“In a battle of wits, it is poor sport to fight an unarmed opponent.” Humorist Mark Twain said that, although similar sentiments have been attributed to William Shakespeare, Winston Churchill, and Walt Kelly’s comic strip creation Pogo. In the same vein, there is little sport in taking potshots at legislators. Everyone does it, though, because legislators are such big targets and are so easy to hit.

Almost no one thinks Congress is doing a good job. A recent Gallup Poll ranked 16 institutions according to the confidence they inspire in the public. The military came out on top, with 76 per cent of the people polled saying they had a “great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in the institution. Congress was at the bottom of the heap, with only 11 per cent of people saying they had real confidence in our elected representatives. This was the lowest confidence level ever for Congress, down from 17 per cent in 2009 and a percentage point below the previous low, reached in 2008. Half of the people polled by Gallup said that they had “very little” or “no” confidence in Congress