From the Write Side of My Brain, "Madame Former-Speaker-To-Be, the American people look forward to giving you more time with your grandchildren."
Pelosi's role in passing healthcare reform puts her in the top rank of House speakers.RTWT at the link.
Anyone who has heard Nancy Pelosi speak knows she is not a great speaker. Her favorite rhetorical device is to seize on a word and club her listeners over the head with it.
When she spoke from the floor of the House on Sunday in support of the healthcare reform bill, the word she wielded was "opportunity." Her point -- that the bill would enable Americans to leave their jobs to start up new ventures without fear of not being able to get health insurance in their new gig -- was altogether valid and perfectly good, but she insisted on repeating the word "opportunity" so many times that she left listeners (this listener, anyway) a little woozy.
But when it comes to being a speaker -- the presiding officer of the House of Representatives and the leader of its majority party -- Pelosi is without peer. No speaker in the past century has played such a key role in enacting major reforms. No speaker since Henry Clay, who wielded the gavel in the 1810s and '20s, has had so great an effect on American life.
RELATED: At Politico, "2,000 House Staffers Make Six Figures":
Nearly 2,000 House of Representative staffers pulled down six-figure salaries in 2009, including 43 staffers who earned the maximum $172,500 — or more than three times the median U.S. household income ....Via Memeorandum.
The 43 staffers who maxed out at $172,500 — the salary cap for leadership and committee staffers — include John Lawrence, chief of staff to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi; Paula Nowakowski, the late chief of staff to House Minority Leader John Boehner; and House Parliamentarian John Sullivan. They earned only slightly less than rank-and-file members of Congress, who make $174,000.
Boehner better watch out on that, or he'll be getting a retirement present just like Pelosi's. Sheesh.
Photoship Credit: The Freaking News.
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UPDATE: Hey, isn't that great that Pelosi's got the support of the "Screw 'Em' Daily Kos community:
Yeah. Right.
A real "caring" community:
Every death should be on the front page.And readers will recall the sick anti-Semitism of the "Kos commumity":
Let the people see what war is like. This isn't an Xbox game. There are real repercussions to Bush's folly.
That said, I feel nothing over the death of merceneries [sic]. They aren't in Iraq because of orders, or because they are there trying to help the people make Iraq a better place. They are there to wage war for profit. Screw them.
"Eulogy before the Inevitability of Self-Destruction: The Decline and Death of Israel."
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