The NY Times has this funny story about the Dem run Congress.

Dems are not to blame for their failures to get anything done during the last 6months - not it is the evil Republicans

I would have loved to be a fly of the wall as the NY Times newroom found out the new Zogby poll showing the Dem Congress with record low poll numbers


BTW - that polll is not in the NY Times today. Strange, they carried all the polls showing the low numbers for Pres Bush and the Republican Comgress



Partisan Anger Stalls Congress in Final Push


WASHINGTON, Aug. 3 — Congress stumbled toward its August recess on a discordant note Friday as angry partisanship and distrust slowed the House and Senate in the latest example of the ideological standoff that has made progress difficult all year.

A bitter procedural fight in the House forced Democrats to delay until at least Saturday consideration of final bills that they had hoped would cap a week of accomplishment. But lawmakers put their disagreements aside long enough to advance $250 million to help rebuild the collapsed bridge in Minneapolis.

The divisiveness was the culmination of months of intense clashes on Capitol Hill as the newly empowered Democrats sought to press their agenda. The effort remained incomplete Friday, leaving dangling legislation to improve energy efficiency, rewrite terrorist surveillance rules and map out Pentagon spending.

Even as they tried to fight off Republican accusations of heavy-handedness, Democrats sought to portray their first months in charge as a success, pointing to this week’s approval of new ethics and lobbying rules as well as initial House and Senate passage of a major expansion of a children’s health care program.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Democrat of California, said the resistance was emblematic of the Republican strategy to block legislation in order to paint Democrats as incompetent. “They have nothing else to talk about,” Ms. Pelosi said in an interview. “Their party has been hijacked by people who don’t really have an agenda but to stop progress.”

But House Republicans were incensed and accused Democrats of abruptly gaveling a roll-call vote to a close when Republicans appeared to be pulling ahead on an agricultural-spending bill late Thursday. “Rarely has the radical agenda of this Democrat majority been more on display,” said Representative Jeb Hensarling of Texas, chairman of the conservative Republican Study Committee.

House and Senate Republicans joined President Bush in demanding that Congress remain in session until it passed changes in a terrorist surveillance program acceptable to the administration. Democrats said they suspected Republicans were more interested in painting Democrats as soft on terror, saying that every time they acceded to administration requests, new ones surfaced. But the Senate cleared a legislative fix for the program Friday night, and House leaders said they anticipated approval Saturday.

The infighting took an almost surreal turn Friday afternoon when House voting machinery malfunctioned just hours after the blowup over the agricultural bill. The failure of the equipment — which displays the running vote total and the time remaining during a procedural fight on the floor — had lawmakers on edge and both sides looking over their shoulders.

“I am just trying to figure out who is doing the dastardly things,” said Representative Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland, the majority leader, as he urged calm during what Representative David Dreier, Republican of California, described as a “very, very difficult time for this institution.”

After one last shouting match Friday night between Republicans and Democrats, the House adjourned until Saturday. Members of the Senate, which was at a standstill for much of the day as the surveillance measure was negotiated, filed out for their recess after approving that bill.

Republicans dismissed Democratic claims of overall legislative success, pointing to dismal approval ratings for Congress as evidence that the public is unhappy with the new majority party’s performance. And Democrats have so far been unable to deliver on a chief demand of many party supporters — the beginning of withdrawal of troops from Iraq.

Even a news conference by Democratic leaders, intended to highlight the recent achievements, was postponed twice on Friday as negotiations continued over the surveillance bill. Finally, when the leaders emerged, they looked ahead to legislative action on the war in September and a potential showdown with Mr. Bush over federal spending.

“We have great hurdles to overcome,” said Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader.

Democrats dismissed as hollow the Republican mantra that the new managers of Congress have accomplished little. They said that they had succeeded in spite of fierce Republican resistance.

for the complete article

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/04/wa...6z97DgTZueYOpA