28 pay raise for congress   The new year will give us a new
President and a newly elected Congress. Only 61 individuals are
newly elected to it though. The remaining 474 are simply
returning to continue their work (two are going from the house
to the Senate). But in this session, all of them are expected to
bring about that muct "touted change" that many of them promised
along with President-Elect Obama.   While the nation and the
world have entered economic trouble, the 535 collective members
of the House of Representatives and Senate will have the
opportunity to see their salaries change with an increase of as
much as $4,700 a year.  The pay raise is automatic and turns out
to be about a 2.8% increase and although it may not sound like
much, when one considers the circumstances of the times that we
are in, accepting such a pay raise would be criminal.  I say
criminal because there do not exist many American institutions
that can determine their own salary at their own whim. And there
are even fewer institut