Freshman Dems flexing their elected muscles

The recent U.S. Congressional vote on raising the minimum wage from $7.50 an hour to $15 must be addressed. Specifically, how did New Mexico legislators vote?

Before we get to that, it’s frustrating to watch people we elect waste so much time whining about President Donald Trump’s tweets and arguing over whether to file articles of impeachment. Sifting through the Mueller report and hoping to find a scintilla of evidence is a waste of taxpayer money.

Congress tried to condemn Trump’s racist tweets. How does that help their constituents? They shot down a resolution, with Republicans, to impeach Trump. It was the wrong bill or the wrong time, Democratic leadership said.

The world is on the brink of another Middle East clash, climate change, an opioid problem of epic proportions, poor and working poor scraping by and prohibitive costing health insurance. The national debt is at $22 trillion and climbing. Instead of addressing part of one of those problems, let’s whine about our lunatic president.

In regard to the minimum-wage vote, it’s no surprise that U.S. Representatives Ben Lujan and Deb Haaland fell in line behind their party without question. They should both try running their own business before voting on such a heavy-handed wage hike. Lujan should try getting a job in the private sector and see how businesses are actually operated.

What was interesting was that a gutsy Xochitl Torres Small voted against it. Good for her. Her vote explanation was simple: doubling the minimum wage was too large of a jump. She’s right. The minimum wage needs to be raised, but incrementally and with thought toward the economic climate and cycle. New Mexico is moving in that direction.

However, Torres Small then went on to vote with her fellow Dems, against a Republican resolution to exempt businesses with fewer than 10 employees or less than $1 million in annual revenue from the minimum wage requirements. The smaller the business, the harder it will be hit, percentage-wise, by a minimum wage increase.

We thought Torres Small had a handle on it. She slipped.

Lastly you have to love (especially if you’re a Republican) those four feisty freshmen giving House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Herr Trump so much heartburn. We’re not sure how much gumption it takes to tell the president he’s an idiot, because it’s almost become fashionable. However, to take on House leadership, wow.

Freshmen congressmen are pulled aside as soon as they hang their coats and find the bathroom and told, “This is how it works.” What follows is a scolding diatribe about following senior leadership’s directions and always being faithful to the party. Forget about who sent you there.

However, these four courageous women are not only giving the president heartburn, Nancy Pelosi can’t get them to follow her instruction either. How refreshing.

U.S. Reps. Ilhan Omar, D-Minnesota, Ayanna Pressley, D-Massachusetts, Rashida Tlaib, D-Michigan and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-New York, are setting their own agenda, supported by Americans tired of the standard Democratic fare. They don’t back down and are more focused on common-sense issues than getting re-elected or raising campaign funds. They speak frankly, but with decorum, backed by facts. There’s no political spin here.

Surely this is what the founding fathers had in mind, versus the building built across from our nation’s capital specifically for fund-raising.

— Rio Grande Sun