"Last week, just before this financial crisis burst into public view, I sat down with Steny Hoyer, the Maryland Democrat who is the able majority leader of the House of Representatives," writes Washington Post columnist David Broder. "He handed me a prepared list of the achievements of this Congress. It was not a shabby compendium. The economic stimulus measure, the minimum-wage boost, student loan legislation, the new GI bill, new ethics rules and a dozen or more other laws to 'improve the lives of the American people' were highlighted. From the high hopes that greeted the Democratic takeover of the Senate and House in November 2006, there has grown, month by month, a sense of disillusionment with the performance of this Congress. Bush has a roughly 30 percent job approval rating; Congress is at least a dozen points below that. I think that institutional reputation has been damaged by two things: the sense that Democrats and Republicans would rather score partisan points off each other than look for ways to work together; and the frustration at Congress's inaction on the big issues of greatest concern to voters."