How I spent my summer vacation

Dear Congress,

I hope you are enjoying your summer vacation. We all need to get away once in awhile to relax, reflect, and rejuvenate ourselves. Have a good time. Make sure you wear your sunscreen and drink plenty of fluids. The sun can get pretty brutal, you know, with all that global warming and stuff.

Oh, one other thing - in case there are no newspapers or radio or TV or Internet where you are, I think you ought to know that oil has fallen over 20% since July. I know you and your majority will attempt to take credit for this, but all us bitter, gun-clinging people are not as dumb as you think we are.

Maybe it's just a coincidence, but didn't your arch nemesis in the Oval Office lift the executive ban on offshore drilling in July? I think he did. Yeah, I'm sure he did.

See, even if domestic drilling might not produce a significant amount of oil for 10 years or so, just the IDEA that we, the largest consumer of oil in the world, are one step closer to expanding our own oil discovery and production infrastructure, the stock market notices. Traders stop buying so many oil futures, since there may be a bigger supply of oil in the future and their contract purchases now might end up losing value. Simple Economics 101, Congress. Perhaps you ought to pick up a copy of Economics for Dummies while on vacation, and come back next month a little smarter and wiser than you are now.

Who knows? With a little more intelligence and action on your part, and you might actually be able to get your approval rating out of the single digits. Nine-percent is pretty lame, don't you think? Not only are you jeopardizing your own political hides and screwing the people you were elected to represent, but your 9% won't exactly help Wonder Boy in November.