On the recordJanuary 25, 2010
Dr. Laurence Peter, the educator who came up with the Peter Principle, once said: Democracy is a process by which the people are free to choose the [person] who will get the blame. In a democracy, that is the people's right. In a democracy, the people elect us to represent them. And in a democracy, the people elect us to be accountable. But the chairman and ranking Republican member of the Budget Committee have come up with a process to shift the blame. They have come up with a process for Congress to punt our accountability away. They have come up with a process to outsource Congress's central fiscal responsibilities to a new budget commission. I can see that a commission may be attractive to some. It is the easy way out. Senators can blame everything on the commission. Senators can say: The commission made me do it. But we should not shirk our responsibility. Rather, we should do the job our constituents sent us here to do. We already have a process for doing so. It is called the budget process.
