Sunday, December 21, 2025

Former Lawmakers Sound Alarm on Health of the House

"Congress is in a coma. It has a pulse, but not many brainwaves," said former Rep. Jim Cooper, a Democrat who represented Tennessee for 32 years. "It's hard to tell that it's even alive as an institution."

Posted by lamplighter at 06:31 PM | 16 COMMENTS | permalink

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Sarah Matthews: "Mike Johnson is going to go down as the least effective and least productive speaker in U.S. history ... Speaker Johnson has made Congress completely obsolete. He is just functioning basically as Trump's puppet."

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-- Home of the Brave (@ofthebraveusa.bsky.social) Dec 8, 2025 at 9:17 PM

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More from the article ...

... A record number of lawmakers are calling it quits ahead of the midterm elections next year and are running for the Capitol exits, pursuing different offices or retiring from political life altogether.

While there's a temptation to look at a diminished House as a symptom of the first year of the second Trump administration, former members told NPR that legislative stagnation and low morale have been building for quite some time.

Barbara Comstock, a Virginia Republican who serves as president of the Association of Former Members of Congress, said the issues are growing deeper.

"We've done studies showing the reason a lot of people are leaving is because it's not functional, because of death threats, because they're not getting anything done," she said in an interview. ...


#1 | Posted by LampLighter at 2025-12-21 04:05 PM

An interesting, informative piece that covers quite a bit of territory well. Thanks for posting it.

#2 | Posted by Doc_Sarvis at 2025-12-21 04:46 PM

When you abdicate your responsibility as a branch of government and become a rubber stamp for a wannabe Dictator it's hard to be taken seriously.

Boo Hoo. Grow a set and reassert Authority as legally required.

Until then the Exodus into Irrelevance Continues...

#3 | Posted by Effeteposer at 2025-12-21 05:00 PM

Our authoritarian President's policy is to ruin whatever he can't control.... and the Congress is showing a slight pulse, so time to kill what he can of it.

#4 | Posted by Corky at 2025-12-21 05:58 PM

Well-known homosexual pedophile Mike Johnson should be impeached.

#5 | Posted by LegallyYourDead at 2025-12-22 12:36 AM

And the midterms are not of another eleven months...plenty of time for the Trump gang to screw up things even more.

#6 | Posted by Hughmass at 2025-12-22 07:30 AM

When you abdicate your responsibility as a branch of government and become a rubber stamp for a wannabe Dictator it's hard to be taken seriously.

#3 | Posted by Effeteposer

It took NOTHING for most of the GOP to surrender.

A bit of fear towards a bully and a bit of promise that if they hooked up with the "winning" side they would personally profit.

Now that they've gelded themselves we'll have a war with Venezuela, among other really bad things.

People much, much better than they are suffering and dying.

And that includes countless millions of migrants, who have always been one-hundred times more socially valuable than they are.

#7 | Posted by Zed at 2025-12-22 08:05 AM

This is Karl Rove's dream fulfilled. A permanent Republican majority, through gerrymandering, phony Christian blathering and grifting at an institutional level. Of course, that majority is now made up of under-performing insurance salesmen, social studies teachers woo never understood why they couldn't teach gym instead, believers in various flat-earth conspiracies who scarcely have ever been more than 10 miles from where they grew up, and weekend traffic reporters woo call themselves journalists. Remember how many in Congress once were military veterans, had college degrees and knew where to find Canada on a map? Not so much anymore...

#8 | Posted by catdog at 2025-12-22 08:10 AM

Congress has willfully ceded its powers to the Executive and bureaucratic state for decades. No wonder it's in a coma.

#9 | Posted by BellRinger at 2025-12-22 12:30 PM

MAGA Mike has cheerfully ceded its powers to the Executive branch. No wonder it's in a coma.

#9 | POSTED BY BELLRINGER

FTFY

#10 | Posted by donnerboy at 2025-12-22 12:50 PM

#10. This week there born goes back decades. You act like history began late 2016.

#11 | Posted by BellRinger at 2025-12-22 01:01 PM

OMG I hate auto correct. This problem goes back decades.

#12 | Posted by BellRinger at 2025-12-22 01:02 PM

This problem goes back decades.
#12 | Posted by BellRinger

Must not really be a problem for Republicans, if Republicans haven't lifted a finger to address it.

#13 | Posted by snoofy at 2025-12-22 01:05 PM

More from the article ...

... When Newt Gingrich became speaker in 1995, he shortened the congressional work week to roughly three days so that members would have more time in their districts " and so they could spend more time fundraising for re-election.
An illustration of a donkey and an elephant facing opposite directions.
Alicia Zheng/NPR

Jim McDermott, D-Wash., who served from 1989 to 2017, said it completely transformed the culture.

"We didn't get barbecues together, we didn't do any of the things that used to happen on the weekends to make it a community and make compromises easier," he said. "You have to know somebody a little bit before you trust them, and getting to know somebody is not just on the floor listening to speeches, for heaven's sakes. It's watching them deal with their kids. It's how fair they are on the basketball court."

Former members said the less time lawmakers spend with colleagues on the opposite side of the aisle, the more partisanship deepens. ...

"I got to the point where I wanted to have a conversation with a Republican colleague that I didn't know and [I said], 'I want you to know that I don't view you as my enemy,'" said Anna Eshoo, a Democrat who represented California from 1993 to 2025. "Isn't that something, that I felt like I needed to say that?" ...


#14 | Posted by LampLighter at 2025-12-22 01:12 PM

" Must not really be a problem for Republicans, if Republicans haven't lifted a finger to address it.

#13 | POSTED BY SNOOFY AT 2025-12-22 01:05 PM | FLAG: "

It's a bipartisan problem but yeah, the GOP sucks on this issue. Best thing they did, through the courts, was to get Chevron overturned.

#15 | Posted by BellRinger at 2025-12-22 01:16 PM

Congressional approval is at an all time low for both sides of the aisle. These folks just want out to cash in on their government service or if they're already wealthy they just want out because they're tired of the hate from the public.

#16 | Posted by TheMajorKong at 2025-12-22 02:28 PM

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