Saturday, October 13, 2012
There are lots of reasons not to re-elect an incumbent. The good reasons have to do with differences of opinion. You believe in this. He/she believes in that, and the difference is a deal breaker.
Unfortunately, Congressman Ruppersberger, running for his sixth term to represent Maryland’s Second Congressional District, hasn’t done enough while he’s been in office to make whatever he believes worth arguing about. Take a look at the table below. You can click on it to make it larger.
In the almost 10 years he’s represented the Second District, he’s introduced 45 bills and 12 resolutions. Of the 45 bills, only one has been signed into law and that had to do with a commemorative coin, hardly a solution to unemployment, under-employment, poverty, deficit spending, a runaway national debt or the edge of the “fiscal cliff” we’ll all be driving over if Congress doesn’t do anything about it soon. Of the 12 resolutions he introduced, none passed the house.
In the meantime, we’ve paid Congressman Ruppersberger $1,670,600, plus benefits and watched him take $2,925,651 from special interests, many of those dollars from PACs whose interests are aligned with his committee memberships – in return for who knows what.
As you can see from the voting percentages, he’s largely been content to sit back, rubber stamp his party’s line and do what amounts to Congressional busy work.
Is Congressman Ruppersberger really the best we can do, or is he a poster boy for why public respect for Congress is at record lows? Fortunately, voters in Maryland’s Second Congressional District have an option. She’s Maryland State Senator Nancy Jacobs. They should vote for her three reasons. One is that she’s extremely capable. The second is that she hasn’t and won’t take special interest money for her campaigns. The families of the Second District will be the only special interests she represents.
Third, and perhaps most important, voting to re-elect Dutch Ruppersberger means rewarding him for being precisely the kind of Congressman we want out of Washington. Voting to re-elect Congressman Ruppersberger sends the wrong message to Congress and, frankly, says more about us, that we’re willing to tolerate, to settle for someone with his record, than it says about the Congressman himself.
Ask yourself the following questions: Just what exactly has Congressman Ruppersberger done for my family during the past 10 years he’s been in office? Has the work he’s done in Congress been worth the $1,670,600 we’ve paid him? Does his addiction to taking special interest money bother you, and what is he giving those special interests in return?
For one day, every two years, you have a chance to change your government, to remind Congress that they work for us, that we, not they, are in charge. That day is Tuesday, November 6. Don’t blow it.
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