The Meninak Club of Jacksonville welcomed U.S. Rep. for Florida’s Fourth District Ander Crenshaw to speak at its Monday lunch to provide an update on the business of Capitol Hill.
“There’s a big mess in our country and a lot of it has to do with what is going on in Washington (D.C.),” said Crenshaw.
He talked about the issues that the U.S. government is facing: a national debt that “ticked up above $15 trillion about a week ago” and an unemployment rate that came down from 9.1 percent to about 8.5 percent.
“That was basically because 315,000 people decided they would just quit looking for a job,” said Crenshaw.
“Actually, 120,000 new jobs were added during that time, which isn’t nearly enough to turn unemployment around. It’s relatively good news, but based mostly on the fact that people are giving up,” he said.
In trying to explain how the “mess” developed, Crenshaw explained that it was a matter of power and policy in the halls of government.
“I think people can get along, but all of the sudden when it becomes about power, who’s in charge, when the Democrats lost control in 1994, they didn’t like that and they got back in charge in 2006,” said Crenshaw.
“My observation is, as long as there is a close partisan battle then it is hard to ever find solutions because being in leadership becomes more important than solving problems. I think that’s very unfortunate. It’s the one thing I observed about Washington when I first got there, is the partisanship,” he said.
Crenshaw also discussed his opinion about how President Barack Obama is contributing to the slow pace of Congress in passing legislation.
Obama has done little to assist in the passage of legislation to reduce the deficit because “as a matter of re-election policy and strategy to say, ‘I’m going to run against a do-nothing Congress,’” Crenshaw said.
“When nothing happens it just plays into his hands,” said Crenshaw. “I’m not very encouraged that between now and the election a whole lot is going to happen because you have got this next year, that some people call the ‘silly season,’ that’s all about the presidential election, it’s about the U.S. Senate. Twenty-three senators are up for re-elections.”
He stressed the importance of being informed about the next election because of the effect it could have on the future of the country.
“This will be one of the most important elections in a long, long time. It will effect the direction of our country,” said Crenshaw.
The Meninak Club of Jacksonville elected Larry Cobb as its president-elect. Cobb is the third generation of his family to serve in Meninak and will also be the third to serve as president.
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