Dem leader: Tea Party stirs retirement thoughts

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., told reporters today that the Tea Party movement is making some members of Congress mull retirement.

“Do I think the negative atmosphere that has been created by the Tea Party and by others certainly goes into the thinking of members? I think it does. I think you have to honestly point out that it does,” he told reporters Tuesday.

Hoyer was responding to questions about Michigan Rep. Bart Stupak’s decision last week to retire rather than seek another term. Stupak had led a group of pro-life Democrats who opposed the health care bill through much of the debate, arguing that its anti-abortion provisions were too weak.

Under heavy pressure from the White House and party leaders, Stupak struck a last-minute deal that secured enough votes for the bill to pass the House. His actions ended up ticking off both liberal and conservative groups.

Longevity in the golden years

Commenter: Government workers in Orange County retire at 50 at 100% pay on a 6 figure salary. Most of them will spend more years collecting retirement than they spent working, and nearly all of them will collect more money from the taxpayer while not working than they did while providing services to the taxpayer.

The real story behind Evan Bayh's retirement is "the failure once again of liberal governance"

The political retirement of Evan Bayh, at age 54, is being portrayed by various sages as a result of too much partisanship, or the Senate's dysfunction, or even the systemic breakdown of American governance. Most of this is rationalization. The real story, of which Mr. Bayh's frustration is merely the latest sign, is the failure once again of liberal governance.

For the fourth time since the 1960s, American voters in 2008 gave Democrats overwhelming control of both Congress and the White House. Republicans haven't had such large majorities since the 1920s. Yet once again, Democratic leaders have tried to govern the country from the left, only to find that their policies have hit a wall of practical and popular resistance.

Democrats failed in the latter half of the 1960s, as the twin burdens of the Great Society and Vietnam ended the Kennedy boom and split their party. They failed again after Watergate, as Congress dragged Jimmy Carter to the left and liberals had no answer for stagflation. They failed a third time in the first two Bill Clinton years, as tax increases and HillaryCare led to the Gingrich Congress before Mr. Clinton salvaged his Presidency by tacking to the center.