Marriage -- it's hard work... or something

From Josh Marshall, I get referred over to this:

A plan to make Congress go back to working five days a week instead of the two that have become traditional during years of Republican dominance is causing a lot of whining.

"Keeping us up here eats away at families," said Rep. Jack Kingston (R-Ga.), who typically flies home on Thursdays and returns to Washington on Tuesdays. "Marriages suffer. The Democrats could care less about families -- that's what this says."

...

The new schedule poses a headache for Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.), who runs her 7-year-old daughter's Brownie troop meetings on Monday afternoons in Weston, Fla. "I'll have to talk to the other mothers and see if we can move it to the weekend," she said.


Gee, sucks to be a Congressman, right? I mean, our military personnel are deployed overseas for years at a time, but, hey, that's okay.

Still, it ain't all that bad:

Next year, members of the House will be expected in the Capitol for votes each week by 6:30 p.m. Monday and will finish their business about 2 p.m. Friday, Hoyer said.

Skipping out of work at 2 in the afternoon every Friday? Sweet! And, of course

Hoyer said members can bid farewell to extended holidays, the kind that awarded them six weekdays to relax around Memorial Day, when most Americans get a single day off. He didn't mention the month-long August recess, the two-week April recess or the weeks off in February, March and July.

Two weeks in April, a week in February, March, and July, and the whole month of August off... all for $165,200 a year!

I'm telling you, we need a way to fire these guys, and no, I don't mean 'elections'. We use elections to hire them. I want some kind of national referendum mechanism put into place whereby if a majority of American voters is dissatisfied with the way any Federal elected official is doing his job, we can vote him or her out of office at any time. That will keep the fuckers on their toes if anything will... and I think it's about the only thing that would.

Barring that, I would very much like to see Congressional salaries have to be approved by national referendum. And I wouldn't mind if a majority could vote to give them roll backs, either.