Tammy Baldwin and Gwen Moore: Almost useless

A new set of “power rankings” for members of congress has been released by Knowlegis and the Wisconsin delegation has produced some interesting results. Found on Congress.org, the rankings are simply explained:

We rated each current Member of Congress on 15 criteria that demonstrated power and the ability to be effective in Congress in 2005. This resulted in a Power Score that ranked members for overall power in each chamber of Congress.

So who faired the best and who faired the worst? Consider these milestones: In the House of Representatives, Dennis Hastert (the Speaker) scored the highest ranking with a 97.25. Second highest was Tom Delay (R-TX) with a 63.50. The highest ranking Democrat was Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) with a 41.89. On the Senate side, Bill Frist (the Majority Leader) scored the highest ranking with a 96.75, Arlen Specter (R-PA) was second with an 82.31 and Harry Reid (D-NV) was the highest placed Democrat with a 71.06.

By far the top placing member of the Wisconsin delegation was James Sensenbrenner, who scored a 48.00 and ranked fifth overall in the House. Not too far behind was David Obey, the second most powerful Democrat in the house (trailing only Ms. Pelosi), with a 40.00 score and 9th place finish.

The lowest ranking members of the state’s delegation, not surprisingly, were Tammy Baldwin and Gwen Moore, who scored 4.50 and 3.87 tallies, taking 424th and 432nd place, respectively. (Keep in mind, there are only 435 members of the House, meaning Wisconsin has two of the 11 least powerful. Impressive, eh?)

On the Senate side, Russ Feingold seems to be all talk and no walk, as despite being a liberal icon he placed 82nd overall with a 21.06 score. Herb Kohl, on the other hand, seems to be doing a lot more in Washington even though he doesn’t have the same affection for sound bytes as Mr. Feingold; the senior senator scored a 31.25 and placed 54th overall. (There are, of course, 100 senators.)

So what are the highlights of all of this? Messrs. Sensenbrenner and Obey certainly seem to be delivering a powerful punch on behalf of their constituents. These are the sort of people you want fighting your fights in Washington – they can actually get things done.

Conversely, Mesdames. Moore and Baldwin, are pretty much lost in the House of Representatives. Considering that Ms. Moore’s election is illegitimate-at-best and Ms. Baldwin has little to worry about with one of the most liberal districts in America, this comes as surprising, seeing as how you would expect one to fight for legitimacy and the other to offer a “nothing to lose”-style attitude.

Oh, and before you go dismissing this all as partisan, consider this one little gem found in a press release from the Dave Magnum campaign:

Interestingly, Brad Fitch, Tammy Baldwin’s former chief of staff, headed up the Knowlegis team that conducted the study.