Last week, the Club for Growth, a DC-based organization that promotes pro-growth policies and less government spending, released a scorecard on 25 votes in the House that would have reduced spending. The proposed cuts scored were mostly, if not all, amendments to spending bills brought before the House. You can view the list of amendments here.
I believe five of them were introduced by Rep. Paul Broun (R-GA) and one by Rep. Austin Scott (R-GA). Unfortunately, only three of the 25 amendments passed, including one offered by Rep. Broun.
You can see how your representatives from Georgia voted on the proposed cuts below.
| Lawmaker | District | Party | Score | Ratio |
| Paul Broun | GA-10 | Republican | 100% | 25/25 |
| Tom Graves | GA-9 | Republican | 100% | 25/25 |
| Rob Woodall | GA-7 | Republican | 100% | 25/25 |
| Tom Price | GA-6 | Republican | 88% | 22/25 |
| Phil Gingrey | GA-11 | Republican | 88% | 22/25 |
| Austin Scott | GA-8 | Republican | 84% | 21/25 |
| Lynn Westmoreland | GA-3 | Republican | 72% | 18/25 |
| Jack Kingston | GA-1 | Republican | 32% | 8/25 |
| John Barrow | GA-12 | Democratic | 16% | 4/25 |
| Hank Johnson | GA-4 | Democratic | 4% | 1/25 |
| John Lewis | GA-5 | Democratic | 4% | 1/25 |
| Sanford Bishop | GA-2 | Democratic | 0% | 0/25 |
| David Scott | GA-13 | Democratic | 0% | 0/23 |
{ 3 comments }
I appreciate the spirit of the attempt of this scorecard, but if they don’t pass, why do they count?
Scorecards are quickly becoming a lot like pledges. Electeds know that the general public will only look at scores, and thus can offer whatever bill they like knowing it will never even get a committee hearing, much less get near legislation on track to pass.
Thus, you can have a Ron Paul vote “no’ on everything, score 100%, and still load up on wild shrimp subsidies for his home district (all the while voting against the budget that appropriates them).
The closer someone is to leadership, the lower they’re going to score on these. The simple answers some simple thinkers is that these folks have sold out and/or are RINO!’s. The more complex answer is governing is the art of the possible.
We used to say that politics is the art of what is possible. Now politics appears to be sponsoring the impossible and getting a good score the base will approve of, even if it contributes nothing to the process of actual legislation.
Most of these cuts are small cuts to small programs. Totally meaningless in terms of overall spending.
If one feels the spending cuts are too small to bother with or that because a bill did not pass that a Representative’s vote should not be counted, then this study is meaningless. However, I believe the duty of legislators is to vote and to me their votes are meaningful. How else can we hold them accountable to our beliefs/
I have done my own analyses of votes.
The spread sheet is at: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AmropTJjc6wqdEplXy1CZzEyS3ZpWFROUFhiODBVRUE&hl=en&pli=1#gid=431
The web site is at:
http://www.electtherightcandidate.us/ETRC/Elect_The_Right_Candidate.html
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