In the field of politics, you either drive the narrative or become a victim of the narrative.  Unfortunately, for most of the 112^th Congress, the GOP-controlled House abdicated their power and became a victim of the political narrative driven by Obama and the Democrat Senate.

Over the past two years, the House has been in recess almost every other week.  Additionally, a large chunk of the days in session were spent passing banal suspension votes.  Many conservatives are exuberant whenever Congress is out of session.  “Thank God, the Republic is safe,” they say.  I disagree.  Ideally, if Congress would have merely served as a steward for our Constitutional Republic over the past 100 years, a relaxed schedule would be appropriate.  However, with government creeping into every facet of our economy and private lives with interventions, subsidies, regulations, and competition, we need an activist Congress just to restore our Republic.

We all understand that with control of just one body of government, we can’t enact these changes unilaterally; however, why should that stop us from driving the narrative by tackling every area of policy that needs reform?  By ceding our legislative days to recess and suspension bills, we have allowed the remaining time in the House to be consumed with Democrat-contrived cliffs and deadlines to take up “must-pass” [big government] legislation.  To that end, we are always caught playing defense, in the incorrigible predicament of saying no to everything.

The House is out of session this week. What is the first bill they will consider next week?  The Obama/Senate Sandy relief bill, which is rife with pork and extraneous items on Obama’s Christmas shopping list.  We are forced to play defense on a very sensitive issue.

It’s time we work harder and drive the narrative against the Democrats.  The House should stay in session even when the Senate is in recess and Obama’s is out playing golf.  They should tackle free market health care reform; they should repeal Dodd-Frank; they should repeal Sarbanes-Oxley; they should pass legislation to ease government intervention in the housing sector – the catalyst for the financial meltdown; they should pass legislation to reform the Fed’s ability to enact infinite monetary stimulus and inflate asset bubbles; they should phase out the green energy regime…just to name a few.

There are so many issues that are political and policy winners for us; we just need to tackle them and communicate them to the public.  126 days in session would be more than enough to preserve our Republic; it’s not enough to restore our Republic.

On the first day of the session, a number of conservative members introduced solid legislation to deal with things like the debt ceiling, financial regulations, the Federal Reserve, and gun-free zones.  We hope to highlight some of these bills over the next few weeks.

Control over the House is a powerful platform.  Republicans must be prepared to utilize that power to its fullest extent this year.