Congress Approval Rating Lower Than North Korea

[damnedifIknow]

"Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) argued on Sunday that rules reform is needed in Congress because it has a lower approval rating that North Korea.

“Is there anyone out there in the real world that believes that what’s going on in Congress of the United States is good? Our approval rating is lower than North Korea’s,” he said on NBC’s “Meet the Press

Republicans have filibustered 15 of Obama’s executive-branch nominees, Reid said, adding that only 20 such nominees have been filibustered throughout history.

Reid said he has had to contend with 420 GOP filibusters since he because Senate majority leader in 2007. During a similar span of time, his predecessor Lyndon Baines Johnson faced only one filibuster, Reid said.

Reid invoked the nation’s founding fathers, claiming they wanted the Senate to approve the president’s nominees by simple-majority votes. "

http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/310871-reid-low-approval-of-congress-justifies-triggering-nuclear-option-in-senate

[rug]

1. Of course. There are no republicans in North Korea.

[JayhawkSD]

2. And again I'm going to call BS on that headline.

I will not buy the so-called unpopularity of Congress when its members are being reelected 85% of the time. If Congress were that unpopular in truth, we would vote them out of office. We do not. We overwhelmingly reelect them.

It's not Citizens United, it's not the Koch brothers, it's not some Communist plot. They run for reelection and we reelect them. Unpopular my ass.

[davidpdx]

4. They are being elected partly because of the polarization in politics

but also because of gerrymandering and lack of creditable challengers. Money is a factor and so is incumbency. Look at how little turnover occurs in the Senate (aside from deaths and resignations from scandals). In order to beat an incumbent senator a candidate has to raise a large amount of money and build a campaign that can go up against someone who may have been in office for years. In 2008, Jeff Merkley beat Gordon Smith who had been in office for quite awhile, by a very small margin. Now granted Merkley was helped by the fact that Oregon has a high number of Ds in the more populated areas on the westside of the state including Portland. He also ran a fabulous campaign.

[dsc]

5. ACtually the Senate has had quite a lot of turn over in the last decade or so

Of the Senators who were elected in or serving in 2000, many are gone, or retiring this year. Of the 100 Senators sworn in on July 3, 2001, 71 are no longer serving. In addition, both parties have had a rough time recruiting candidates for either House even when the nomination appears to be valuable. In Iowa the GOP can't get a decent candidate for the Senate. In Montana, we couldn't get our first choice of candidate.

[vatar]

3. WaPo gives this claim 4 Pinocchios

Like most everything Reid says.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/harry-reids-claim-that-congress-ranks-lower-than-north-korea/2013/07/15/f55ee510-ed61-11e2-9008-61e94a7ea20d_blog.html