Party abuse of Senate procedure serves the President......

[Joanne98]

Why hasn’t there been a vote on a health care-related amendment on the Senate floor since last Tuesday, although the Senate has been in public session since, on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday, and hundreds of amendments, from members of both Parties, have been filed on the bill, with only a dozen or so given the opportunity for a vote to date?

Premise: The leadership of the Democratic Party in Congress – especially in the Senate – is, and has been, allowing, encouraging and/or tolerating the wholesale dictation of legislative policy by the Executive Branch to the independent Legislative Branch on the health reform bill, while using extreme secrecy to try to hide their actions from the public, and even from fellow Members of Congress.

And those Party leaders are now trying to force that Executive Branch-created and blessed legislation through the Senate and House essentially unchanged, and promoting it as a Party product, rather than letting America’s federal legislature as a whole create its own product.

You may think that such power-driven and power-motivated abuse of regular order and democratic process is a good thing, if your pet policy (or your job) happens to align with the private will of the President and/or his most-powerful appointees, but such back door, unchecked concentration of legislative power in the Executive’s hands is an extremely dangerous thing for this nation and its separation of federal powers.

Does the U.S. Senate exist to serve the President and the Party, or to serve the American people?

The most recent public manifestation of this secret process, from Friday, 12/11/09’s Congressional Record:

Mr. McCAIN. Could I ask my friend about the situation as it exists right now? Right now, no Member on this side has any idea as to the specifics of the proposal the majority leader, I understand, has sent to OMB for some kind of scoring. Is that the way we want to do business, that a proposal that will be presented to the Senate sometime next week and voted on immediately–that is what we are told–is that the way to do business in a bipartisan fashion? Should we not at least be informed as to what the proposal is the Senate majority leader is going to propose to the entire Senate within a couple days? Shouldn’t we even know what it is?

Mr. DURBIN. I would say to the Senator from Arizona, I am in the dark almost as much as he is, and I am in the leadership. The reason is, because the Congressional Budget Office, which scores the managers’ amendment, the so-called compromise, has told us, once you publicly start debating it, we will publicly release it. We want to basically see whether it works, whether it works to continue to reduce the deficit, whether it works to continue to reduce the growth in health care costs.

We had a caucus after this was submitted to the Congressional Budget Office, where Senator Reid and other Senators who were involved in it basically stood and said: We are sorry, we can’t tell you in detail what was involved. But you will learn, everyone will learn, it will be as public information as this bill currently is on the Internet. But the Congressional Budget Office has tied our hands at this point putting it forward. Basically, what I know is what you know, having read press accounts of what may be included.

Mr. McCAIN. Could I ask my friend from Illinois–and by the way, I would like to do this again. Perhaps when he can get more substance into many of the issues.

Mr. DURBIN. Same time, same place tomorrow?

Mr. McCAIN. I admit these are unusual times. But isn’t that a very unusual process, that here we are discussing one-sixth of the gross national product; the bill before us has been a product of almost a year of sausage-making. Yet here we are at a position on December 12, with a proposal that none of us, except, I understand, one person, the majority leader, knows what the final parameters are, much less informing the American people. I don’t get it.

Mr. DURBIN. I think the Senator is correct, saying most of us know the fundamentals, but we do not know the important details behind this. What I am saying is, this is not the choice of the majority leader. It is the choice of the Congressional Budget Office. We may find that something that was sent over there doesn’t work at all, doesn’t fly. They may say this is not going to work, start over. So we have to reserve the right to do that, and I think that is why we are waiting for the Congressional Budget Office scoring, as they call it, to make sure it hits the levels we want, in terms of deficit reduction and reducing the cost of health care.

It is frustrating on your side. It is frustrating here. But I am hoping, in a matter of hours, maybe days, we will receive the CBO report.



While the backroom sabotage of the public legislative process has been underway this week on a couple of fronts (because the Party needs a "win" at any cost, and doesn’t dare let representative democracy work its will if the President has other ideas), the finger-pointers of the Senate have been quarrelling about whose Party team is to blame, or who deserves more credit for the inaction on the Senate floor.

Meanwhile, those Senators actually trying to publicly legislate in the best interests of the American people are stymied and obstructed. Even, unbelievably, name-called by anonymous Senate insiders as ‘in it for themselves’ simply because they’re trying to do their jobs like adults on behalf of the American people, while privileged to be among the relative few empowered to act on our behalf in our independent Legislative Branch of government.

Byron Dorgan, whose amendment is the most-recent Democratic amendment called up for debate from the hundreds of filed amendments that sit idling, speaking last Tuesday, 12/08/09:

AMENDMENT NO. 2793, AS MODIFIED, TO AMENDMENT NO. 2786

(Purpose: to provide for the importation of prescription drugs)

Mr. DORGAN. Madam President, I call up amendment No. 2793, as modified, and ask for its immediate consideration.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.

The bill clerk read as follows:

The Senator from North Dakota , for himself, Ms. Snowe, Mr. Grassley, Mr. McCain, Ms. Stabenow, Ms. Klobuchar, Mr. Brown, Mrs. Shaheen, Mr. Vitter, Mr. Kohl, Mr. Leahy, Mr. Feingold, and Mr. Nelson of Florida, proposes an amendment numbered 2793 to amendment No. 2786, as modified.

Mr. DORGAN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

(The amendment is printed in today’s Record under "Text of Amendments.")

Mr. DORGAN. Madam President, my understanding is that the Senator from Idaho is to be recognized next for laying down an amendment.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Idaho.

MOTION TO COMMIT

Mr. CRAPO. Madam President, I have a motion at the desk which I wish to call up and ask for its immediate consideration.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.

The bill clerk read as follows:

The Senator from Idaho moves to commit the bill H.R. 3590 to the Committee on Finance with instructions to report the same back to the Senate with changes that provide that no provision of this Act shall result in an increase in Federal tax liability for individuals with adjusted gross income of less than $200,000 and married individuals with adjusted gross income of less than $250,000.

<...>

Mr. DORGAN. <...> Tomorrow my hope is with my colleagues–Republicans and Democrats–we will pass this legislation at last, at long last. Many of us have been working on this issue 6, 8, 10 years. We will pass this legislation. Why? Because this is the place for it. This is the bill that should be amended. This is the time to do this. We cannot walk out of this Chamber and say something happened in that Chamber to deal with health care. But did you do something about prescription drugs? No, no, we couldn’t do that, couldn’t do that. This is not the way I want this to end, and it is not the way it has to end if enough of us have the courage to take on this fight.

As I said, I will have a lot more to say tomorrow morning. I appreciate the indulgence of my colleagues to listen tonight about why we have offered this legislation.

I started and let me finish by saying this is broadly bipartisan. It is, first and foremost, a Dorgan-Snowe bill. Senator Dorgan–myself–and Senator Snowe from the State of Maine, but many others–my colleague, Senator Grassley, who is on the floor, Senator McCain, who spent a lot of time on this issue–Republicans and Democrats have come together.

By the way, this has not happened very often on this bill. But this is a bipartisan bill with Republicans and Democrats pulling their oars together to try to get this done.

I yield the floor.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.

Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, before the Senator from North Dakota leaves and before I speak on another issue, I wish to tell him I am going to speak in support of his amendment. But I would like to ask him a question now, if he will answer it for me–a friendly question, but it is something I don’t know absolutely for sure, but I believe that pharmaceuticals are about the only thing a consumer in the United States cannot buy anywhere in the world that they want to buy. We ought to give them that same right we do on everything else. There may be some other items I am not aware of, but I think it is only pharmaceuticals that you cannot import from wherever you want to buy them.

Mr. DORGAN. Madam President, I say to the Senator from Iowa, that and Cohiba cigars from Cuba, I reckon. We have a special embargo with respect to Cuba. With that exception, I don’t think there is a legal product the American consumer cannot access anywhere else in the world.

This is about giving the American consumer the freedom that the global economy should offer everybody. The big shots got it. The big interests can do it. How about the American people having the opportunity to shop around the world for the same product and pay a fraction of the price of the charges that are imposed on them in the United States.



And again on Wednesday, 12/9/09:

Mr. McCAIN. I thank the Senator from North Dakota who has been pursuing this issue for a number of years. I believe we are on the verge of success.

I appreciate his eloquence, I appreciate his passion, but most of all, on behalf of the citizens of my State who can’t get up to Canada, who now are experiencing unprecedented economic difficulties, and who need these lifesaving prescription drugs–many of them senior citizens–I just wish to say thank you for your advocacy.

I think you have made an eloquent case, and I hope my colleagues have paid attention and will vote in the affirmative for the Senator’s amendment today.

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, let me say that Senator McCain has been a part of this effort for a long time. It is interesting, with all the action on floor of the Senate in recent weeks, this is one of the few examples of a significant policy that is bipartisan. We have Republicans and Democrats–over 30 cosponsors–who have worked with us to make certain we can do this, do it safely, and give the American people the opportunity they deserve. This is very bipartisan. I appreciate that a lot.

I wish to say, the National Federation of Independent Businesses supports this; the AARP supports this. We have a long list of organizations that are strong supporters of this amendment, and so I hope, today, perhaps at last–at long last, after 8 or 10 years–we might finally achieve a breakthrough and get this through the Senate.

I have said previously that the pharmaceutical industry is a formidable opponent. I understand that. We have had difficulty getting this in a piece of legislation to get it signed and give the American people freedom and give them fair pricing. When we do this–Senator McCain, myself, and others–it is suggested that somehow we have no regard for this industry. That is not the case at all. It just is not. We have no regard for a pricing policy, however, that we believe is unfair to the American people. It has been that way for too long–a long time too long. Perhaps today–with the vote on this amendment, which I expect later this afternoon–will be the first step in getting that changed.

I yield the floor.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona is recognized.

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I believe if I am to speak for more than 10 minutes I need to ask unanimous consent. If that is correct, I ask unanimous consent to speak for 15 minutes.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I wish to speak to the Crapo motion–an amendment that, hopefully, we will be voting on a little later today–and I urge my colleagues to support the motion of the Senator from Idaho.

This is about jobs and it is about taxes.

Then, later Wednesday, 12/9/09, a bit of the backroom sabotage leaks out onto the Senate floor:

Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the Senate stand in recess until 6:15 p.m. today; that upon reconvening at 6:15, the Senate continue in debate-only posture for an additional hour under the same conditions and limitations specified under previous orders.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

Mr. REID. Mr. President, I would also tell everyone here there will be no more votes tonight. I don’t think we can arrange any.

Thereupon, the Senate, at 5:06 p.m., recessed until 6:15 p.m. and reassembled when called to order by the Presiding Officer (Mr. Brown.)

Still later Wednesday, 12/9/09:

Mr. REID. Mr. President, I had a conversation earlier today with the distinguished Republican leader. It appears now that we are going to get the appropriations bill from the House of Representatives. The bill is bipartisan, and everybody has worked hard. There are some conference reports we have completed. Yet we didn’t find them to work on the floor, for reasons everyone understands. That bill will come over from the House tomorrow. We can move to that with a simple majority vote, and then if I have to file cloture on it tomorrow, we would have a Saturday cloture vote. Thirty hours after that–sometime Sunday morning–we would have a vote on the conference report.

I have indicated to the Republican leader that it would probably be to everyone’s advantage if we allow people to go home for the weekend, rather than going through all these procedural gyrations.

We have worked hard. I had a Senator come to me and say she hadn’t been home in 2 or 3 weeks, and it was not a good situation. That Senator said if we have to be here this weekend, she will be here. We need to not be doing things just to delay. I understand the Republican leader doesn’t want to do health care. I appreciate that, and we have different positions on that issue.

I see no reason to punish everybody this weekend. I hope the minority will give strong consideration to the proposal I have made. We are waiting for a score to come back from CBO anyway. Anybody who has had experience with CBO knows that will take a matter of days. So I hope the minority will allow a little bit of time to go by so that we can have our respite from the tedious work we have been doing on the Senate floor.

Thursday, 12/10/09, at about 3 p.m.:

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I say to my good friend the majority leader, we have been anxious to have health care votes since Tuesday, and we have had the Crapo amendment pending since Tuesday. You have said repeatedly, and I agree with you, that the health care issue is extraordinarily important and that we should be dealing with it and debating it.

So it is my hope that somehow, through our discussions both on and off the floor, we can get back to a process of facilitating the offering of amendments on both sides of the aisle at the earliest possible time and we can get back to the health care bill.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader.

Mr. REID. Mr. President, I am happy to respond through the Chair to my distinguished colleague.

I think it is pretty evident to everyone here not only what has happened here on the Senate floor but the statements that have been made publicly and privately. And certainly I am not going to discuss any private conversations I have had, but based on Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck, which is on all the news today, they are upset at Senator McConnell because he is not opposing the health care bill enough–that in a reasonable process on this, there are no efforts being made to improve this bill, only to kill this bill.

Continued>>>
http://seminal.firedoglake.com/diary/18788

[dkf]

1. Interesting

Why do we assume this is for the president? Isn't it because of the cbo?