The CQ/Roll Call Guide to the Next Congress (pdf) is out, and it makes for depressing reading. We’ve really elected a group of ideological misfits. It’s a group of rodeo announcers, hog farmers, nursing home owners, car dealers, oilfield equipment CEO’s, derivatives traders, lobbyists, congressional aides, commercial trucking magnates, fumigators, investment bankers, air conditioning and heating company owners, insurance agents, energy company executives, and, of course, lawyers. A very large number of these freshmen have never held any previous elected office. But they almost all agree that our changing climate is not a problem and that we shouldn’t concern ourselves about carbon pricing. They almost all deny that women have any privacy or reproductive rights. They almost all are hostile to any kind of gay rights. None of them, as far as I know, have any interest in helping to resolve the mess down at Guantanamo Bay. They are all for massive tax cuts, especially business tax cuts, and the Estate Tax. They all want to gut entitlements to help pay for those tax cuts. Many of them are stridently anti-Latino. This is a train wreck waiting to happen.
The New Congress
