The State of the Congress

There is a great deal of angst being vented over the Senate and those being seated (or not) this morning. The truth be told, Roland Burris has every right to be seated even though there is a stench on his appointment and Al Franken has won (we think) the Minnesota race and defeated Norm Coleman. No matter how much we would like to do otherwise (and I sincerely would like to do otherwise), one man was appointed by the governor to fill an empty seat and the other, ostensibly, has been elected by a razor thin margin by the people of his state. There are laws that dictate how appointments should be made, qualifications for who can be appointed to fill a vacant seat in the Senate or House of Representatives and there are laws and rules for the conduct of a "fair" election. It appears that these qualifications have been met and we need to take our lumps and seat these men.

I live in Missouri, where a few years back we elected a dead man to the U.S. Senate under the campaign slogan "I'm Still With Mel." When he was elected posthumously, the empty seat was filled by his widow, Jean Carnahan, who was promised the seat to warm if her deceased husband could win the election and who was promptly unseated in the next election by Senator Jim Talent. It appears that Caroline Kennedy whose greatest qualification for being a US Senator is her name and the fund-raising capability that it brings to the New York political machine will also be seated in the highest governing body of the country.

What we need to do now, is take a hard and long look at the road ahead and make sure that qualified candidates get our unbridled support. AND, we need to make sure that they win by large margins that cannot be called into question at the end of the day. The laughing stock that has been made of the Senate by potentially seating a buffoon, an unqualified socialite and a man who was appointed by a corrupt governor giving the middle finger salute to all authority is certainly a shame. The infighting that resulted this morning and which will continue until all of this is resolved is even more a pox on the house of Obama and his Merry Band.

While it might be tempting to sit on the sidelines and let the Democrats eat each other alive (after all, with the Republicans out of the way and definitely in the majority, they only have themselves to trip over and fight with), this should be yet another rallying cry for all conservatives to come together and set the stage for a real house cleaning at the very first opportunity!! We have only ourselves to blame for the state of the Senate and the immediate future of our country, but that doesn't mean that we can't learn some very valuable mistakes and move forward in a better direction.

OMG!! My hard drive was making a weird noise and I thought that a fan needed to be replaced but when I took the cover off, I found 500 uncounted Minnesota ballots for Norm Coleman! Wonder how they walked to Missouri and got into my computer??? Oh the wonders of our political system!