Are they conducting any real business in Congress?

So a couple years ago, there was a vote in the U.S. House of Representatives "expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that those who celebrate Christmas believe that the symbols and traditions of Christmas should be protected." I'm not entirely sure what that is supposed to mean, but the resolution passed by a margin of 401-22. Oddly, the one Congressman who usually votes no on anything that comes before the House because he believes it is not within the Constitutional powers of Congress is Ron Paul, and he voted yes for Christmas. C'mon, Ron Paul even voted against giving the Congressional Gold Medal to Peanuts cartoonist Charles Schulz (he brags about it on his myspace page). And here I thought libertarians might believe in the separation of church and state.

More recently, Congress voted for a resolution "recognizing the commencement of Ramadan." This time, nobody voted no, but 41 Republicans and 1 Democrat voted present. One Congressman who voted for Christmas but "present" on Ramadan is Tom Tancredo of Colorado, who like Paul is seeking the Republican nomination for President. Tancredo said the resolution was "an example of the degree to which political correctness has captured the political and media elite in this country." And a vote for protecting the symbols and traditions of Christmas was not driven by a right-wing political correctness, the kind that believes there is a war on Christmas? I hate to speculate on the ulterior motives of politicians (okay, I actually love it, it's kind of a sport, isn't it?), but could it be that Tancredo just thinks Christianity is the superior religion and that it's okay for that to be the policy of the U.S. government? After all, this is the guy who suggested we bomb Mecca as a deterrent to terrorism. Yeah, Tancredo, thanks to folks of your ideology, the war on terrorism has been about as successful as the war on Christmas.