Talk with Alaska's Sole Congressman

[Sourdough]

Congressman Don Young was in town yesterday.  He stopped in for lunch with our wildlife group.  We had an interesting discussion about what is going on in DC.  He told us about a bill he is putting togeather, and looking for other congressmen to sponsor it.  Congressman Young talked about the number of regulations passed by agencies since 1991, that are being used as laws.  This process circumvents congress, and is improper.  Don Young told us there are over a million of these regulations.  His bill will strip these regulations and any authority that goes along with them, off the books.  Any agency that wants to keep any of the regulations, will have to bring them to congress and get them passed the proper way into law.  Don Young said there are a lot of regulations that are good and need to stay in affect after they are looked at, and passed, by congress.  But there are more that just need to go away

This bill will help Alaska, but it will also help the nation.  It will strip stupid regulations off the books that styime industry, mining, patrolium drilling, logging, farming, and other things that the country needs to start doing again.

I wish him luck in getting this bill through Congress and the Senate.

Oh and by the way, he was able to get a lot of the funding for the Park Service witheld this year.  Now he is going after the US Fish and Wildlife Service, to get as much of their budget defunded as possable.

[magooch]

It sounds like you guys actually have a "working" Congressman.  Kudos.

[oldandslow]

It seems that you have a congressman that actually knows why he is in Washington and takes his job seriously. Another is Steve Pierce from the second district of NM. The rest of our delegation  are just demos that toe the party line and spend most of their time patting their own back about what a good job they are doing for the country.

Redistricting for us wound up in the courts again. Everyone in the state that has the least clue knew that was going to happen but the state spent a lot of money that was needed elsewhere on a special session to address redistricting. Now we have to spend millions on lawyers to help the courts figure this out. The minority republicans went up Santa Feeble and actually tried to work a little to a solution and were joined by the few responsible democrats that are interested in the welfare of our state and not just being in control of it. There just aren't enough to get anything done. The senate and house leaders just sat on their hands while almost everyone had a good time courtesy of lobbyists and per diem. I think most went to the session planning to do nothing and then hand it off to the courts. Lots less political fallout back home when you can blame someone else.

Hopefully when the courts finish we down here in the south can still elect a republican if we want to.

Sorry for the highjack and the rant. I just got started and couldn't stop.

[Dixie Dude]

At least in Alabama, the Republicans took over the house, senate, and the governors office first time since Reconstruction.  So we can redistrict reasonably.  That is why we got an illegal immigration law on the books.  Cut budget without raising taxes.  However fees, liscenses, and speeding tickets have gone up.  I live in Auburn and the city cops issued 22,000 tickets last year.  They sometimes sit in front of my house and catch speeders since the speed limit goes from 35 to 25 before it gets to my neighborhood.  Funny, they catch one evey 15-30 minutes.  Helps them slow down in a residential area.