Don’t believe the fear mongering about the coming decreases in the growth of defense spending.

Thanks to redistricting and the fact that it gained one new Congressional seat from reapportionment, there are apparently some rumors circulating in Georgia that former Congressman Bob Barr, most recently the 2008 Libertarian Party candidate for President, is considering a bid for a return trip to Congress. Barr hasn’t said publicly whether he’s running or [...]

The much celebrated ban on earmarks isn’t stopping Congressmen from trying to earmark.

One of the three major credit rating agencies has put the United States on negative credit watch: Following the failure of the supercommittee, the U.S. government’s AAA credit rating was placed on a “negative outlook” Monday by Fitch Ratings, indicating a more than 50 percent chance the country gets slapped with another downgrade in the [...]

Barney Frank, who has represented Massachusetts’ 4th Congressional District since he was elected in 1980, will announce later today that he will not be seeking re-election in 2012: US Representative Barney Frank, the state’s highest-profile congressman and one of the nation’s leading liberal voices after being among its first openly gay elected officials, planned to [...]

Grover Norquist has become the target of blame for problems that are far more deep than just one man.

Are Republicans mostly to blame for the supercommittee failure?

With the Super Committee dead, 2012 is likely to see a fight over the defense cuts set to take place starting in 2013.

Coming as no surprise to nobody, the co-chairs of the Joint Select Committee on the Deficit have announced the failure of their quixotic endeavor:  The bipartisan congressional committee tasked with finding at least $1.2 trillion in deficit reduction announced on Monday it cannot reach agreement by the Wednesday deadline, a stark if not unexpected admission [...]

Another meme debunked, plus some thoughts on policy.

Not surprisingly, the Supercommittee is a Super Failure.

Not surprisingly, today’s vote in the House on a Balanced Budget Amendment failed to achieve the 2/3 majority required: The GOP-controlled House failed on Friday to muster the required two-thirds majority vote to pass a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution, a legislative exercise agreed upon by both parties this summer in the deal that [...]

Rick Perry is out with a plan to reform Washington. Mostly, it’s just a bunch of gimmicks.

Senator Pat Toomey said this morning that Congress may end up working around the automatic cuts included in August’s budget deal if the Supercommittee fails to reach a budget deal that can be passed by Congress: A member of the deficit super committee says Congress likely would rethink allowing the automatic budget cuts to be [...]

Congressmen apparently regularly make investment moves based on the information they learn. Of course, for them it isn’t illegal.

Perversely, highly qualified nominees for the courts are more likely to be rejected by Congress.

A not insignificant number of House Republicans are joining with a group of House Democrats to call for a deficit reduction deal that includes spending cuts and tax increases: Forty House Republicans signaled support for revenue increases, joining 60 Democrats yesterday to urge a congressional supercommittee seeking a $1.5 trillion debt-reduction deal to aim for [...]

For some reason, the House Of Representatives decided that it was important to take time yesterday to debate this issue: The House took a break from battles over economic policy Tuesday and returned to the culture war. With overwhelming bipartisan support, the Republican-led chamber voted to reaffirm “In God We Trust” as the official U.S. [...]

For the most part, all those plans the candidates release are barely worth the paper they’re written on.

Increasing taxes on the rich may be a fiscal policy worth talking about, but it won’t make the poor richer.

The House Of Representatives will be in session for less than 1/3 of the year next year: House Majority Leader Eric Cantor released the 2012 House calendar today, and lawmakers will be spending even less time in Washington next year than they did this year. There are just six scheduled working days in January. Three [...]

Merrill Lynch is telling investors to expect another downgrade of U.S. debt before the end of the year: The United States will likely suffer the loss of its triple-A credit rating from another major rating agency by the end of this year due to concerns over the deficit, Bank of America Merrill Lynch forecasts. The [...]

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor abruptly canceled a long-scheduled speech to the Wharton Business School after school officials changed the guest list.

Commentary’s Alana Goodman is upset about the way the recent defeats for the American Jobs Act are being characterized in the media: Memo to Obama and the media: the Senate is controlled by Democrats. Which is why it’s curious that headlines like “Senate Republicans Block Obama’s Jobs Bill” continue to pop up all over the [...]

To the surprise of nobody, the Senate yesterday failed to muster the 60 votes necessary to proceed to debate on the American Jobs Act, as modified by Harry Reid on the revenue side: President Obama received a slap from members of his own party Tuesday as the Senate voted 50-49 to block his $447 billion [...]

Even if the Senate operated under wholly majority rules, it would not be the House.

Harry Reid takes to the Washington Post with a piece headlined “Trying to restore Senate comity,” which points out that Republicans are big poopy heads who hate America. Somehow, I think this will not have the effect of restoring comity to the Senate.

Not surprisingly, the “Super Committee” to deal with the deficit isn’t making much progress.

Samuel Wurzhelbacher is running for Congress: Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher, better known as “Joe the Plumber,” has taken steps toward launching a bid for a House seat in Ohio. Wurzelbacher filed candidacy papers with the Federal Election Commission on Friday, indicating he would run as a Republican from the state’s 9th district. “Joe the Plumber” emerged [...]

Harry Reid’s “nuclear option” has changed the rules of the game, for now.

Perhaps I’m misreading this, but I have a feeling that this quip could hurt Scott Brown in his re-election bid: Republican Senator Scott Brown made a crack about Democrat Elizabeth Warren’s physical appearance on a radio show this morning. Brown was responding to a crack Warren made in Tuesday’s debate, when the Democrat said that [...]

South Dakota Senator John Thune hinted today that the much-feared ATR tax pledge may be more vulnerable than thought: Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) said Wednesday that members of Congress shouldn’t be “bound by” taxpayer pledges, and suggested that such vows would need to be broken in order to achieve broad-based tax reform. Thune told MSNBC’s [...]

Well, they’re going to be hard-placed to blame this one on Republican obstructionism: Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said, at the moment, Democrats in Congress don’t have the votes to pass President Obama’s jobs bill, but Durbin added that that situation would change. “Not at the moment, I don’t think we do, but, uh, [...]

Beginning with “BREAKING: Witnesses reporting screams and gunfire heard inside Capitol building,” a series of tweets with the #CongressHostage hashtag have been decidedly unfunny.

North Carolina Bev Purdue (D) has come up with what may be both the most ridiculous and the most outrageous idea ever: North Carolina Gov. Bev Perdue (D) proposed suspending congressional elections for a cycle so legislators could focus on fixing the economy. “I think we ought to suspend, perhaps, elections for Congress for two [...]

Neither political party is resonating with the public right now, and neither is acting in the manner the public would like.

House Energy and Commerce Committee “is investigating Planned Parenthood’s federal funding, requesting lots of docs.”

It appears that the Republican and Democratic leaders have decided not to take us to the brink this time: Senate leaders agreed to a deal Monday evening that is almost certain to avert a federal government shutdown, a prospect that had unexpectedly arisen when congressional leaders deadlocked over disaster relief funding. After days of brinkmanship [...]

When the old rules don’t apply anymore, the system breaks down.

FEMA is about to run out of money, but don’t worry your Congressman is getting his vacation time in.

Judging by the defeat this afternoon of a Continuing Resolution backed by House GOP Leadership, the answer may be yes: WASHINGTON — In a rebuke to GOP leaders, the House on Wednesday rejected a measure providing $3.7 billion for disaster relief as part of a bill to keep the government running through mid-November. The surprise [...]

The second half of the President’s political strategy is in place. Don’t mistake it for a serious legislative effort.

We won’t solve our fiscal problems by soaking “the rich.”

Public disapproval of Congress continues to fall.

The President of the United States is touring the country promoting his jobs bill with shouts of “Pass This Bill” and telling crowds “If you love me, help me pass this bill.” In the Senate, however, even his fellow Democrats aren’t in a rush to get anything passed: Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said [...]

Ezra Klein argues that there aren’t many jobs for which Hill experience is an asset.

The “how to pay for it” part of the President’s jobs plan seems destined to be rejected by the GOP. Which may be exactly what the President wants.

With the economy at the forefront of the public’s mind, the GOP needs to be careful in its response to President Obama’s new jobs bill.

Top Democrats are starting to voice public concerns about 2012.

A Republican mailer in the surprisingly competitive Special Election to replace Anthony Weiner has dredged up last summer’s controversy over the so-called “Ground Zero Mosque”: New York Republicans have sent out a kitchen-sink mailer in the hotly-contested Queens congressional special election depicting a mosque superimposed over the scarred Ground Zero site on one side, and [...]