Today in Washington, D.C. - Aug 11, 2010 - Congress Heads Home to Face Dismal Approval Ratings

Yesterday, the House voted 247-161, largely on party lines, to concur in the Senate amendment to H.R. 1586, the $26 billion state bailout bill. The bill was signed into law by President Obama yesterday

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has announced the Senate will hold a short session at 10 AM tomorrow to consider a unanimous consent request to pass H.R. 6080, a bill with funding for border security measures the House passed yesterday by voice vote. Yes, the Senate previously passed a bill supporting border security, but they got the "cart ahead of the horse" as all revenue spending bill must originate in the House. So their will be a quick unanimous consent vote on H.R. 6080. The Senate will also take up a resolution honoring the late Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK). Most senators who have traveled to their home states will not be returning from recess to vote on these issues.

After hurrying to Washington to approve Democrat leaders’ $26 billion bailout for states and teachers’ unions, House Democrats scattered back to their districts today to explain their votes to their constituents. But as The Wall Street Journal editorializes today, it seems that Democrats had one constituency above all others in mind with their votes yesterday: “Standing with teachers yesterday in the White House Rose Garden, Mr. Obama said, ‘We can't stand by and do nothing while pink slips are given to the men and women who educate our children or keep our communities safe.’ Maintaining the salaries and generous benefit plans for members of teachers unions is indeed a top Democratic priority. That's why $10 billion of the bill's funding is allocated to education, and the money comes with strings that will multiply the benefits for this core Obama constituency. Specifically, the bill stipulates that federal funds must supplement, not replace, state spending on education. Also, in each state, next year's spending on elementary and secondary education as a percentage of total state revenues must be equal to or greater than the previous year's level.”

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell pointed out last week, “Our friends on the other side are now in the business of paying for states to hire more workers even if they can’t afford it on their own. Why? Because it creates a permanent need for future state bailouts, at a time when we can least afford it.” Indeed, the WSJ editors note both Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour and Texas Governor Rick Perry expressing frustration at the Democrat bill’s altering of state budgets and forcing more spending.

But that’s not the only thing about this bill Americans should view with a skeptical eye. The WSJ editors write, “Keep in mind that this teacher bailout also amounts to a huge contribution by Democrats to their own election campaigns. The National Right to Work Committee estimates that two of every three teachers belong to unions. The average union dues payment varies, but a reasonable estimate is that between 1% and 1.5% of teacher salaries goes to dues. The National Education Association and other unions will thus get as much as $100 million in additional dues from this bill, much of which will flow immediately to endangered Democratic candidates in competitive House and Senate races this year.”

Sen. McConnell made a similar observation. “[T]his bill is a brazen attempt to funnel more money to the public employee unions before an election at a moment of record deficits and debt, and to set the stage for a massive tax hike before the end of the year. It’s time Democrats in Congress stop funneling billions of dollars to their favored constituencies and asking the American people to pay for it with higher taxes.”

“So,” the WSJ ediors summarize, “in the name of still another ‘stimulus,’ Democrats are rewarding their own political funders, putting the most fiscally responsible states into even greater distress, and postponing the day of reckoning for spendthrift states.”

It’s precisely this kind of behavior that’s resulted in stunningly low approval ratings of the Democrat-run Congress. In a poll today, Gallup finds only 19% approve of the job the Democrat-led Congress is doing, while a whopping 75% disapprove. Gallup notes, “Congress' average approval rating thus far in 2010 is 20% -- down from 30% in 2009, the first year of the 111th  Congress. This year's average easily trails the 36% average approval Gallup has recorded for Congress since the measure was established in 1974, and is the lowest seen in any midterm congressional election year since then.”

“The persistently low approval of Congress this year is a strong signal of public discontent with the legislative branch,” Gallup writes. And now Democrats have yet another expensive piece of legislation to defend to their constituents who don’t belong to teachers unions.

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