WHAT DOES CONGRESS DO ALL DAY AND WHY DOES IT COST SO MUCH? This question is a polite paraphrasing of a chapter title in P.J. O’Rourke’s political satire: Paraliament of Whores. It’s a great question.

The answer lies partially in knowing that Congress has two goals, although no Member would ever admit either: The first is to make the absurd sound sensible and desirable. For example, farm subsidies for millionaires. The second is to systematically increase government control over the quality of our lives. Think cap and trade, economic stimulus and health care.

As a citizen blogger with a conservative bent, I am especially concerned by how Members of Congress use our money to buy votes from unions, Big Business, tort litigators and environmentalists.

I get so upset watching a shameless Congress erode our individual freedoms through their hypocritical, self-aggrandizing, overweening legislative offerings that I decided to write about them and alert my fellow citizens as to what awaits us.

First I authored an eBook titled Ten Dumb Things Congress Does, which is for sale on this Website. Second I’ve started this blog. Two entries each week should keep me at a simmer.

My goal is simple: Offer easy-to-digest articles about dumb things Congress does, which by the way provides me with an almost inexhaustible supply of material, and make a modest contribution towards pushing back at our congressional scalawags.

I have earned two academic degrees, one an MBA. As an entrepreneur, I had three flings. None was a success but I learned how admirable starting a viable business is, and how important new ventures are in stoking our economy.

My wife, our cat and I live in beautiful (and conservative) East Tennessee where we are visited, but not nearly often enough, by our three grandchildren.

Onward,

Richard Collins, dickthebookie