Rep. George Miller announced Monday he will retire at the end of his current term. The California Democrat has long been a staunch liberal of the blue-collar populist variety. He used his position as the chairman of the House Education and the Workforce Committee from 2007-2011 to advocate for higher minimum wages, immigration reform and Big Labor issues like card check.

Miller was not one to let the fact that he lost the gavel in 2011, when the Republicans regained the majority, stop him much, either. As I noted in my very first Washington Examiner column back in July 2012: