She was elected in 1996, and is serving her 8th full term in Congress.

She believes her mission in life is to solve world hunger—whether its through foreign aid or food stamps here in this country that we can no longer afford. But if people start eating too much, well hold it right it there, because the federal government has a role in controlling obesity too.

She will subsidize anything. Tobacco, sugar, peanuts, milk, mohair, energy, Fannie and Freddie, the Postal Service, the DC metro system, small businesses, and the purchases of auto consumers (Cash for Clunkers).

Increasing the minimum wage? She is a fan. Price controls on prescription drugs? She co-sponsored the bill. Davis-Bacon? She supports it.

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He was elected in 2000, and is serving in his 6th term in Congress.

He is pathetic on education issues and school choice reforms in particular. He voted in favor of No Child Left Behind, and earlier this year, was one of only 4 Republicans to oppose reinstating opportunity scholarships for poor children in D.C.

He is a restrictor of free speech. He supported McCain-Feingold campaign finance “reform,” along with 527 reform a few years later. He even opposed a bipartisan bill to ensure that campaign finance laws would not apply to bloggers.

He is a defender of seemingly every liberal spending program, including: the National Endowment for the Arts, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, Amtrak, Headstart, Americorps, the National School Lunch Program, the Legal Services Corporation, etc. He is serial reauthorizer of farm subsidies, highway subsidies, and energy subsidies.

He is profoundly unserious about cutting spending. He voted to earmark funds for Kentucky’s tourism industry, the DC metro system, a National Mule and Packers Museum, researching the genetic makeup of grapes, the Bronx Council of Arts, etc. He consistently votes against the conservative budgets offered by the Republican Study Committee (with one exception, which must have been a mistake). He opposed comprehensive reforms to the budget and spending process designed to limit government rather than expand it, probably because they were opposed vigorously by the appropriators.

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Editor’s Note: Starting last week and each week from here on, I’ve decided to focus on a Republican in the House or Senate the Tea Party should consider primarying. I think we are too distracted by Presidential politics and cannot afford to keep on keeping on in the House and Senate.

Last week I started with Martha Roby. This week, another one. Each week, based on finding pitiful scores in the Heritage Action for America rankings and considering the districts at stake, I’ll highlight a new one. This should be fun.

He was elected in 2002. He is serving his fifth term in Congress.

In 2003, his first year in Congress, he voted for a massive omnibus spending bill and the Medicare prescription drug benefit.

In 2004, he voted for an energy bill bloated with subsidies (ethanol, clean coal, loan guarantees, etc.), and he voted against long-needed conservative reforms to the federal budget process, but ones opposed by the appropriators.

In 2005, he voted for a highway bill loaded with earmarks and billions more than the Highway Trust Fund had collected in gas taxes. He voted to keep funding for the National Endowment for the Arts, and to postpone savings from realigning defense bases. He voted against at least seven across-the-board amendments to cut just 1% from various of the annual spending bills. He voted to increase funding for Big Bird and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. And he voted to keep Fannie and Freddie’s line to the U.S. Treasury wide open.

In 2006, he never seems to have found an earmark he didn’t like, including: the Leonard Wood Research Institute, the Bronx Council for the Arts, the Kentucky tourism industry, and a city-owned pool in California. Oh, and he voted for campaign finance restrictions.

When Democrats took control, his votes got worse.

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pathetic |p?’THetik|

adjective

1 arousing pity, esp. through vulnerability or sadness: she looked so pathetic that I bent down to comfort her.

• informal miserably inadequate: his test scores in Chemistry were pathetic.

2 archaic relating to the emotions.

3 political representing Lower Alabama and only scoring 58% on Heritage Action for America’s scorecard: Martha Roby is pathetic.

Back in 2010, we backed Rick Barber in Alabama’s 2nd Congressional District. At the time, I wrote

Martha Roby is unimpressive. She is typical of what we like to call the country club Republicans, but more accurately the status quo Republicans. She’ll bring home the bacon. She’ll vote the right way on most issues. But she’s not going to get her hands dirty fighting for freedom.

I have been proven right. In a solidly conservative district, Martha Roby scores a pathetic 58% on the Heritage Action scorecard. And yes, when you represent Lower Alabama and only score 58% on a conservative scorecard, you are definitionally pathetic.

She has led on nothing conservatives care about and voted against conservatives on much that they do care about. She has carried water for the leadership, betrayed her conservative constituents, and failed to fight against the tide of creeping socialism in the country. But she’s got a pretty smile.

If the tea party wants a do-over, AL-02 would be a good place to start.