High-Priced Politician
Senator Mary Landrieu is one of our most expensive politicians. You do remember her invoice to taxpayers for her vote on Obamacare? Landrieu demanded a $300,000 payment to Medicaid for Louisiana before she would vote for the program. That noxious deal became known as the Louisiana Purchase and, along with a similar bribe dubbed “the Nebraska Cornhusker Kickback” to Sen. Ben Nelson, were the deciding votes which allowed the Bill to pass.
But she’s an award winner! Citizens Against Government Waste has just nominated her 2013 Porker of the Year for her refusal to support reform of “the antiquated and costly federal sugar program in the Senate version of the 2013 Farm Bill.” Her arrogant response to her critics: “Yes, the price of a candy bar might be a penny or two higher, but who needs cheaper candy bars? No one.”
Senator, what we actually need are cheaper politicians.
But career politicians do not follow their own rules–they’re above that, you know. They call themselves “public servants” but act like little kings and queens. A recent case in point is the bloated $1.1 trillion, 1,532-page omnibus spending bill that breezed through both House and Senate without any of our “public servants” even bothering to read it. It’s their job, dammit! This pork-filled monstrosity was passed instead of the legally mandated budget; the Congressional Budget Act requires the President to submit a budget to Congress by February 1st and then the House and Senate have to agree on a final version.
And it is Sen. Mary Landrieu and the other Poster Children who are responsible for this sad state by their breach of duty. Tragically, thanks to these entrenched career politicians, the United States is well along on the path to financial ruin.
Senator Rand Paul offered a Bill (S.Res 28) to the current 113th congress that “Makes it out of order in the Senate to consider any measure or matter until one session day has passed since introduction for every 20 pages included in the measure or matter in the usual form, plus one session day for any number of remaining pages less than 20.” as seen in this video. Sen. Harry Reid, the Majority Leader, would not allow it to be voted upon. Sen. Reid recently called the idea of passing a budget “foolish.”
As another poster, Rep. John Conyers said, “What good is reading the bill if it’s a thousand pages and you don’t have two days and two lawyers to find out what it means after you read the bill?” (See Sen. Reid’s and Rep. Conyers’ posters –click their names on the right side of this page).
Now you know why we call these Poster Children “the worst of a bad lot.”
Mary Landrieu is true to her roots–she’s from a political family. Her father, Moon Landrieu, was mayor of New Orleans and a former secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Her brother Mitch is the current New Orleans mayor and formerly lieutenant governor of Louisiana. She went to a Catholic high school and graduated Louisiana State University in 1977. After a couple of state-level posts and a failed run for governor in 1995 she was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1996 and has been there since. She’s also chair of the Homeland Security Appropriations subcommittee. She’s up for reelection in 2014.(See comment following.)
As most of our posters, Landrieu has spent her entire life in politics with little or no experience in the private sector. No matter–in 2008 she became Chair of the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship! Career pols get to rule on subjects they have no understanding of or experience in –it’s all a matter of tenure. Special interests affected by their laws help them understand their business needs while contributing to their reelection. And for the career pol, reelection is Job #1.
With term limits it will be more likely that candidates who have been successful in business and professional careers can get elected. Real life experience might avoid much of the counter-productive rules and regulations coming from lifetime professional politicians whose only experience is politics.
The U.S. unfunded liabilities debt (promised future obligations) now exceeds $118.5 trillion, a debt of over $1 million per U.S. taxpayer. And now we must add in the multi-trillion dollar Obamacare law. On March 1, 2012, Landrieu voted against a measure that would have repealed a birth control mandate in the health care bill. In October 2013, she introduced a bill to force health insurance companies to re-issue plans which they had already cancelled.
Without Sen. Landrieu’s votes, Obamacare would not be the disaster to our healthcare system and economy that it is today.
All of our poster children have been in congress during the period of this incredible spending spree and these long-tenured politicians did nothing to control spending–and all of them approved regular increases in the debt limit.
The non-partisan ratings groups: NationalTaxpayers Union (NTU) for taxing and spending and Citizens Against Government Waste’s (CAGW) for waste and extravagance. NTU gives Landrieu an “F” for most years and a “D” for others, among the worst in congress http://tinyurl.com/m54ybcl. CAGW rates her “Hostile” to taxpayers http://tinyurl.com/l635p97. The Club for Growth looks for votes that allow for free markets to function in growing the economy; the Club rates her at a lowly 16% meaning she votes for growth-stifling programs 84% of the time! http://tinyurl.com/mx2zzy3 . No wonder the economy is stagnant.
Her Heritage Action score is currently 3% http://tinyurl.com/k7avjba –that makes Landrieu 97% liberal. The ADA gave her credit for voting to not let religious groups opt out of the Obamacare abortifacient* mandate. (She says she’s a Catholic.) But the ADA didn’t like her vote to enable the construction of the XL pipeline. http://tinyurl.com/25fntsq
For more clarity go to the sites for details –just click on the links given after each to see all of the votes. Congressional term limits is a costless reform that can go a long way to limiting the damage that entrenched politicians like these Poster Children can do. Now, with congress approval ratings in single digits is a propitious time to get it done. See www.termlimits.organd sign the petition –we’re already over 250,000 signatures on our way to a million.
*abortion-inducing drugs, etc.
She's so Washington D.C. (District of Corruption) that she doesn't even live in LA anymore.
Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA) likes to spend your tax dollars. She voted for the failed stimulus bill, Obamacare, Cash for Clunkers, the housing bailout, and for billions of dollars in wasteful earmarks. But did you know that Mary Landrieu also spent your tax dollars on charter airplanes to travel to campaign fundraisers? That's the report from CNN, which has landed the Louisiana Democrat in some pretty hot water. It's illegal to use tax dollars for campaign expenses. This breach of trust was discovered after USA Today published a story revealing that Landrieu had charged taxpayers $47,000 for charter airplanes and… Read more »
Rob Maness is a constitutional conservative with a remarkable record of service to our country. He understands the value of our freedoms and will fight to repeal Obamacare and stop the massive spending, bailouts, and debt that are bankrupting our country. He offers voters a compelling choice over Senator Mary Landrieu because he's not a Washington insider. Rob Maness is a principled leader who will make Louisiana proud