U.S. Constitution, Amendment XXVIINo law, varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect, until an election of Representatives shall have intervened.
When this Amendment was ratified in 1992 it looked like any pay raise would have to wait for an election to take place, and that a pay raise couldn't possibly happen any more frequently than every two years.
But, lo and behold, the bums were ready to put THAT silly idea to rest!.
Once again -- and for the fifth year in a row -- the Senate and House has voted themselves a pay raise that goes into effect when the next session starts in January. How can this be? Because immediately after the 27th Amendment was ratified they wrote a law that automatically gives them a "cost of living" (COLA) increase unless they specifically vote it down.
In the past five years they've not unvoted themselves an additional $21,000 a year. (That's over 9 million of our tax dollars every year, and it'll go up again next year.)
Uuuuh, forgive me, but I don't believe that the cost of freakin' LIVING has gone up for Senator Graftcat by almost what I make in a year.
Unless, of course, the price of the Congressman's food, mortgage, electricity, cable TV, gasoline, telephone and heating oil has gone up 6 or 7 times what mine has. I haven't gotten a raise in two or three years, and many people have lost their income altogether, but our esteemed "leaders" get a COLA increase on their entire income, most of which -- if we accept a strict definition of a Cost of Frickin' Living -- is discretionary.
Oh, goody! Congressman Backscratch gets to buy three new Armani suits and hire another maid next spring.
So with respect to the 27th Amendment, they get a pay raise but it's not a new law.
'm guessing that the language of the Amendment was deliberately worded to allow this rot.
Grrrr, I've got more to say on this but Kristine Vander Hauvel is on Chris Mathews torguing me off because she has no understanding of the history of Vietnam nor, obviously, the current situation in Iraq.
Posted by Tuning Spork at October 23, 2003 07:51 PM