General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsA Day in the Life of a Congressman
One of the interesting things about this Congressjob is that at any given moment, there are three or four different things to do. What one has to show for one's time in Congress is, more than anything else, a question of time management.
Last Wednesday posed an interesting choice for me. I was invited, like all Members of Congress, to the Radio/TV Correspondents Association annual dinner. This is a spectacular opportunity to "network with" (i.e., suck up to) major figures in the national news media, like network news anchors, national radio show hosts and White House correspondents.
To make the dinner extra-special, Emeril Lagasse, a world-famous chef, prepared a unique New Orleans-inspired menu. It featured olive and goat cheese hors d'oeuvres, fried oysters, Creole shrimp and stuffed quail.
I didn't go. I had something else that I needed to do.
Also on Wednesday night was the annual Bipartisan Congressional Baseball Outing. (As President Obama would say, "Baseball is not a Democratic game. It's not a Republican game. It's an American game!!" <<wild cheers>> ) Members of Congress were invited to go see the game between the Washington Nationals and the New York Mets. Congressional staffers were to sing the national anthem, but I wanted to go anyway. (Just kidding, Congressional staffers. You know I love you.) I have a great deal of fondness for the Amazin' Mets, going back to the Tom Seaver/Jerry Koosman era, when Nolan Ryan was a fifth starter with a very wild arm. I used to watch Mets games on a 21" black-and-white TV screen, on Channel 9, WOR-TV. (Note to my children: "TV" is something that people used to watch before there was Netflix and YouTube.) If I had gone, I would have been one of the few people in the ballpark to enjoy that game, since the Mets won by a score of 10-1.
I couldn't make it. I was too busy doing something else.
On Wednesday night, there also was a four-alarm fire three blocks from my office in the Cannon House Office Building. Having grown up in New York City, I know that nothing draws a good crowd like a fire.
I was in the Capitol Building the whole time, so I didn't see it. Plus I have an alibi.
So what was I doing all night on Wednesday? Passing three amendments in the Homeland Security appropriations bill:
An amendment prohibiting federal contract awards to contractors that commit numerous crimes;
An amendment requiring Homeland Security to respect our constitutional rights under the 1st, 2nd and 4th Amendments (think racial profiling); and
An amendment prohibiting Homeland Security from acquiring and using military or weaponized drones in the United States. (Hats off to Rep. Rush Holt, who came up with this amendment but couldn't offer it on Wednesday not because he was at a dinner or a ballgame, but because he was at Senator Lautenberg's funeral.)
To get these amendments passed, I had to sit down with the House Parliamentarian, and make sure that they would not be ruled "out of order" on procedural grounds (as many are). Then I had to discuss the amendments individually with Democratic and Republican Members and staffers a very dicey game, because the Republicans have enough votes to vote down any amendment at will. (And, duh, I'm a Democrat.) Then I just had to sit, and wait.
And wait.
And wait.
Until we reached the part of the bill when I could offer my amendments, and it was my turn to offer those amendments.
So I could have spent Wednesday night in gastronomical paradise, or being honored at a ballgame between two teams that I love. But instead, I did my job as a lawmaker, which is to make laws. To make the world a better place.
Isn't that what you deserve?
Courage,
Rep. Alan Grayson
southerncrone
(5,506 posts)Thanks for doing your job! Just wish there were more with your character in Congress & fewer slackers there.
Thank you again, for working for the "little people".
Laelth
(32,017 posts)-Laelth
awoke_in_2003
(34,582 posts)One of the few in congress not bought and paid for.
octoberlib
(14,971 posts)Skittles
(153,193 posts)a kennedy
(29,711 posts)Thanks Rep. Grayson.
pacalo
(24,721 posts)& the Patriot Act.
And instead of taxpayer dollars (mostly by the poor & middle class) paying the tab for the Utah Data Center & its satellite facilities across the country to "protect" the corporate world & the wealthiest citizens the citizens that the Hoover congress seem to have contempt for from "terrorists", let's get rid of the scam called the "Patriot Act". Then let's spend those billions & billions of dollars to help us where we need it most: our quality of life.
Why can't each congressperson be like you?
Liberal_Dog
(11,075 posts)Rhiannon12866
(206,084 posts)We need a hundred more like you!
MindPilot
(12,693 posts)Rhiannon12866
(206,084 posts)johnnyreb
(915 posts)Auggie
(31,194 posts)I share of the opinion of DUer pacalo (post #7), but since abolishing the department of Homeland Security or curtailing its powers is likely an impossibility, amendments such as yours are welcomed. Thank you for your efforts. Please keep us informed.
madokie
(51,076 posts)I wish I could be so fortunate to have you representing me here in Ok.
Peace
jessie04
(1,528 posts)nt
HeroInAHalfShell
(330 posts)MindPilot
(12,693 posts)I changed my voter registration; I'm no longer a Democrat. I'm "No Party Affiliation".
I can no longer be supportive of a party that has moved so far to the right. This NSA dust-up is just the final straw, the party that doesn't support working people, chooses universal surveillance over universal health care, and seriously entertains cuts in Social Security is not the party I want to be associated with.
And after how I've seen supposed liberal and progressives on this board embracing the idea of an ever more intrusive, punitive, authoritarian govenment...I want to get as far away from them as I can.
When Democrats start acting like Democrats, supporting civil rights, and individual freedom, when there is as much attention paid to preserving the 1st, 4th and 5th as there is the 2nd, when jobs and infrastructure are real priorities, when a candidate campaigns on dismantling the for-profit prison system and the TSA and DHS, and restores Americans' ability to travel within their own borders unmolested, then the Democratic party may actually once again be the party of ordinary Americans.
Thank you Alan, for being one of the outliers.
nadinbrzezinski
(154,021 posts)And fires, you are correct, they draw a crowd.
Fires are exciting, parliamentarian procedure is dry, but vital.
truebrit71
(20,805 posts)...Thank you for setting an example...
Whisp
(24,096 posts)would have that could change the NSA and security questions topic of the week that he has and isn't using?
Would you be able to do this solo or do you have to rely on others in the process of law making to help you achieve this? How would you convince an obstructionist Congress to follow your lead? What would you do differently than the President now that would ensure that you get more and better results (on any issue)?