The U.S. House of Representatives is scheduled to meet only 113 days in 2014, down from 126 this year-- this is shameful!

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Congress is a work-free zone and will likely stay that way
By Joel Connelly, December 2, 2013

The U.S. House of Representatives voted early this fall to knock 3.8 million Americans off the federal food stamp program and to impose stiff work requirements on able-bodied, childless adults receiving federal food aid.

The House put no work requirements on its able-bodied self.  The “People’s House” will be in session only 126 days this year, and is scheduled to meet only 113 days in 2014. With money to run the federal government due to run out on Jan. 15, the House will meet just eight days between now and Jan. 7.

“Sadly, the House of Representatives has shown an inability to move on any meaningful legislation:  It has been obsessed with repeal of the Affordable Care Act, and blocked progress on everything else,” Rep. Steve Israel, D-New York, who chairs the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said in Seattle last week.

House Speaker John Boehner at times seems proud of the record. Just 15 bills have been sent to President Obama this year for his signature.

“We should not be judged on how many new laws we create: We ought to be judged on how many laws we repeal,” Boehner told CBS’ Bob Schieffer in July. The House under Boehner has voted more than 50 times to repeal health care reform.

October’s federal government shutdown built up Democratic hopes that the “Tea Party House” could change hands in the 2014 midterm elections. The inept roll out of Obamacare has, however, put Republicans back narrowly in the lead in “generic” national polls of which party voters want to run Congress.

Republicans hold an advantage of 30 seats in the House. The GOP has been bolstered by gerrymandering of district boundaries in such big states as Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania and North Carolina. Democrats took a majority of House votes last year in Ohio and Michigan only to wind up a minority of seats.

Washington has no U.S. Senate seat up next year. The state’s 10 House districts were redrawn in 2011, in such a way as to reduce the prospect of competitive races.

Two Republicans — Reps. Dave Reichert and Jaime Herrera Beutler — were given much safer districts. So was Democratic Rep. Rick Larsen. A new, Democratic-leaning South Puget Sound district was created to the specifications of now-Rep. Denny Heck. Democrat Suzan Del Bene easily captured the supposedly up-for-grabs 1st District.

What, then, could upset the applecart?

* A second Republican-caused shutdown of the government, or another debt ceiling crisis, could swing the advantage back to the Democrats. The October shutdown allowed Israel to recruit some front-rank challengers to Republican incumbents. Reichert was among GOP lawmakers to sag in the polls.

* Continued problems with Obamacare could underscore Republicans’ anti-government arguments, and throw Democrats — as the party of government — back on their heels. The Democrats have 21 Senate seats to defend in 2014, and seem likely to lose seats in two states, South Dakota and West Virginia, where incumbents are retiring.

* Turnout will sway the 2014 outcome. The mid-term electorate tends to be older, more white and more male than in presidential years. Democrats need to motivate the coalition of young voters, Hispanics, women and African Americans that has twice put President Obama into the White House.

The food stamps issue might just motivate the Obama coalition. Senate and House negotiators are locked in negotiations over a new farm bill. The Democratic-run Senate has voted to trim $4 billion from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Programin the next 10 years. The GOP-run House would slash $40 billion from the program.

A sharp exchange of correspondence between Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., a member of the House Republican Leadership, and Spokane Democratic activist Sharon Smith shows America’s political divide.

Smith wrote to McMorris Rodgers questioning her vote for food stamp cuts. McMorris Rodgers wrote back with a blame-the-other-side letter.

“Since President Obama took office, the (SNAP) program has grown at an unprecedented rate with one in seven Americans now receiving food stamps,” McMorris Rodgers wrote back.  “. . . I believe we need to make responsible and reasonable spending cuts to preserve the integrity of this program for those truly in need.”

Smith has edited McMorris Rodgers’ response on her Facebook page. When McMorris Rodgers claims the House bill is saving taxpayers $40 billion, Smith suggests injecting the words “is nothing compared to how it affects seniors, children, men and women in my district who literally rely on food stamps to live.”

When McMorris Rodgers claims the House bill makes “common sense reforms” and “closes loopholes,” Smith claims this “is a smoke screen to give billions to big agriculture and continue the unfair practice of tax breaks and loopholes to corporations and our most wealthy.”

McMorris Rodgers represents an Eastern Washington district with a higher percentage of people receiving food stamps, and a higher poverty level, than the nation as a whole.

Given the current polarization in America, however, the 5th District will likely vote to reelect the congresswoman who voted to cut the food stamps program that has historically enjoyed bipartisan support. With Chelan and Kittitas counties added to his Western Washington district, Dave Reichert is unlikely to pay a political price for his vote to cut people off food stamps.

The voters may be mad as hell, but they’re likely to keep taking it.
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