Personally, I think they should work for free! (Senate pay raises)

[XMan]

Link

Do you feel that you're getting your money's worth?

 

[burnedout]

Personally, I think they should work for free!

Personally, I think they should pay us for serving in the Senate.

To answer your question, no, I don't feel that we receive our money's worth.

 

[smashp]

Originally posted by: X-Man
Link

Do you feel that you're getting your money's worth?

I didnt realize that whores and prostitutes made so much in amaerica today.

 

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by: X-Man
Link

Do you feel that you're getting your money's worth?

Actually if they were paid more maybe we could get those from the Private Sector who could really do the job. Those who can go for the money, those who can't teach or end up in Politics. Dubya is a perfect example of that!

 

[CADsortaGUY]

Wow - 4 minutes for a Bush quip.

Fine - now for mine.

I wonder who voted which way....or better yet...who didn't even vote. Hmm....

CkG

 

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by: CADkindaGUY
Wow - 4 minutes for a Bush quip.

Fine - now for mine.

I wonder who voted which way....or better yet...who didn't even vote. Hmm....

CkG

I voted for McCain in both the CA Primary and the General Elelction. Did you vote for the Dub like your party Leaders instructed you to do?

 

[DealMonkey]

If only America's working poor could vote themselves a pay raise. Hmmm, what would WalMart employees be making if they could vote a wage increase 5x in the last 5 years?

 

[prontospyder]

Originally posted by: CADkindaGUY
Wow - 4 minutes for a Bush quip.

Fine - now for mine.

I wonder who voted which way....or better yet...who didn't even vote. Hmm....

CkG

Didn't vote:
Boxer (D-CA), Domenici (R-NM), Edwards (D-NC), Ensign (R-NV), Kerry (D-MA), and Murkowski (R-AK).

Complete Roll Call

 

[prontospyder]

Nay votes broken down by party:

Republicans: 19
Democrats: 15

 

[konichiwa]

Whatever they get as salary is paltry compared to the sum they recieve from lobbies. It's no wonder the rings in their noses are tugged by the lobby-whores and not the public, as they should be.

 

[Zebo]

For the fifth straight year, members of Congress will see a jump in their paychecks in 2004, with election-year salaries rising from the current $154,700 to about $158,000.

Bastards.when americans are loosing jobs and senators get a pot of gold on retirement in private sector.
Job should be unpaid 6 year limit.

 

[Aegion]

Originally posted by: Zebo

For the fifth straight year, members of Congress will see a jump in their paychecks in 2004, with election-year salaries rising from the current $154,700 to about $158,000.

Bastards.when americans are loosing jobs and senators get a pot of gold on retirement in private sector.
Job should be unpaid 6 year limit.

You know everyone in this thread who is seriously advocating something like this is ignoring the logical consquences. It would literally and completely turn the US into a Plutocracy. Only the very rich could potentially afford to spend the extensive time handling congressional business and not get paid. Right now you may need to raise funds to get elected, but its possible to do this without being very wealthy to start with. A congressional job would mean you can't work another job at the same time. With this change, a limited pool of wealthy candidates would the only people willing to take the job. (There might be a few other nutty people willing to do so, but they are likely to be involved in a bribery scandal a couple of years into their turn when they end up broke and need to get money somehow.) Not paying Congressmen at all is trully an awful idea.

 

[ITJunkie]

Not even close. They're P'sOS that are robbing us blind.

 

[Zebo]

Originally posted by: Aegion

Originally posted by: Zebo

For the fifth straight year, members of Congress will see a jump in their paychecks in 2004, with election-year salaries rising from the current $154,700 to about $158,000.

Bastards.when americans are loosing jobs and senators get a pot of gold on retirement in private sector.
Job should be unpaid 6 year limit.

You know everyone in this thread who is seriously advocating something like this is ignoring the logical consquences. It would literally and completely turn the US into a Plutocracy. Only the very rich could potentially afford to spend the extensive time handling congressional business and not get paid. Right now you may need to raise funds to get elected, but its possible to do this without being very wealthy to start with. A congressional job would mean you can't work another job at the same time. With this change, a limited pool of wealthy candidates would the only people willing to take the job. (There might be a few other nutty people willing to do so, but they are likely to be involved in a bribery scandal a couple of years into their turn when they end up broke and need to get money somehow.) Not paying Congressmen at all is trully an awful idea.

Everyone of them is already a millionaire before they take office now ! (which raises another interesting question, why would they quit that job to take one paying pennies in comparison?(kick backs, FOB?)) It's already a plutoracy. How many teachers, plumbers, farmers and normal everyday people you see running let alone winning? In the past I heard it was much more populistic.

 

[BaliBabyDoc]

Exemption from the SS/Medicare system and automatic COLA . . . make the US Congress the most unaccountable group of public servants in America. Accordingly, the power of the US government (particularly Executive/Legislative) branches should be dramatically curtailed. Jesse Helms and Strom Thurmond were scarcely short of a century of BS . . . including almost a decade where they did little more than consume millions in healthcare benefits while their staffs and other unelected twits/lobbyists distorted the democratic process.

Clearly, the GOP Congress has not been good for budgetary restraint or accountability. Unfortunately, those damn Democrats are scarcely better.

 

[308nato]

Certainly goes against what I interpret as the founding fathers intentions. I don't think they ever planned for Congress to need huge salaries and retirement packages. I always took "of the people-by the people-for the people' to mean the average joe should be grateful they had a chance to *SERVE* a term or 2 in washington and then go back to whatever they did before.

No matter what their stripe or spot , the professional (and I use the term loosely) career politician has been one of the, if not THE, biggest contributing factors in creating the current clusterf@ck in DC.

Its possible that we might all agree that re-election to the public dole is the main concern of the majority who fling poo down at us daily.

 

[burnedout]

Originally posted by: Zebo

For the fifth straight year, members of Congress will see a jump in their paychecks in 2004, with election-year salaries rising from the current $154,700 to about $158,000.

Bastards.when americans are loosing jobs and senators get a pot of gold on retirement in private sector.
Job should be unpaid 6 year limit.

Exactly! Congress really pissed me off about this topic in '92 (maybe late '91 - can't remember) when they voted themselves a payraise in the depths of a recession.

I'm in complete favor of campaign finance reform. Congressional elections should have a level playing field. There are plenty of PhDs, retired officers, disillusioned attorneys and other capable leaders out there who would gladly take $100K per year for the opportunity to really serve our country.

 

[BaliBabyDoc]

No matter what their stripe or spot , the professional (and I use the term loosely) career politician has been one of the, if not THE, biggest contributing factors in creating the current clusterf@ck in DC.

There is something to be said for experience and it is reasonable to believe that weak Reps/Sens would get rolled even moreso by lobbyists and career bureaucrats. It would be nice to see a moral stand by the President. But considering he insisted on fat pay raises for his White House political hacks last year, I doubt he really cares about Congress raiding our pockets as well.