salary

Newt Gingrich is struggling to regain being anybody in the GOP field, so now he is grasping at straws:

Newt Gingrich is seeking to salvage his Iowa campaign by going after President Obama -- and suggesting the president give up his salary in 2012 because of reports he will spend most of the year seeking re-election.

At a campaign appearance this morning in Independence, Iowa, Gingrich blasted reports that Obama and his re-election team will run against a "do-nothing" Congress in 2012.

"For the president's staff to announce that he's now going to govern without Congress," Gingrich said, reports the Des Moines Register. "Well, that means he's not going to govern. He's going to be a candidate for an entire year. He shouldn't take his salary.

How about this; for December of 2011 Michele Bachmann and Ron Paul will get $18,000 in pay, yet both have an antecedence record of less than 5%. Does Newt feel they should do the same? How about surrogates, like Senator Rand Paul, who is now out on the campaign trail with his father. Should he forego his pay?

Or what about Newt himself. During his tenure in Congress, did he ever once sacrifice his salary while campaigning? No.

This is nothing but Newt grasping at straws and it shows what a two faced bastard he really is. Our political system certainly is screwed up and this is one of the reasons for it, but to sit there and demand only one person make this kind of sacrifice while others, including Newt himself, never have and never will, shows the hypocrisy that people like Newt will resort to just to pander to the fringe base. Of course that is the Newt we all have come to know. Don't you screw around on your wife, only I can. Now you can see why his campaign has imploded.

Today President Obama announced that he was freezing the salary of all White House aides. Not only that, but he also announced he was instituting new limits on lobbyists in the White House.

Since Bob Ney pleaded guilty Friday, we now have a felon sitting on the United States House of Representatives. Now he has said he will resign in the future and the Republicans have vowed to vote him out, but that will not happen until after their recess, which means Ney will continue to draw a salary from U.S. taxpayers.

This needs to become another key Democratic issue. Republicans really pissed America off last year when they all flew back into D.C., from around the country, late on a Sunday night in order to vote if they should step in on the Terri Schiavo fiasco. That was the first time in our nation's history that Congress has tried to intervene on an issue that affects only one person. The fact that a felon is now getting paid by U.S. taxpayers because the Republicans are to worried about themselves and won't take a vigilant stance is effecting the entire country.

Should our Congress be in the practice of harboring felons? That is exactly what they are doing right now. Ney's decision to plead guilty was no surprise either. We have known about it for a couple of months. Why didn't Congress take action before leaving? They knew damn well it was coming, and even what day it was coming on for well over a month.

What is really disturbing is the fact that Felons are not allowed to vote, yet we allow one to stay on the U.S. payroll and remain an active member of Congress? Oh I get it. To Republicans if you are poor, black, Hispanic or just not one of them, then if you commit a crime you loose your right to vote, even after paying your debt to society. If you are some white-Christian Republican, then you can remain in power even after you have confessed to your crimes, but yet start to repay your debt to society.

Let's sum that up. This man has not been convicted of a crime yet, however Republicans are demanding he be removed from office (and the Democrats have already removed him from all his committees, taking the vigilant stand).