posted on May, 8 2008 @ 02:12 AM
In a previous post i made reference to the high salaries that our officials receive, i would now like to expand on that a little so that you may see
where i'm coming from. In congress: a congressman has a salary of $165,200. , speaker of the house $212,100.(during the 109th congress, 1-4-05
-1-3-07) ,party leaders $183,500. they receive a cost of living increase annually unless they vote not to accept it ( rotflmao, like they're gonna
refuse it) They are eligible for lifetime benefits after five years of service, including pension, health benefits, and social security. THEY set the
salaries of the members of congress, however the constitution prohibits changes in wages from taking effect during the congress in which it was
enacted. What if we we all had a job where we set our own salaries and gave ourselves raises regardless of wether or not we were performing our job
duties. Senate: senators have a salary of $169,300 as of
2008, president pro tempore and party leaders $188,100. they have fully vested retirements after five years of service in 2006 members that retired
with the old plan CSRS have an annual pension of $60,972. and members that retired under the new plan FERS have an annual pension of $ 35,952.
All of these figures come from wikipedia. You can find more
salaries of officials if you google Slaries of Federal Officials: a Fact Sheet.
All i'm saying is that with all the money that these officials make, from our tax dollars, don't you think that they
should be representing us instead of themselves and corporate america? Why are we allowing them to vote "present" that's not a vote it's answering
the teacher when she takes attendance ! We need to let them know that we are not going to accept this misrepresentation any longer. I live in Illinois
and i know that one of my senators has quite often voted "present" and that doesn't sit well with me, one time merely voting "present" imo is one
time too often. Would anyone like to take a guess who that senator is? Imagine if a senator that is so derelict in his duties as to merely vote
"present" were to run for president, how good of a job do you think he would do there?