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| Congress Outsourced Congress Walks the Line |
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The 537 members of the US House of Representatives and the US Senate were chagrined to learn that they had obsoleted themselves in legislation authorizing $87 billion for the reconstruction of Iraq and Afghanistan. A minute detail in the fine print authorized the reduction of $85 million in federal government expenses. Few members read far enough into the details to realize that the authorization includes the disbanding of Congress. “The devil is always in the details,” said former House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt from the presidential campaign trail. Few members noticed that the figure happened to be almost exactly the cost of the new $158,100 salaries that will be paid to members of the legislative bodies next year, before the cost of health care, executive lunches and parking spaces at Ronald Reagan National Airport. Former House Majority Leader Tom Delay — who has taken on a position removing the bugs from the software that will replace Congress — explained the need. “For the cost of a single hangnail surgery for a member of Congress at Bethesda Navy Hospital,we can pay the salary of an energetic, productive Punjab programmer,” Delay said, "this way we can create a custom database of yay or nay answers to a set of common legislative issues into a PC,”. With the exception of a refrigerator full of Snapple iced teas and a case of cheese crackers per month, the costs of expensive Congressional perks will be largely eliminated," Delay added. “If anyone is concerned about the fairness of reducing Congressional votes down to a single computer program, let me assure you that the results will be as fair as the newly introduced Diebold election machines,” Delay said. “These votes couldn’t be any fairer if I had programmed them myself.” In his Saturday radio address announcing the termination of the entire Congress, George W. Bush said he made the move as a last resource. “The people of Iraq have never known freedom, and if word got out to them what it costs to run a Congress, we would need a hell of a lot more than $87 billion to finance the reconstruction.” Bush said he realizes there are probably not a lot of job opportunities for 537 people who have spent their entire lives in politics, playing with other people’s money and having public arguments on national television. “Take it from me, if you find yourself out of opportunities, always ask your daddy, Bush said. “…chances are he’ll have something else for you.” Although some angry members of Congress threatened to take up the vote for the Iraq money a second time, members of the Bush administration wasted no time in moving the Congressional offices out of the Capitol building. US General Services Administrator Stephen A. Perry says the building has already been sold to Wal-Mart Inc. and will operate as Wal-Mart Super Center beginning this weekend. The new store may even allow some of the former members of Congress back to work at Wal-Mart’s standard rate of $5.15 per hour. However, senior management at Wal-Mart insists the former members of Congress will have to earn that salary. With Congressional elections removed from the 2004 agenda, the Bush administration says it may decide to save even more money by eliminating the need for next year’s presidential election. “Elections are such a waste,” President Bush noted. “Just a year ago, Saddam Hussein was re-elected by a 99 percent vote, and Gray Davis was elected by about 56 percent of the people, and look at them now.” |
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The
Bush administration says it will save much of the cost of rebuilding Iraq
by outsourcing Congress to a Microsoft computer facility in India. "It's
time that Congress looks more like America, "Bush said. "Much
of America fears its jobs will be outsourced.