Congressional Politics, by the Numbers
Florida Democratic Rep. Corrine Brown’s recent outburst — you know, the one during the heated farm bill 2.0 debate where she furiously spat 2012 presidential hopeful Mitt Romney’s fatalistic campaign calculus back in House Republicans’ faces — got us thinking about the numbers that matter most to Congress these days:
- 99.98 percent — chances that, no matter what the issue or who threatens to drag their heels, the Senate will skip town by no later than Thursday night
- 99 percent — outraged members of the Congress-bashing “Occupy” movement
- 85 percent — chance it will rain in D.C. from now until FOREVER
- 70 percent — functional support the “gang of eight” believed it needed to browbeat House Republicans into seriously considering its contentious immigration bundle (nice try)
- 60 percent — minimum support required to even bring up a bill for a Senate vote
- 51 percent — theoretical vote threshold required to pass a bill in the Senate (almost never happens)
- 50.1 percent — theoretical vote threshold required to pass a bill in the House
- 47 percent — part of the electorate GOP standard-bearer Romney infamously wrote off during a secretly taped speech at a private fundraiser
- 33.33 percent — probability that the congressional hearing/speech/presser you desperately need to watch is on one of the OTHER C-SPAN channels
- 17 percent — latest congressional job approval rating (per Gallup)
- 1 percent — the ultra wealthy; presumed beneficiaries of most behind-closed-doors legislative haggling