Congressman Earl Blumenauer, the funny little man with the bow tie, welcomed people to the “alternative universe” that is the House of Representatives on Saturday – as staunch faced Republicans sat there with their mouths open like they couldn’t believe what he was saying or something. Others were, as you can perhaps imagine highly offended by what the Congressman said.
On October 5, 2013 Rep. Earl Blumenauer asked for and was granted permission to address the United States House of Representatives for one minute regarding the government shutdown. A shutdown, by the way he blames the Republicans for – and I quite agree with him on that.
Admittedly what he said caught many in in Congress off guard as he described the House in terms of being an “alternative universe.” In fact you could see many of the Republican there bristle at his statement, others stood there with their mouths open – like they couldn’t believe what he said or something?
“Mr. Speaker, welcome to the alternative universe in the House of Representatives. We just voted, as we knew we would, to pay the furloughed workers when the shutdown ends, as we knew we would.”
“What started as a right-wing tantrum to defund ObamaCare, which failed, as it inevitably would, and then it became a demand to pull the rug out for another delay, we’re now arguing about something. Negotiations? What? Since we decided to pay everybody anyway, let’s vote on the continuing resolution so we can at least get work in exchange for paying our employees and stop losing tens of millions of dollars every hour”, he said.
“The Republicans now want to negotiate. I think that’s terrific. We’ve been waiting 6 months for the House Republicans to appoint their conference committee so we can reconcile differences on the budget. Let’s vote on the continuing resolution. Let’s appoint conference committees and get back to work”, said Rep. Blumenauer.
Blumenauer currently a member of the Budget Committee and Ways and Means Committee and the subcommittees on Health and Trade. He is considered somewhat of an academic because rather extensive university, which includes law degrees from the prestigious and elite Lewis and Clark College in Portland – which is, I might add outrageously expensive in terms of cost. So much so in fact that many Americans can only dream of having such educational opportunities there.