NRA + the rest of the Old Right opposed him. He won by 9 points.
First elected to the House in 1974, Rep. Rick Nolan, D-Minn., left after his third term ended in 1981–and now after a 32-year hiatus, Nolan is back. Much to his surprise, the biggest change he’s encountered was the work week, and he’s not happy about it…
“My first term, we worked 48 out of 52 weeks,” Nolan said on Friday’s edition of The Daily Rundown. “Most of those days were four and five day weeks. We were in committee virtually every morning, we were on the floor of the House throughout the afternoons and the evenings and we were working in the process of governing which is what we’re elected to do.”
He expressed his disappointment that Congress is only currently scheduled to work 34 out of 52 weeks and considers most of those days “not real.”
“We went into session Monday, for example, we don’t have any votes scheduled until 6:30 in the evening, we were also scheduled to work on Tuesday–which we did–and then we were scheduled to work on Wednesday and we took the day off,” Nolan said.
Nolan quickly agreed with the public’s sentiment “everybody’s campaigning and nobody’s governing,” saying Congress isn’t governing like they should especially with all the serious issues the country is facing. He told Todd that the time given for Congressional members to campaign and the money they use has become “toxic.”
“I mean, we’re told here two things,” he said. “One is the one with the most money gets the most votes and number two – you should be spending 30 hours a week in fundraising and call time–dialing for dollars.”
Can we achieve a Congress that isn’t for sale to the highest bidder.
He is saying what we all assumed/knew. Maybe he will keep at it and make a big issue of it.
He better not start mouthing off about the bosses multi-million dollar holidays in Hawaii, or the endless golf games and celebrity gala dinners. Might find himself with 2 bullets to the back of the head, in a dumpster, and a suicide note pinned to his back.
tinfoil hats for sale! seriously. so much nonsense in the comments on this great news site.
Can I ask..
What would happen t MOST of you if you did not Work a full week at work?
What would happen if yo didnt do your JOBS, in the way needed/ask/required?
YOU get paid by the hour, 80% of the USA gets paid by the hour..these guys get paid 10 times what 60% of the USA Earns in FULL TIME yearly wages..
Considering only 1/3 of the USA votes, the odds are that MOSt of these people didnt get at LEAST 25% of the state to vote them into office..Its closer to 15-16% Elected them to office.
You really had NO CHOICE in who you selected..
For those that dont understand, Elected officials only started getting PAID WAGES in the 70’s..
BEFORE that it was an allowance for TIME SERVED/Living expenses/transportation..
Washington DC was built in that location for many reasons..
IT WAS A SWAMP..
NO ONE WANTED IT..
It was centrally located..
IT WAS CHEAP LAND..
Lets MOVE Washington DC..to the middle of IOWA or some desert or mountain top.. build a barracks for our reps, and surround it with barbed wire..
Didn’t know that. Good post
What makes you think we want them here in Iowa?
How about Alcatraz? Nobody using it, plenty of bunk space, fresh ocean breeze.
Works for this Iowa boy.
You mean waterfront property in San Francisco? Let’s not.
Try Perkins Oklahoma.
He can’t last one term.
Just look at that smile… happy grey haired man gets his old job back. Only a few crows feet around the eyes.
………..Jump forward 18 months…………
I’ll bet he’s not smiling and decides to go back to whatever he was doing before.
The Repukes will do anything to destroy this man.
It is the same in many other democracies such as here in Europe. Instead of idealists working for the common good, we now have a bunch of narcissistic reality tv “star” dishonest politicians having politics (robbing) as a living.
The dance of the idiots: narcissists, spin doctors, bureaucrats and lobbyists makes you feel like puking. Throw in the media and the liars (lawyers) and mayhem is guaranteed.
Perhaps politicians should be elected for 6-8 years at at time with no possibility of reelection? This way they might consider doing their jobs and represent the population? Maybe even consider the future (generations)? Perhaps somebody qualified could and would want to be elected? At least there would be no need to spend energy on reelection.
OTOH in a representative democracy the population got who they elected. We are all to blame for the state of society. The state of the sorry politician is perhaps just a reflection of ourselves…
BTW. It seems to me you guys in the US spend at least half of each president’s 4 year terms on reelection campaigns. Combined with the elections every two years for some of the members of congress the state of reelection has become permanent. The media love it. I think it should be claimed not only as theater but as one of the definitions for “waste of time”.
(proof of intelligent alien lifeforms: they have not contacted us!)
You remind me of a really great saying that you probably never even heard of (or maybe you just forgot):
“The fault is not within our stars, it’s within ourselves!
Hollywood, and all it’s shenanigans would not even exist if we didn’t LET it. And our government is nothing more than a reflection of those collective values.
Therefore, if you patronize (buy) Hollywood’s crap, then you are NOT part of any solution.
I think the media realize they only exist to help those in power. That seems to be where most of their funding comes from…
Or, they are owned by those in power, close to the same thing.
And politicians are owned by those in power. Nice closed circle.
Pah—leeeze!!!
He’ll get sucked into that politician black hole like everyone else.
And if you’re looking for someone to blame, try looking at big business and then look at your own values for creating that hole. That’s not a knock on you personally! I mean, look at the products you own and services you contract and ask yourself if you could live without them or if there is/was an alternative that wouldn’t make some Wall Street board member richer?
For example, if you purchased a Chevy or a Chrysler product within like the last 5 years then you obviously made a mistake by REWARDING poor business practices. Not that Toyota, Nissan, Ford or any of the others are really any better. I’m sure they are all nice cars/trucks. But remember those bail outs?!
Maybe you disagree. But then if you bank at Wells Fargo, Bank of America, or any of the other “too big to fail” banks then you are STILL making a mistake! And this guy is simply trying to get in on that monetary feeding frenzy that we all WILLINGLY pay for in some way. And I say “willingly” since it’s either a mindset of ignorance or arrogance that makes us forget our values when we do business with whom we know to be CROOKS! (Just as another example, should I even point out the cell phone industry?!)
So does it really surprise anyone that an out of work lawyer want’s to make a few green backs and NOT have to work for it? That’s politics – grow up! But it’s also our CULTURE!
George Will says it best when he says that we all want those government handouts but then don’t think anyone needs to pay for them. (It also pretty much sums up the Democrat philosophy too.) And in that regard, Congress is indeed leading the way.
Ford? Sorry, Ford didn’t take any bail outs.
As far as the rest, no one is to big to fail. The notion that “to big to fail” only serves to preserve the idea that no matter how crappy we manage a company, someone will bail us out thus encouraging the current corporate management systems like GM’s. Where there is a large disproportional ratio of Chiefs to Indians.
PP–why is the Dumbo party called the tax and spend party if they aren’t willing to pay for their social programs?
We have some way to go, but our political, judicial and economic systems are becoming as byzantine, time-consuming, expensive and arbitrary as India’s.
“Can we achieve a Congress that isn’t for sale to the highest bidder.” – yes, as soon as executive branch of Government is prosecuted for usurpation of the rights of said Congress, making it irrelevant and hence corrupt.
If Congress is left to do its job and executive branch actually does its real job… by default corruption will be minimized.
This article is nothing more than a fundraising scheme by Rick Nolan and a bad one.
Rick Nolan is not the big antiright hero who defeated the evil tea party pick Chip Cravaack. He was at the right place when northern Minnesota’s Democratic party was in disarray from the previous defeat of a ten or fifteen term career politician that had lost touch with reality and did not leave a succession plan. The Republican, Chip Cravaack, was a guy who basically lived in New Hampshire! It is no surprise the Democrats reclaimed a seat that was, except for the most recent two years, was reliably Democratic.
Rick Nolan wants to complain about committees, interesting… watching some of these hearings is nothing more than an game of posturing. It is amazing watching the similarity between Democrats and Republicans–both sides are eager to find answers so long as the witness is aligned with the interests of the other party. Even the witnesses get in on the act–both sides are willing to distort the truth so long as the questioner is from the other party.
Congress could be in session for all fifty-two weeks and the budget deficit would remain at 1/3 and 1/4 the inflation adjusted cost of WWII! All congress would do is just find more witnesses for their daily meaningless posturing sessions!
Another old liberal retread back again… that’s grounds for flags at half-staff.
Why would anyone care what happens out of Minnesota? It, Hawaii, Rhode Island, New Mexico, and DC are the most irrelevant places in the USA.
Actually, Population density is inversely proportionate to relevance. All large cities are cesspits of devolved subhumans. One way to fix the country is to require all polling places to be located at least 60mi. from any form of mass transit.
Why not just relocate everyone from the city to the country. It worked so well in Cambodia.
Would mass transit include the Acorn vans that routinely make pickups at the gutter outside Liquor World on election day?
I shudder at the thought of the additional damage Congress could do if they spent 16 more weeks per year creating, amending, and passing sh**ty laws than they do now.
LOL, no doubt, the Republicans could try 4 more times per year to repeal the new health care law and the Democrats could have more time to pass gun control rather than just making sure current law is enforced.
The federal gov’t is actually really easy to fix.
At the beginning of any electoral cycle, measure the number of Americans living in “large” houses located many miles from their workplace and commuting in private 4×4’s. This the measure of standard of living. If, at the next electoral cycle, the standard of living has gone down. the President, VP, and Congress all have their names thrown into a hat. 10% are randomly drawn and executed. The rest are forced to serve another term alongside the replacements, so their at risk again. Now, they all have motivation to do their jobs.
See how easy it is?
I’ll believe it when he objects to adjournment, calls for salary cuts, and insists on committees handling bills rather than going thru rules committee. Also when he complains about the Senate’s not passing a budget for 3 years.
He’s a liberal, he only complains about this stuff during the election. The rest to the time he just accepts it in his long suffering way all the way to the bank.
Congressional members from both parties average 5 hours per day fund raising and two hours on legislative issues. Seriously.
Term Limits would solve this problem. The only people who care about seniority and committee leadership are those who are abusing it.
Committee’s are boring and no one would volunteer to serve on one without coercion. It’s pretty crazy how you can’t find anyone to serve on the unpaid board of directors for a homeowner’s association.
Congresspeople fight for committee appointments! Maybe we should draw out of a hat and see who shows up.
Expand House terms to 3 years with a moratorium on accepting political contributions during your first two years of service.
Pay would be docked each time you missed a vote and in-person vote would be required. 10 proxy votes per year max. 20 missed votes you are replaced by the next highest vote getter still living in your district.
Representatives would be required to email a summary of all bills (compiled by their staff and signed by them) to indicate the impacts to people in his or her district.
He or She would also have to indicate what interests or assets (real estate, stock holdings, or family ties) they had in any bill.
No doubt some conflict of interests seem unavoibable, but now the reason to get into politics is conflict interests.
It amazes me that people still don’t understand that the bigger you make government, the more corruption you tend to have. If government would stay in it constitutional bounds then wide spread corruption wouldn’t be a problem, and could be dealt with on a local level.
Still it doesn’t matter, we are screwed anyways, now that more and more people sign the back of the check rather than the front.
You get what you vote for.