A recent syndicated column written by Ledyard King of the Gannett Washington Bureau quotes Kristi Noem (R-SD), a member of the House freshman class as saying:
“You have to keep moving the ball down the field. You’ve got to make progress. You can’t afford to sit here and say no to everything and accomplish nothing…that would be very detrimental to our country.”
The Congresswoman was referring to her vote in support of the Debt Reduction Act, the “compromise” measure that raised the debt ceiling thereby empowering the continuation of Washington’s spending orgy, while making meager cuts in spending over the next 10 years.
“Moving the ball down the field” is only productive if you are moving toward the proper goal line. You CAN and should say “no” to moving in the wrong direction.
Defeat of this “compromise” did not make default unavoidable. Revenue and assets of the US Government were more than adequate to avoid default while satisfying our debt payments, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.
Defeat of the “compromise” would have sent a message to the Republican leadership in the House, the Senate and the President that we must get this right NOW. Default could have been avoided long enough for an effective plan to be drafted that stopped the unrestrained spending without increasing taxes thereby living within our means.
Further evidence of the inadequacy of this “compromise” is obvious in that the US credit rating has been downgraded because the “compromise” was insufficient to meet AAA rating status.
We do not elect our lawmakers to compromise, we elect them to stand on principle and get it right.
So who would you support in a Senate primary?
Governor Mike Rounds or Rep. Kristi Noem?
That is the question a lot of us will be asking in 2014.
Rounds v Herseth-Sandlin
or
Noem v Herseth-Sandlin
?
This was only one disappointing vote by Kristi Noem (it was a big one though) and there is much more to come. If a primary challenge was to come for Mrs. Noem it would likely be from a conservative, not a more liberal Republican such as Rounds. Too early to choose but we tea party terrorists are watching.