As a former, hard-working federal employee married to a current, hard-working federal employee, I couldn't agree more with Rep. Connolly on this. Thanks for standing up for the hundreds of thousands of dedicated, yet sadly unappreciated (by Teapublicans, anyway), federal employees in the NOVA/DC metro area.
[Federal employees] are the law enforcement agents, park rangers...who make our communities safer. These are middle class families struggling to make ends meet just like everyone else. Yet House Republicans have routinely used them as a punching bag, chipping away at their pay and their benefits...It is time to say enough...If anyone's salary should be frozen as a result of our nation's fiscal paralysis, it's us, it's members of Congress...
Again, it's long past time to stop bashing good people who are working to make our country stronger, and instead to start giving them the tools and the support they need to get their jobs done!
P.S. Also see the "flip" for Rep. Jim Moran's speech on House Republicans' "modest proposal" -- to "ensure that our elderly are cared for, let's cut the pay of those who care for their health..to find a cure for cancer, let's punish the researcher who works daily to save millions of Americans from that disease."
The purpose of Blue Virginia is to cover Virginia politics from a progressive and Democratic perspective. This is a group blog and a community blog. We invite everyone to comment here, but please be aware that profanity, personal attacks, bigotry, insults, rudeness, frequent unsupported or off-point statements, and "trolling" (NOTE: that includes outright lies, whether about climate science, or what other people said, or whatever) are not permitted and, if continued, will lead to banning. For more on trolling, see the Daily Kos FAQs. Also note that diaries may be deleted if they do not contain at least 2 solid paragraphs of original text; if not, please use the comments section of a relevant diary. For more on writing diaries, click here. Thanks, and enjoy!
