Was it just 16 months ago that Nancy Pelosi, newly elected Speaker of the House and leader of the Democratic majority that took over the House and Senate declared that: "The election of 2006 was a call to change — not merely to change the control of Congress, but for a new direction for our country. Nowhere were the American people more clear about the need for a new direction than in Iraq. The American people rejected an open-ended obligation to a war without end.”
Pelosi, third in line to be president, the first woman to ever get that close, promised to spend the first 100 hours in control of Congress to begin to "drain the swamp" after more than a decade of Republican rule. A legislative package was included in the 100-hour promise along with the Iraq war promise and even a major cutback in pork barrel spending by congress.
As the deadlines came and went and congress still sputtered under new management about the only thing that changed was the approval rating for congress as it went into a freefall and plunged to the lowest levels in polling history, reaching around 13%, compared to the highly unfavorable president they were after whose rating also plunged to around 30%, still almost triple that of congress.
Her agenda for change was swept under the carpet along with all the campaign promises and the longer the Democratic contenders for president battle it out no one will notice how the new Democratic leadership failed to deliver on all their promises. And now Pelosi wants Bush to boycott the Olympic Opening ceremonies in China, yet another misguided effort that will only snub the USA Olympic team whose entire lives have been dedicated to representing us in China.
Concerning pork barrel spending, Nancy promised to reduce the spending by 50%. Every year since he became president Bush tried to eliminate the spending altogether but to no avail. So with a new House Speaker and a promise for reform things looked up and the first year the pork barrel did drop from $29 billion in 2006 to $13.2 billion in 2007 for 2,668 projects although the Bush vetoes had a lot to do with it.
Now we are in the second year of Pelosi rule and lo and behold, the pork barrel spigot seems to have been turned back on with expenditures rising to $18.3 billion for 12,881 pet projects. In just one year we went from a 60% reduction in spending to a 40% increase in spending, what a stunning turnaround. I guess Nancy forgot to mention she was only going to stop pork barrel for one year. And who is the national leader in pork barrel projects, why Hillary Clinton of course. Now just how are things changing for the better?
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