Wednesday, August 1, 2007

Cancel Congress's summer recess

Dear Nancy and Harry,

Please do the right thing and cancel Congress's summer recess. I know that you want a vacation like everyone else, even if you don't want it as much as the Vacationer-in-Chief. But it's the right course to stay in Washington and keep after the Bushists, who are rotten to the core.

Stand together in the Capitol rotunda together and make these points:

  • The obstructionism of Republican Senators has stagnated the legislation America needs - SCHIP, stem cells, Iraq withdrawal, a dozen others. When the Republicans give up standing in the schoolhouse door, they can take a vacation, but not until then.
  • Investigations into the deep corruption of the Bush Administration cannot wait even a day. If your colleagues across the aisle will pressure Duhbya and Darth to give up their ridiculous claims of executive privilege, they can take a vacation, but not until then.
  • The Iraqi Parliament may think it deserves a vacation. We disagree. The Republican Party has influence in Baghdad and should be hammering Maliki and his coalition to make some real progress. Americans are dying on a daily basis to keep Maliki in power. The least he and his cronies can do is work toward something on a daily basis. We can't keep the Preznit from taking August off, but the Republicans in Congress haven't earned a vacation and won't get one until they get something done about this, too.
  • Yes, we Democrats would love to have an August break. We have families, too. We need time off to recharge and refresh. But we see the sacrifices that normal Americans make, especially the awe-inspiring sacrifices of our uniformed personnel and their families, and we Democrats believe it is a small sacrifice for us to work through August.
  • If the press wants to mail it in from Martha's Vineyard, that's up to them. We Democrats aren't looking for coverage, though that would be nice; we're looking for progress.
And since you control the calendar, I'm sure you can schedule your home-state downtime in big enough weekend chunks to do some good. Just don't let the Republicans know until the last minute.

Of course, an important benefit is no recess appointments!

Best regards,
LL

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