Baron Hill’s reality check

U.S. Representative Baron Hill, D-IN, was the featured speaker at a Harrison County Chamber of Commerce luncheon on June 30. Reality was not on the menu.

Throughout his remarks, Hill made repeated misstatements about the Democrats’ first six months in power, according to a report in the Corydon Democrat and Majority Accountability Project (www.majorityap.com) research.

The biggest whopper came when Hill reportedly told those assembled at Magdalena's Restaurant in Corydon “that unlike the GOP-led 109th Congress, this Congress is working five days a week, if not more.”

According to official House of Representative’s records, the House has been in session a total of twenty-two weeks since the beginning of the year. During that time, they recorded votes Monday through Friday only six times, about once every four weeks. As noted in an earlier majorityap.com report, this was one of the first promises broken by the Democrat Majority, whose leaders vowed at the onset of the new Congress the House would be in session five days a week

In December, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer issued a stern warning. “Those trips you had planned in January, forget 'em,” he said. “We will be working almost every day in January, starting with the 4th.”

Hoyer’s pledge was short-lived. The House did not record a five day workweek in January.

Hill also reportedly claimed that “Congress enacted the remaining 9/11 Commission recommendations.” But as the Washington Post reported, Democrats left out a key provision of the commission’s recommendations: “a wholesale reorganization of Congress to improve oversight and funding of the nation's intelligence agencies.”

“Of all our recommendations, strengthening congressional oversight may be among the most difficult and important,” the 9/11 Commission reported. “So long as oversight is governed by current congressional rules and resolutions, we believe the American people will not get the security they want and need.”

Democrats did not include that provision in their legislation, or another to declassify part of the intelligence budget, meaning that Democrats did not enact the 9/11 commission’s remaining provisions, as Hill claimed.

Hill’s presentation to the Chamber and community leaders, “New Directions for America: Six Month Progress Report,” included a minimum wage hike as part of the Democrat majority’s accomplishments.

But Hill failed to note that 140 Democrats, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, voted against increasing the minimum wage, because it was tied to funding the Iraq War. Since a majority of House Democrats opposed the measure, it was actually Republicans who increased the minimum wage. Hill was one of only 86 Democrats who joined with 194 Republicans to pass the bill.

Finally, Hill noted that the House passed tougher restrictions on lobbyists, even though it was his own leadership that had been stalling the measure.

Before his 2006 election, Hill was working for a Washington, DC, lobby firm.