Coburn calls out Reid: “We are self-indulgent addicts over our power.”
The good news is that conservative stalwart Sen. Tom Coburn is looking out for you.
The bad news is that Dingy Harry and the Dems have wasted no time wasting more of your money. One of the first orders of business of the 111th Congress will be to pass a massive omnibus lands bill. Sen. Coburn reports:
“The decision by Senate leaders to kick off the new Congress with an earmark-laden omnibus lands bill makes a mockery of voters’ hopes for change. This package represents some of the worst aspects of congressional incompetence and parochialism. Congress should spend the next few weeks holding hearings on an economic stimulus package and identifying areas of the budget to cut to pay for that proposal. Instead, the Senate is set to resume business as usual,” Dr. Coburn said.
I’m excerpting a speech Sen. Coburn gave on the Senate floor yesterday, which applies not only to this bill, but to the stimulus package and all the past and future mega-bailouts to come that amount to generational theft.
Listen up, Washington:
The reason we have a 9-percent approval rating is because we are not trusted. We are addicts. We are self-indulgent addicts over our power.
My query to the body and to the American people is, will you hold us accountable? You have to do an intervention with us, each one of us, every time we are home: Are you being a good steward with the limited dollars we have? Are you making choices that may not look good for you as a politician but are truly the best choice for the country? Are you putting yourself second and our country first? Are you acting as a statesman or are you acting as somebody who wants to get reelected?
The real paradox is, with trust comes confidence. With that confidence comes the involvement and support of the very people we actually do represent.
We have a choice. I hope the introduction of this bill does not portend that we will not take President-elect Obama’s lead and offer the American people real hope, real change, that we will get away from our addicted self-indulgence to look good at home and start making the hard, tough decisions that will right our ship and put our country first. Anything less than that says the people who took their oath today and those of us who have taken it before, we violate it. We raise our hand and put one on the Bible and say we will uphold it, but then when it comes to the first tough choice, look good at home or do what is in the long-term best interests of the country, we swivel, we back down, and we opt for the short term, the self-aggrandizement, and the stroke on our own back. We are better than that. The people in this body are better than that.
My hope is we can prove to the American people over the next 6 to 9 months that we got the message, that it is about making the tough choices. It is about doing what is right in the long term. It is not about what makes us or our party look good; it is about what is best for the country as a whole.
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- This Is Why I Wanted Tom Coburn for Senate Minority Leader | All American Blogger
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- terryfrank.net » Diagnosis: Political Münchausen Syndrome
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I believe they call this speaking truth to corrupted, bloated power.
Very well said.
Very well said.
The GOP has to offer alternatives, rather than just opposition. Other than that, let the Democrats implement their failed policies on party-line votes so they can own their failure.
Self-indulgent addicts only partially explains it. I’d also say most of them are outright criminals and pompous ignoramuses. OK, let’s not stop there. How about dirtbags who sell our country out? Who spend our money on earmarks to the politically connected to the point of madness? Who have wrecked our economy for the sake of political correctness? Many of whom would be in jail in a more just society? Who keep getting re-elected by an incompetent electorate? Who steal elections and replace themselves with cronies and connected families? Who gerrymander the system and have destroyed the voting system?
Imagine the uproar and cries of racism had a Republican led senate refused to seat a duly appointed African-American senator, and yet not one MSMer has uttered the thought.
I know Reid and Pelosi are two reason I don’t trust congress, but the poster boy of a Bad Congressman has to be Barney Frank. He is the guy who will steal everything you have then blast you for complaining about it. He thinks the American people have a giant “kick me” sign on our backs.
In one ear and out the other…nothing to stop it in between.
Good for the record, but a voice in the wilderness. As Rush predicted yesterday, Obama (and, subsequently, the Dem-run congress) will get 95% of what they ask for. Elections (and RNC nomination decisions) have consequences. Barring unforeseen circumstances, gird thy loins people…
Mister P, I’m with ya, but given the recent elections, can you blame him?
Putting thousands out of work, destroying many small town economies and rasing the cost of heat in MY house as well because thats where my gas comes from. F%^& you to harry reid. F$%^ you very much.
Hate to be old school but…
Can we bring back the stocks?
Tar and feathers, maybe?
Just saying…
This statement should be followed with a big with DUH!
Sen. Tom Coburn is one of our better Republican leaders–but I fear a too large contingent of Republican Senators will side with the Democrats to get a piece of the pork pie. Party discipline is cracking under the weight of out right greed.
If the Party DOES NOT hold firm and oppose this waste the voters WILL NOT see the Republican Party as a viable alternative in 2010 and 12. Get to your local precinct meetings and start to take back the Party. Find a Conservative to back for local, Congressional and Senate offices NOW.
I for one have voted the last time for a Lesser of Two Evils or as my friend calls it The Evil of Two Lessers. Hold on tight cowboy, we are in for a wild ride.
That every man be armed-you too ladies.
WHat?! Everybody knows the Government has unlimited dollars. If they run out, just take more from the sheeple. Or print more, like we have been doing. Sheesh!
Coburn is magnificent. The nation as a whole is light-years away from deserving him.
What we need now is a Coburn-like Saddam, which of course is an inherent contradiction. Just like Congress itself.
A big thank you to Sen. Corburn, DeMint and others like them. If the GOP’s Representatives and Senators alike were more like these gentleman a conservative Congress would still be in their control. Instead they became self-absorbed, selfish, elitist bastards just like their dem counterparts, led by a liberal themselves in the form of GWBush. He was absolutely a bust as a political leader. Let me add, this clown Duncan running the RNC now and running to be re-elected is a perfect example of what is wrong with the GOP. We need people with strong minds, backs and morals to fight the ever encroaching disease of liberalism.
It never fails, every time I make contact with my congressional rep’s I remind them they are working for us not the other way around.
Trouble is this: The GOP will be barred from offering alternatives. The Dems will not want open debate and true deliberation. They want obeisance and submission.
However, I agree. Get the word out about what the real issues are, offer alternatives that are better and more practical than fuzzy-headed socialism, and pound the proverbial pulpit until voters wake from their Obama-sugar coma.
Corburn in my senator. He is going to have a very long up hill battle for the next couple years. I hope he can weather the storm.
Nice sentiments from Sen. Coburn, but it will result in nothing. He is a good man in a sea of corruption. He went to DC to make a difference but it is like trying to turn back the tide. I’m not usually pessimistic but these next four years are going to be brutal.
Anyone who believes that the Dems are about anything other than slash and burn politics, vicious payback and seizure of as much power as they can get, are truly naive.
Mark, Rush, and Sean have it right. There is a bullseye on the backs of conservatives and the Dems will not hesitate to use their knifes in those backs.
I don’t know if any conservative will be allowed to do much on the floor of either the house or senate. Much will have to be directly to the people much like Reagan did. I realize it’s a streach to think they will get the media coverage to pull it off but I think it may be the only way to hold the libs feet to the fire.
That is one truly frightening aspect of this. We will not be allowed to debate or give input…Pelosi so much as said that out of one side of her mouth, while pledging bipartisanship and civility out of the other side. Add in the MSM that will not get the truth out to the people. Add that to a large portion of the population who wouldn’t listen even if the word did get out. I know this a a terribly pessimistic view, but is there anything we can do?? All of the truth comes through conservative radio, blogs such as this one, and the one TV station that actually tells both sides. That isn’t much against the rest of them. If half this country is supposedly conservative, WHERE ARE THEY?
The same idiots who give Congress a 9% approval rating continue to re-elect the same crooks to represent them.
Bobby Jindal needs to get into the race for ‘12. He’s our only hope.
The “Kick Me” sign is not on our backs. We’re wearing it in front, just below our belt buckles.
Tom Coburn, my senator, makes me angry from time to time (endorsing McCain, voting for the bank bailout), but more often than not he makes me proud to be an American & an Oklahoman (on a side note, Oklahoma, with the highest percentage vote for McCain, just seated its state legislature, controlled by the Republicans for the first time since statehood in 1906!)
Speaking of Reid, the Senate, bad legislation, etc. I got this from NumbersUSA just this morning -
Source and Complete Article Here
Too little, too late.
How ironic that the change to Barack uhhhhhh Hussein uhhhhhhhh Obamuhhhhhh has left me with no hope.
Tom Coburn makes me proud to be an Okie. Seems the dems are hard charging toward screwing up. Will Republicans return to their Reagan Conservative roots so we can “Recreate 1996?”
I have experience with the recovery movement in this country. Once you learn some of the basic tenets of it, you quickly see just how dysfunctional our country and government are. We and our leaders need a big dose of recovery! It is amazing how screwed up we are once you get a sense of how the addictive mindset and point of view operate. Once you “see it”, you see it in lots of places including how backasswards our government is.
Forgive me for telling a war story. My platoon and I were in an area of I Corps searching for a company sized group of Viet Cong. We stumbled upon a regiment size. We were too few but decided we couldn’t let them through. Our five squads split up did a 270 around them , then split up into our fire teams of 4 men each….. The resulting firefight allowed a devastating result on the surprised regiment and we soon were supported by assistance from Ist MarDiv III MAF. Why do I say this? because this is how we must fight the Democrats, liberals and other filth. We haven’t the means to go all out at once right now. but we can and should fight cell by cell, county by county. Happyscrapper asks a great question… where are the 49- 50%?. Well, we’re going to regroup , small at first, stay true to the mission that we must define( no moderation) and get back the country we have so loved and now see being desecrated and raped.
Cincinnattus – go home!
Not crazy about cold winters, main reason I left Utah, you folks gotta be proud back there in Oklahoma, your Republican legislature(hope there’s not too many RINO’s),and very important your laws regarding the illegal aliens…good job Okies!
PKAmmoTroop
“Omnia relinquit sevare Republicam”
Use the news media against themselves and our so-called elected officials. I scan the newspapers daily to see bias and highlight corruption. Then write letters to the editor. I know it’s not likely my letters will ever be printed, but I am fighting the war in my own small way–consistently. I loved the story MNUSMC David–you are a hero to me!
MNUSMC David – Lead the way and we’ll follow.
Semper Fi.
I’ve been saying for years that the Democrats believe that what’s good for the party is good for the country. Republicans, however, believe that whatever is good for the country is good for the party. Both, sadly, are wrong!