“United States Congress” on The Daily Caller

Congress has generated its lowest approval rating in decades. President Barack Obama is treading the 50 percent line with his approval ratings. (more)

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) is considering canceling the results of the November elections by changing the Senate rules when senators conduct their opening day procedures on January 5th. Democrats want to reduce the number of senators needed to invoke cloture (limit debate). (more)

According to a George Washington University study, the Obama administration issued 16,200 regulations in 2009. In comparison, just 28,400 regulations were issued in the period from April 1996 through December 2000. If this doesn’t get your jaw dropping, a 57% increase in the staffing and the federal funds devoted to developing and enforcing federal regulations should have you shaking your head. Also, in order to get an accurate picture of regulators run amok, you need to add to these 16,200 regulations the thousands of regulations included in the financial reform bill, the food safety bill and the health care bill, all passed in 2010. Finally, a full picture of regulators on steroids can be plainly seen if you also add the final weeks in December 2010, when Obama’s regulators continued to issue rules and vote on regulations that had been defeated or vigorously opposed in Congress. (more)

A key issue animating Tea Party energy among conservative activists who helped propel Republicans into control of the House on Election Day is that much of the congressional agenda over the last two years is unconstitutional. (more)

The founder and chairman of the Congressional Constitution Caucus wants to ensure that all Hill staffers are familiar with their country’s founding principles. (more)

The lame-duck Congress is a clone of Marvin K. Mooney. He’s the Dr. Seuss character who refused to leave. (more)

The House on Wednesday passed a measure that authorizes almost $1.1 trillion in government spending for the rest of the fiscal year, which would be the same level as last year.  (more)

After voting to institute a ban on earmarks, the House GOP Conference is now faced with an overhaul of how Republican members — and, ultimately, the House of Representatives — will do business in the 112th Congress. The conference vote, taking place Wednesday, will show American taxpayers how serious the new majority will be in changing the bias towards bigger government and higher spending. (more)

In what amounts to an epic constitutionality #fail, Senate Democrats may have blown their chances to see their food safety bill signed into law. (more)

In July of 1958, Jim Bunning walked into Fenway Park and did what was seemingly impossible — he threw a no-hitter against Ted Williams and the Boston Red Sox. (more)

Nearly every major media outlet is reporting that if the president’s fiscal commission gets agreement among 14 of its 18 members, it will force a vote in Congress.  They are wrong. (more)

Last week, the American people sent a loud message to Washington: Congress needs to be reformed and get back to the business of representing the people. The American people are tired of Congress continually expanding the cost and scope of the government. The American people are tired of Congress passing destructive bills that are thousands of pages long and that no one has even read. The American people are tired of Congress and the Administration putting special interests ahead of the common good, whether by exempting unions from new laws or by bailing out corporate failures. (more)

The New York Times reported on Wednesday that lobbyists are now courting potential Republican chairmen with fundraisers in an effort to create and cement relationships prior to a potential Republican takeover of the House. The White House communications director called this story another sign of Republicans’ “loyalty to these special interests.” (more)

Defending her record of leadership last summer, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told Politico she would defend “every grain of sand” of what she’s built in Congress. Truer words were never spoken — having passed a slew of bills no one read, with bipartisan opposition and little public support, Pelosi’s agenda increasingly looks like a House built upon sand and vulnerable to the shifting political tides. (more)

Changing the membership of Congress does not fix its out-of-touch culture. (more)

This Sunday, many New York Times readers will read that our country spent $787 billion on an economic experiment or test model of sorts. You know, that test model known as the “stimulus.” The New York Times’ White House correspondent, Peter Baker, says that the president admitted in an interview with him that he learned too late that “there’s no such thing as shovel-ready projects.” (more)

With the return of Congress from more than a monthlong recess, the pace in the legislative mills ranges somewhere between sluggish and stalled. (more)

Last Thursday, Americans sat fixated as a banner across the bottom of their television screens announced that the government was about to hand down indictments for Congressional lying. (more)

When a Congressional committee summoned Roger Clemens to testify at a nationally televised hearing in February 2008, it was trying to determine the accuracy of George J. Mitchell’s report, which had named Clemens as a user of steroids and human growth hormone. (more)

The cartoon musical television series Schoolhouse Rock presents children with an educational perspective on how the United States government creates laws. An animated piece of legislation, aptly named “Bill,” dances on the steps of the Capitol and sings, “I’m just a bill.
 Yes, I’m only a bill.
 And I’m sitting here on Capitol Hill.” He explains to viewers the entire legislative process, from committee consideration to the possibility of a presidential veto. While this series is considered by many to be a classic teaching tool, it fails to accurately prepare its audience for the reality of this Democratic-controlled Congress. (more)