Forget the Fourth of July!

"This proposal will probably go over like a bad gas pain in church with the folks in the 115th Congress. But failure to perform will probably be a ticket to ensure them they will not be around for the 116th Congress."

Don't worry. This is not for us. It is a very important holiday in this country and should be recognized and celebrated with great passion. No - I am talking about the group of people we elected to go to Washington and fix things. All we heard about for months and months on the campaign trail is how bad things are in Washington. How we needed to elected a new President with a new Congress full of change agents to fix things. Hello? Waiting....

Many years ago, I was involved in a nine week negotiation which took place in the middle of the summer. My wife and kids would take me to the airport on Sunday afternoon, I would fly out to Washington, have a team meeting in the hotel on Sunday evening, get up Monday morning and meet with the customer. Then negotiate every day until we flew back home on Friday night. 

It just so happened that the 4th of July hit on a Wednesday that year. The government had that day off, as did my company. One day - not the week. We worked up until Tuesday night, the government folks went home to be with family, and my team stayed in Washington on the 4th, away from friends and family. Would I have rather been home, taking the kids to see fireworks and having a fun day? Absolutely - but there was work to be done in Washington.

Between the dates of June 6th and September 6th, our Congress will be off 31 days not including weekends. When they come back after Labor Day, the focus will be on (get ready for this), getting re-elected in 2018. The new silly season will have started. And the way things look now, nada will have been accomplished on the big ticket items.

Here is my proposal. Because I am not scrooge, I will allow Congress and the Senate to have both the 4th of July and Labor Day off. No more. Well, plus Sundays. Other than that, it is heads down, total focus on getting the agenda done. What agenda? Here goes:

• A fix for ObamaCare. I don't care what it is, so long as it is better. I don't give a rip what the House has passed, as the Senate has done nothing. And until SOMETHING is signed into law by President Trump, we all are still caught in this whirlpool called ObamaCare. Promise made, promise kept.
• MEANINGFUL and REAL tax reform. Not a tinker around the edges effort, I am talking about a once in a lifetime fix to this unholy behemoth called our tax code. We need reform so sweeping that our GDP will get out of the doldrums and get back to Reagan era levels. Promise made, promise kept.
• CONTROL the borders. BUILD the wall. I don't give a rat's butt where you find the money, but build the damn wall for crying in the beer! Promise made, promise kept. 
• One more, and this is part of good governance. The government fiscal year runs out on September 30th, as it does every year. This year, we should have APPROVED and signed into LAW the budget for GFY 2018. On October 1st, the new budget takes affect. No more CR's - ever!

One final thought. This proposal will probably go over like a bad gas pain in church with the folks in the 115th Congress. But failure to perform will probably be a ticket to ensure them they will not be around for the 116th Congress. Time to get to work people, you promised us you would. Promises made, promises not yet kept.