I’ve been working on the….campaign trail…
For most of the population, if you missed important meetings, numerous days of work (without a viable reason) or did not carry out the responsibilities of your job I doubt very much you would be employed for very long.
Not so for members of Congress according to this post at Evangelical Outpost:
Can a Senator or Congressional Representative do their job as a legislator if they never show up for work? Ask the ten legislators currently running for President. Each has continued to collect their $165,200 salary while missing votes during the current Congress:
John McCain has missed 218 votes (53.3%)
Joseph Biden has missed 146 votes (35.7%)
Christopher Dodd has missed 140 votes (34.2%)
Barack Obama has missed 139 votes (34.0%)
Sam Brownback has missed 134 votes (32.8%)
Duncan Hunter has missed 321 votes (28.8%)
Tom Tancredo has missed 311 votes (28.0%)
Ron Paul has missed 276 votes (24.8%)
Hillary Clinton has missed 76 votes (18.6%)
Dennis Kucinich has missed 126 votes (11.3%)Federal law requires the Secretary of the Senate and the Chief Administrative Officer of the House to deduct the pay of congress members who are absent without just cause (and, no, running for President is not a valid excuse). Each of these candidates should refund the portion of their salaries that were due to campaign related absences.
There is much more at the link, but I found the above paragraph rather intriguing. It would certainly be interesting to know if any of the candidates throughout the years, not only in this election cycle, have refunded any of their salary due to campaign absence.
I think I probably know the answer already, but it would be nice to think that there are those who would honor the law and return monies which they have not earned. Or, maybe there is a loophole in this law which allows them to earn taxpayer dollars while not actually carrying out the duties with which they have charged by their constituents.
It’s just another one of those unknowns, and will probably remain so, when it comes to politics today.
Written by Sue
~J~ Says:
November 20th, 2007 at 3:04 amVisit ~J~
What I wonder and am concerned about is why the Chief Administrative Officer of each chamber isn’t doing his/her job?