talked of a five-day-a-week schedule, at least one was willing to look at the bright side Tuesday.
“Two and a half days a week is plenty of time to consider the ideas coming out of this Democrat-led House,” said Rep. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.). “Imagine the damage they could do with five-day workweeks.”
http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=2C847978-18FE-70B2-A893CC6CE259BD89
Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) boasted that lawmakers would work four or five days a week to bring change to America.
This is right up their with Pelosi and her statement on having the most honest, most open, and most ethical Congress in history.
By: Jake Sherman
October 7, 2009 05:03 AM EST
Like most Americans, members of the House are expected to report promptly — no excuses — when summoned by their bosses for the start of another workweek. One difference: For lawmakers, starting time doesn’t come until about 6:30 Tuesday evening.
After taking control of the House in 2006 — and again when President Barack Obama was elected president in 2008 — Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) boasted that lawmakers would work four or five days a week to bring change to America.
But midway through Obama’s first year in office, Hoyer’s House has settled into a more leisurely routine. Members usually arrive for the first vote of the week as the sun sets on Tuesdays, and they’re usually headed back home before it goes down again on Thursdays.
Since the House returned for its fall session on Sept. 8, it has stuck around to vote on a Friday just once: to approve a 5.8 percent increase in Congress’s own budget.
A Democratic leadership aide vehemently defended the schedule, saying members shouldn’t be kept in Washington for four or five days when work can be completed in fewer.
Two-and-a-half-day workweeks are not exactly what Hoyer had planned.
But while some GOP lawmakers grumbled in 2006 when Hoyer first talked of a five-day-a-week schedule, at least one was willing to look at the bright side Tuesday.
“Two and a half days a week is plenty of time to consider the ideas coming out of this Democrat-led House,” said Rep. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.). “Imagine the damage they could do with five-day workweeks.”
http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=2C847978-18FE-70B2-A893CC6CE259BD89
Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) boasted that lawmakers would work four or five days a week to bring change to America.
This is right up their with Pelosi and her statement on having the most honest, most open, and most ethical Congress in history.