I Don’t Know What to Say
I spent way too much time obsessing today and made this picture.
I was fascinated by how few people are represented by these far right radicals. There are 435 voting members in the House of Representatives. What they couldn’t get at the ballot box, they’ll try to get by threatening to trash the economy. Why don’t they just ask for a pony of each of them while they’re at it?
While the negotiations for the affordable health care bill was going on, I was one of those people who criticized it from the left. However, after those negotiations were past, I stopped criticizing it. People on the far left were critical of people like me for “falling in line.” I don’t see it as “falling in line”, or even compromise. It’s a matter of priorities. We live in a democracy. That’s more important to me than having every last detail I want in any given piece of legislation. It seems that the members of the ironically named Tea Party Caucus don’t consider democracy a priority.
The names are hard to read in the picture. Here’s the list:
- Michele Bachmann, Minnesota, Chair
- Joe Barton, Texas
- Gus Bilirakis, Florida
- Rob Bishop, Utah
- Diane Black, Tennessee
- Michael C. Burgess, Texas
- Paul Broun, Georgia
- John Carter, Texas
- Bill Cassidy, Louisiana
- Howard Coble, North Carolina
- Mike Coffman, Colorado
- Ander Crenshaw, Florida
- John Culberson, Texas
- Jeff Duncan, South Carolina
- Blake Farenthold, Texas
- Stephen Fincher, Tennessee
- John Fleming, Louisiana
- Trent Franks, Arizona
- Phil Gingrey, Georgia
- Louie Gohmert, Texas
- Vicky Hartzler, Missouri
- Tim Huelskamp, Kansas
- Lynn Jenkins, Kansas
- Steve King, Iowa
- Doug Lamborn, Colorado
- Blaine Luetkemeyer, Missouri
- Kenny Marchant, Texas
- Tom McClintock, California
- David McKinley, West Virginia
- Gary Miller, California
- Mick Mulvaney, South Carolina
- Randy Neugebauer, Texas
- Rich Nugent, Florida
- Steven Palazzo, Mississippi
- Steve Pearce, New Mexico
- Ted Poe, Texas
- Tom Price, Georgia
- Phil Roe, Tennessee
- Dennis A. Ross, Florida
- Ed Royce, California
- Steve Scalise, Louisiana
- Pete Sessions, Texas
- Adrian Smith, Nebraska
- Lamar S. Smith, Texas
- Tim Walberg, Michigan
- Lynn Westmoreland, Georgia
- Joe Wilson, South Carolina
fojap 
Seems my state takes the prize for having the most. 😦 Thanks for preparing all the links. It probably wasn’t a task for you, but it would have been for me. I clicked on my representative and shouldn’t have. Going to spoil the rest of my day.
I just cut and pasted from Wikipedia. However, I did have to look up each person to find out their district and then find their district on a map, so it took an absurd amount of time. I did it partly because if you look at the map on Wikipedia they appear to represent a large portion of the country because some of the districts are big. I noticed that about Texas. Don’t feel too bad. Texas is a populous state. Louisiana and South Carolina are worse if you think about it in terms of percentage. I can’t see someone like Anne Richards coming from South Carolina. (No offense to South Carolina; one of my grandmothers lives there.)
I don’t know what she was like as a governor, but this is my favorite Ann Richards video.
I actually like my current Congressman, John Sarbanes, a lot. He represents a highly gerrymandered district colorfully known as “The Pinwheel of Death” due to its shape.
http://www.rollcall.com/features/Election-Preview_2011/election/top-5-ugliest-districts-210224-1.html
In the past, I’ve been represented by Jerry Nadler, who’s to the left of me politically, and Carolyn Maloney. Both of them are part of the Progressive Caucus, which has 68 voting house members. So, they’re actually more numerous than the Tea Party.
Since the Republicans have a majority, being a little bit obstructionist would be par for the course, but this behavior is dangerous for the country. They say that since the government has to prepare for the possibility of a shutdown, simply threatening to do so is costing the taxpayer money. It’s like if they had a credit card bill arrive and decided that they wouldn’t pay it because they’re trying to spend less money. What part of “car repossessed” do they not understand?
Ann Richards was a riot. I had not seen the video. Thanks.