Legislators' Solitaire Playing Causes A National Stir

Maybe this is why a lot of these politicians do not read the bills before signing them, they're too busy playing computer games while on the tax payer's time.

Legislators' Solitaire Playing Causes A National Stir -- Courant.com

It all started with late-night solitaire at the state Capitol Monday.

And the fallout still hasn't stopped.

Two Democratic legislators were playing solitaire on their state-issued computers Monday night during a late-night debate on the state budget, and an Associated Press photo that showed the solitaire games soon whipped around the nation on the Internet.

From there it was a short hop to national cable TV news.

Now there are calls for apologies — and for new rules regarding computer games at the Capitol.

Republican Thomas Foley, the former U.S. ambassador to Ireland who hopes to unseat Democratic U.S. Sen. Christopher Dodd, has sent a letter asking state Democratic legislative leaders to adopt a new rule banning the use of laptops and electronic BlackBerry devices during formal House and Senate sessions.

"I hope you share with me the sense of outrage felt by the people of Connecticut over the embarrassing spectacle of Democratic legislators playing solitaire on laptop computers while important debate was taking place on the state budget," Foley wrote in a letter to House Speaker Christopher Donovan and Senate President Pro Tem Donald Williams.

Foley said that the photo "has subjected our state legislature to national shame and controversy."

Williams declined to comment on Foley's letter. Donovan's spokesman, Doug Whiting, said that Donovan had not seen Foley's letter and had no comment.

Milford Republicans are calling upon Democratic state Rep. Barbara Lambert to apologize for playing solitaire as House Republican leader Larry Cafero was speaking about the state budget. The chairman of the Milford Republican Town Committee, Tom Jagodzinski, said that voters "expect their elected officials to represent their interests, not be preoccupied with putting the red five on the black six. They expect their elected officials to listen to others' ideas, not to be sitting in the people's chamber looking for alternatives to Minesweeper."

With a nod to Monday's game-playing, Jagodzinski announced that the Milford Republicans will be holding a solitaire fundraiser at their campaign headquarters on Sept. 15 to raise money for the local police department.

Lambert, a Milford Democrat from the 118th District, replaced former House Speaker James Amann, who is now running for governor against Republican M. Jodi Rell. Lambert could not be reached Thursday night.

State Rep. Jack Hennessy, a Bridgeport Democrat, was playing solitaire on the computer next to Lambert, and he, too, could not be reached for comment.

Amann, a veteran of 18 years at the state Capitol, remembered the days when the House sessions were not televised and the general public had little idea what actually happened in the House chamber. During extremely long debates that spilled into the early morning hours in sessions that lasted more than 12 hours, House members sometimes started doing "the wave."

Amann said that he could not blame Lambert — his successor — for playing a computer game.

"I'm sure if they panned the whole place [in a photograph], there would have been a lot more on solitaire," Amann said.

I would expect this behavior of an elementary school student in the computer lab, not of an elected official.

Oh good grief !

What a bunch of pansies. As IF one couldn't play solitaire and listen to some drone prattle on.

Keep it up, GOPers. Thin out the younger voting block support some more. :rofl

Is that someone on iTunes a couple computers to the right of the guys playing Solitaire?

I bet that if you took a snapshot of everyone of their screens at that moment in time, Solitaire would not be the worst thing you would see.

This is amusing, and the fact that some are trying to use it for partisan politics is just sad. I dare people to watch one of these late night sessions on CSPAN and not do something to entertain themselves.

jackalope said:

Oh good grief !

What a bunch of pansies. As IF one couldn't play solitaire and listen to some drone prattle on.

Keep it up, GOPers. Thin out the younger voting block support some more. :rofl

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So you are saying that if you were an employer then you wouldn't mind your employees ****ing off while they are supposed to be working?

ScottD said:

I bet that if you took a snapshot of everyone of their screens at that moment in time, Solitaire would not be the worst thing you would see.

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They should be condemned for it regardless of party affiliation. These people are employees of the tax payers and have no business ****ing off while on the clock.

jamesrage said:

So you are saying that if you were an employer then you wouldn't mind your employees ****ing off while they are supposed to be working?

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I think what he is saying is this: Reprimand, but don't make a federal case out of it. They did something they didn't, they got caught, but the way these people are making it out, you'd think somebody committed genocide.

People that live in glass houses should not throw stones so I wont.


Its not like they were on a WoW raid or something. Now that takes some concentration.

Travelsonic said:

I think what he is saying is this: Reprimand, but don't make a federal case out of it. They did something they didn't, they got caught, but the way these people are making it out, you'd think somebody committed genocide.

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I do not think anyone is acting like they committed genocide. It is outrage over the fact that these employees of the tax payers were ****ing off/goofing off/not doing their job/shamming when they were supposed to be working. If these employees of the tax payers were goofing off then who knows how many more were doing the same thing.

jackalope said:

Oh good grief !

What a bunch of pansies. As IF one couldn't play solitaire and listen to some drone prattle on.

Keep it up, GOPers. Thin out the younger voting block support some more. :rofl

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I see nothing partisan about it. Simply a lack of professionalism by these congressmen.

jamesrage said:

I do not think anyone is acting like they committed genocide. It is outrage over the fact that these employees of the tax payers were ****ing off/goofing off/not doing their job/shamming when they were supposed to be working. If these employees of the tax payers were goofing off then who knows how many more were doing the same thing.

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Which of their duties did they not perform adequately? I can easily listen to a boring debate and play solitaire at the same time.

Redress said:

Which of their duties did they not perform adequately? I can easily listen to a boring debate and play solitaire at the same time.

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I am sure there are some people who can play Crysis and pay attention to some boring debate. however these employees of the tax payers are on the clock,therefore they have no business playing games. The type of game is irreverent. What if it was a judge or jury member playing a Nintendo DS or a PSP while on the clock?

I think the problem of video gaming at work is far more widespread than just this case.

I am not defending them. They have no excuse except they got caught.

jamesrage said:

I am sure there are some people who can play Crysis and pay attention to some boring debate. however these employees of the tax payers are on the clock,therefore they have no business playing games. The type of game is irreverent. What if it was a judge or jury member playing a Nintendo DS or a PSP while on the clock?

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A judge or jury is doing something other than listening to a boring debate. Really, turn on CSPAN and watch these "debates" and see how long you can pay attention. At least they where there, which I guarantee was better than some.

If these politicians did not want to listen and pay attention to "boring" debates, then they should have never ran for office.

jamesrage said:

If these politicians did not want to listen and pay attention to "boring" debates, then they should have never ran for office.

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They are playing solitaire for gods sake. It's not like it requires brain activity to play it. If they can't manage to follow the debate well enough while playing solitaire, they have to be just about brain dead.

There are things to complain about our lawmakers doing. This just ain't one of them. It's trivial and is not going to have any negative impact on us unless we want to make a big issue out of it.

jackalope said:

Oh good grief !

What a bunch of pansies. As IF one couldn't play solitaire and listen to some drone prattle on.

Keep it up, GOPers. Thin out the younger voting block support some more. :rofl

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Are you trying to tell me that Young voters won't be angry over their "Representatives" scr*wing off,,,when they should be Working? :lol:

You have a low opinion of the Young.:roll:

Redress said:

They are playing solitaire for gods sake. It's not like it requires brain activity to play it. If they can't manage to follow the debate well enough while playing solitaire, they have to be just about brain dead.

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Again I am sure some people can play Crysis and listen to a debat. Regardless of the game they are not paid to play games while working. IF they wanted to play games while working then they should have got jobs as game testers.

There are things to complain about our lawmakers doing. This just ain't one of them. .

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I beg to differ, if these people are playing solitaire then who knows what other games they are distracting themselves with instead of actually working. Their job is a little too important for them to be ****ing off with other things. What if a judge or jury was playing solitaire while a court case was going on? Wouldn't the defendant have a grounds to demand a retrial? It doesn't matter how much brain power a game demands to play it. Would it be okay for a bus driver to play solitaire while driving a bus? After all it doesn't require much brain power to play it, some people only need on hand to drive and the game doesn't require someone to hit pause so he is free to shift gears when ever he wants with that hand that is playing a game.

Despite being sort of conservative-ish on many things, I'm going to take a different tack.

The less Congress does, generally speaking the happier I am. 90% of the bills they pass are either meaningless BS, more unnecessary spending of my money they took from me, or outright damaging to the nation.

The LESS they do, the better off we are. Maybe we should issue each new Congressman an XBOX360 and a $200 Gamestop gift certificate. :mrgreen:

So I look at it like this...if they're already planning to vote "no" to whatever was being proposed, I don't care if they were playing WoW with earplugs in.

Now if they ignored the whole debate and then voted YES to something they had no clue about, okay tar and feathers then. :mrgreen:

Okay, I'm being a little ironic. It's just that I've been aware for a long time that most Congress critters frack off and don't do a lot of "work", and that speechmakers are often speaking to a half-full, quarter-full or nearly-empty House.

Personally, I think the best new Amendment we could pass would limit Congress to being in session no more than 3 weeks of each year, except in time of declared national emergency. Keep 'em out of our hair... they'd have to frantically run around like mad trying to pass those few bills that HAVE to be passed, and wouldn't have so much time to dream up new BS. :think:

Realist1 said:

Are you trying to tell me that Young voters won't be angry over their "Representatives" scr*wing off,,,when they should be Working? :lol:

You have a low opinion of the Young.:roll:

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Not in the least, as they are perfectly aware that playing solitaire and listening to some prescripted, already known, talking points 'debate' can be accomplished (together) without impairing said Representatives ability to actually accomplish something useful.

akyron said:

People that live in glass houses should not throw stones so I wont.


Its not like they were on a WoW raid or something. Now that takes some concentration.

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LOL ! That was funny ....

Redress said:

They are playing solitaire for gods sake. It's not like it requires brain activity to play it. If they can't manage to follow the debate well enough while playing solitaire, they have to be just about brain dead.

There are things to complain about our lawmakers doing. This just ain't one of them. It's trivial and is not going to have any negative impact on us unless we want to make a big issue out of it.

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Okay how about we take it a step further. Sheila Jackson Lee, a local representative from where I live took a cell phone call while she was holding a townhall meeting. As a concerned citizen was talking to her, she was yapping away on her phone, "but also listening to the ongoing debate." Would this be "trivial"? Cause to me it sounds just plain disrespectful, saying I have more important things to do, just like those congressmen suggest they have better things to do besides pay attention to a debate. It's just pathetic.

cmckinney said:

Okay how about we take it a step further. Sheila Jackson Lee, a local representative from where I live took a cell phone call while she was holding a townhall meeting. As a concerned citizen was talking to her, she was yapping away on her phone, "but also listening to the ongoing debate." Would this be "trivial"? Cause to me it sounds just plain disrespectful, saying I have more important things to do, just like those congressmen suggest they have better things to do besides pay attention to a debate. It's just pathetic.

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Nope, that was outrageously rude. And yep, disrespectful, and the explanation was pathetic.

Let me guess...

Accepted practice is..

Watching Fox News, listening to some Christian radio, and reading right wing media sites.

Unacceptable practice is..

Watching anything but Fox News, listening to devils music (basically anything), and reading places like Huffington Post, NYT webpage and so on..

Fear that legislators need a bit of relaxation... fear that!...