The 108th Congress has spent this entire year with their sails furled, their anchor down, and their oars in. The two parties have been scheming like mutinous sailors, and scoring points against the other side has consistently trumped getting the heck out of the doldrums. It sounds like a disaster, but for taxpayers, it may be a blessing in disguise. With Congress run aground, our budget has seldom been safer.

It took 12% tariffs from the European Union and a pirate's booty of tax breaks for politically connected businesses to get this do-nothing Congress to finish the corporate tax bill. However, this is a bill that never should have been picked from the legislative vine. In its final form, it is little more than a cynical vote-getter that doles out goodies to Congressional members facing tough races.

Aside from that single, meager accomplishment, Congress's record this year is about as memorable as a high school graduation speech. Their favorite activities have been naming buildings after each other and sanctimoniously pontificating on politically motivated cultural issues. Every other issue has fallen by the wayside. The good news is that they are running out of time to run up the deficit and waste our money. But they're coming back after the election and all bets are off.

Congress, which originally hoped to adjourn on October 1, worked through last weekend to pass the $32 billion Homeland Security spending bill, a massive measure containing almost $15 billion in disaster aid for states hit by hurricanes and farmers suffering through drought, and the corporate tax bill. By the beginning of this month, Congress was supposed to have passed the 13 spending bills that pay for government operations. This year, they only passed four. Consequently, when Congress comes back for a lame duck, post-election session it will have to lump the remaining spending bills together to create an overloaded omnibus spending bill that breaks the fiscal bank.

This Congress may be remembered not for what they accomplished, but for what they failed to accomplish. The energy bill is dormant; the highway bill is in a ditch; the Central America Free Trade Agreement has been shuffled off to next year; judicial appointments and administration appointments have been derailed; and asbestos and tort reform legislation have gone nowhere. Congress still hasn't finished welfare reform legislation.

Why wasn't anything accomplished? After big accomplishments in 2003, House leaders spent this session resting on their laurels and gearing up for the election by holding 'message votes' and taking swings at their political opponents. The Senate's legislative record is worse still, one that makes the House look positively industrious. The new Majority leader couldn't keep the legislative train on track. At times it seemed that leadership in the Senate was asleep at the switch.

Maybe the reason Congress didn't do very much was that they weren't around. The House was in session for 102 days, compared to 133 days last year. The Senate fared only marginally better, sitting for just 125 days, down substantially from 167 days last year.

The upshot of all the back-and-forth bickering, partisan pot-shots, Presidential election tension, and high-stakes congressional races, is a grouchy, antagonistic Congress. Their animosity and heavy remaining workload will have a serious impact on the prospects for success of the 109th Congress, no matter who ends up at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue or has power in Congress.