Can Anyone Tell Me Why Robin Hayes is Rated at the Bottom ???

May 17th, 2008 by Steve Smith · 22 Comments

Can anyone tell me why Robin Hayes and Liz Dole are rated so low in the ratings of Congress???Also why are they rated lower than Representatives that are Junior to them.

http://www.congress.org/congressorg/power_rankings/…

Category: Beyond Cabarrus Tags: Robin Hayes

22 responses so far ↓

1 Justin Thibault // May 17, 2008 at 10:09 pm

Simple - they are not in the Party that’s in power. That governs these silly little rankings.
2 Steve Smith // May 18, 2008 at 11:58 am

Yes I understand that concept but why would Hayes be ranked lower than McHenry and Dole lower than Burr???
3 Justin Thibault // May 18, 2008 at 3:26 pm

Steve - Fundraisng would be my first guess. Second guess would be legislation supported. Dole and Hayes have not submitted a lot of bills of their own.

Personally, I’ve never put too much stock into these ratings.
4 Thierry Wernaers // May 18, 2008 at 4:36 pm

Simply, because he doesn’t accomplish anything.
Democrats are in control of congress, but that doesn’t mean you can’t achieve anything as a Republican, unless you’re not willing to reach across the aisle.
Besides, the fact that Hayes doesn’t get hardly any of his bills passed isn’t new. This was also the case when Republicans were still in charge of Congress. Hayes is good at supporting his fellow Republicans and he votes with our President most of the time, but he doesn’t achieve anything on his own.
Robin Hayes has sponsored 66 bills since Jan 6, 1999, of which 53 haven’t made it out of committee and 5 were successfully enacted.
In 2007, exactly one bill sponsored by Robin Hayes passed the house:
H. Res. 69: Recognizing and honoring Benny Parsons and expressing the condolences of the House of Representatives to his family on his death.

Maybe it’s time for a congressman who can actually do something?
5 Caleb Seamone // May 18, 2008 at 5:22 pm

Its hard to do anything in Congress. Getting a bill out of committee is sometimes akin to winning the lottery. Who heads these committees? Democrats. Committee chairs don’t have to read a bill if they don’t want to, much less consider it and put it to a committee vote. I don’t want to hear about how someone else can get in there and be better for our district, because I soundly believe Hayes is doing better than any Democrat would do. How do you judge the “something” that a new congressman would do? Earmarks? A neat new bridge bought and paid for by the federal government with our congressman’s name on it?

The key beliefs of the democratic party, and liberal ideology are counter productive to a free and prosperous American society. I’m working at length on a paper that proves that, to be done in the next couple of months. I’m tired of hearing about politics of change, and then seeing John Edwards paraded on television in a political move. I’m tired of hearing how we need to elect more Democrats, when Congressional ratings are at an all time low since electing a Democratic Majority. Yes, the president is of the opposing party, but lets remember this isn’t the first time in history that has been the case, so it doesn’t explain away the numbers.
6 Thierry Wernaers // May 18, 2008 at 5:44 pm

Caleb,

Nothing your saying explains the numbers either.
I guess you didn’t read this part of my comment:
Robin Hayes has sponsored 66 bills since Jan 6, 1999, of which 53 haven’t made it out of committee and 5 were successfully enacted.
Democrats took control of Congress late 2006.
7 Caleb Seamone // May 18, 2008 at 6:47 pm

I don’t know why his numbers are the way they are, and I wouldn’t put much stock in them. Remember, John Kerry has only passed 11 bills, and he ran for president (factcheck.org). Its hard to get bills out of committee, no matter who is in charge.
8 Thierry Wernaers // May 18, 2008 at 7:37 pm

“I don’t know why his numbers are the way they are”
Maybe you should ask him?

Your comparison with Kerry is interesting if you look at what I said about Hayes:
Robin Hayes has sponsored 66 bills since Jan 6, 1999, of which 53 haven’t made it out of committee and 5 were successfully enacted.
and then compare it to Kerry’s record:
John Kerry has sponsored 382 bills since Jan 21, 1993. Kerry has co-sponsored 2578 bills during the same time period.
Even when you keep in mind that we’re talking about a time period that’s 6 years longer, I’m sure we can agree that it looks like Kerry worked a lot harder than Hayes.

Your comparison isn’t really accurate in the first place, since Hayes is a House member, Kerry is a Senator.
9 Caleb Seamone // May 18, 2008 at 7:59 pm

So the way to tell how hard of a worker a congressman is is to look at how many bills they have sponsored or cosponsored? And perhaps the comparison isn’t accurate, and since Kerry is a Senator, he should be sending in more bills since he represents more people.
10 Thierry Wernaers // May 18, 2008 at 11:01 pm

Since one of the main jobs of a congressman is to draft legislation it only seems normal to me that they are judged by how effective they are as legislators.
If you look at the legislation Hayes drafted I’d say he’s not very effective at all.

And no the comparison with Sen. Kerry isn’t accurate, but you made that comparison to begin with.
11 Justin Thibault // May 18, 2008 at 11:51 pm

I’ll take “nothing” over the isolationist drivel that Kissell would sponsor.
12 Thierry Wernaers // May 19, 2008 at 12:23 am

Sounds like a good campaign slogan Justin.
“Vote Hayes, at least he doesn’t do anything”.
13 Caleb Seamone // May 19, 2008 at 12:57 am

If every member of the House sponsored enormous amounts of legislation, then nothing would ever get done. Also, that would imply that there are 435 (multiplied by what ever number would satisfy your “hard working number”) problems that need addressing, that can be solved via legislation. Lets say every Congressman submitted 3 bills a year. Thats 1305 bills a year in committee. How is that a working congress? Shouldn’t they be taking up the big issues, instead of dealing with every little piece of legislation that a member proposes just to get his numbers up? It sounds like you’re advocating more pointless legislation and earmarks. How better to fix the problems this nation has than by adding more to the constitution, and passing thousands of resolutions so every Congressman has something to take home and say, “Look, my name is on this, and that, and that, so I must be doing a good job.”
14 Justin Thibault // May 19, 2008 at 8:37 am

Caleb -

It sounds like you’re advocating more pointless legislation and earmarks. How better to fix the problems this nation has than by adding more to the constitution, and passing thousands of resolutions so every Congressman has something to take home and say, “Look, my name is on this, and that, and that, so I must be doing a good job.”

That’s how Democrats work: they want a bigger government that “does more” regardless of what it actually accomplishes.
15 Kenneth McClamrock // May 19, 2008 at 10:59 am

Caleb, Justin

You guys hit it right on the head.
16 Mike Lyda // May 19, 2008 at 11:17 am

He ranks 133/200 within the GOP.. 8 of the top 30 are from either TX or CA. That’s a lot of influence coming from two states. NC only has 3 in the top 100. It’s not all about “reaching across the isle” as a lot of the top 30 aren’t known for doing that.

look at what influenced the #1 from the GOP.. Boehner ..
“# Member garners frequent media coverage
# Receives significant PAC funds, indicating special interest groups consider Member powerful
# Member’s Leadership PAC receives significant contributions indicating special interest groups and wealthy contributors consider Member powerful”
So maybe Hayes needs to cozy up to more PACs and work the media more?
17 Thierry Wernaers // May 19, 2008 at 12:16 pm

“That’s how Democrats work: they want a bigger government that “does more” regardless of what it actually accomplishes.”
Says the guy who belongs to the Party who’s President never vetoed one single bill, no matter how many earmarks were in there (until Democrats took over congress) and the Party who was in control of Congress for 12 out of the last 14 years, during which time “government” grew to the biggest size it’s ever been.
18 Kenneth McClamrock // May 19, 2008 at 12:34 pm

Thierry

Now you hit it right on the head. The same party who has chosen John McCain to be their man in 2008. The GOP has major work to do or else the democrat party will not be the only party to tear itself apart.
19 Justin Thibault // May 19, 2008 at 12:35 pm

Theirry -

the Party who was in control of Congress for 12 out of the last 14 years, during which time “government” grew to the biggest size it’s ever been.

Really? So, the middle-class tax burden is higher now than it was 14 years ago? Welfare reform - that would have happened with a Democrat Congress?

While I’ve never been a fan of big-government Conservatism, I’m sure that with the Dems running things: the government would have been much, much larger.

I would imagine that if we had 400 Larry Kissell’s in the Congress we’d have 1200 different ways government could invade our lives every year; but sadly, we’d have nobody left to trade with.
20 Thierry Wernaers // May 19, 2008 at 12:38 pm

Justin, I’m glad to see you seem to have a crystal ball. How much was it?
21 Kenneth McClamrock // May 19, 2008 at 12:58 pm

According to Kissel’s own website, it is obvious he hates capitalism and is a fan of redistribution of wealth. It is also easily seen that he has very little understanding about many things. For instance, he is in favor of raising the minimum wage. He claims that such a low minimum wage is keeping millions of Americans living in poverty while “CEO salaries continue to soar, with the big oil bedfellows of a Republican-led Congress breaking record profits across all industries.” What I still do not understand is this… If raising the minimum wage is SOOOO important, why stop around $7/hr. Heck, lets make it $20. Hey, why not $50! It is good for the economy, right?

He wants to increase government subsidies to fund means for alternative fuels. I do not see why people can not understand that this is not the magic cure all. If I worked for years to invent something that took the place of gasolene, I am not going to only charge $1 / gallon. At the very least it would be barely less than the price of gas at the pumps. If we stopped purchasing oil from the ME, I would charge ??$20.gallon?? Capitalism baby!

Larry Kissell is obviously a big government guy. He can say he is not, but then make claims that prove otherwise.
22 Aaron // May 19, 2008 at 2:43 pm

Kissell’s popularity has more to do with voting against Robin Hayes than voting for “change”, “hope” “chope” or “hange” or whatever other meaningless buzzword the local dems are pushing these days.

Thomas Sowell did a really good job summing it up over on townhall.com. It’s a three parter but very much worth the read.

Here’s the first part. Youll have to navigate to find the rest.

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/ThomasSowell/2008/05/13/too_complex

Illogical People respond to illogical principles. It’s really that simple. You’d have to go back to Pre- FDR days to find more than a few folks who don’t think that government can fix certain ailments. If times are tough for you, then the “gub-ment” can fix it. If your man in office isn’t want to fix your situation, he must be a “bad guy” and therefore you need to vote against him. Its only after he’s defeated and the new fella takes office that you find out that you make 400 dollars per month too much to get all those handouts but just enough to get taxed to the hilt to pay for them…