From Sirotablog:
VOTE ALERT: Dick Cheney Dems Plan to Hide Votes On Iraq TODAY
http://www.workingassetsblog.com/2007/05/vote_alert_dick_cheney_dems_pl.htmlToday is the day House Democrats are expected to vote on Iraq - except, news out of Washington this morning says the leadership has come up with a nifty little trick to try to prevent the public from seeing who voted for giving Bush a blank check, and who voted against it. If you thought Democrats were behaving like cowards by caving into a President at a three-decade low in presidential polling and giving him the very blank check they explicitly promised not to give him during the 2006 election, you ain't seen nothing yet. We are watching the rise of the Dick Cheney Democrats - that is, the rise of Democrats who endorse governing in secret and hiding the public's business from the public itself.
Here's how it is expected to work today in a process only Dick Cheney could love (though you never know - it could change). Every bill comes to the House floor with what is known as a "rule" that sets the terms of the debate over the legislation in question. House members first vote to approve this parliamentary rule, and then vote on the legislation.
Today, however, Democrats are planning to include the Iraq Blank check bill IN the rule itself, meaning when the public goes to look for a vote on the Iraq supplemental bill, the public won't find that. All we will find is a complex parliamentary procedure vote. Lawmakers, of course, will then tell their angry constituents they really are using all of their power to end the war, and this vote on the rule - which was the real vote for war - wasn't really a vote on the war. It is a devious, deliberately confusing cherry on top of the manure sundae being served up to the American public, which voted Democrats into office on the premise that they would use their congressional majority to end the war.
All of this is happening at the time top Republican leaders are making ever more sociopathic statements at odds with mainstream public opinion. Today, as just one example, House Republican Conference Chairman Adam Putnam (R-FL) cheered on the blank check, telling Roll Call that "You drop Murtha , you drop withdrawal, the troops win." He doesn't explain how popular proposals to better equip and train American soldiers for combat and force the Bush administration to come up with a plan for redeploying troops out of harms way means "troops win."
If this secretive behavior seems familiar, it should. You may recall that in the past two weeks, the same Democratic leadership that is now trying to hide its votes on Iraq negotiated a secret free trade deal with the White House, steamrolling its other key Election 2006 pledge to stop lobbyist-written trade policy. The legislative texts of the trade pacts in question remain concealed from the public, though K Street lobbyists have told reporters they have received "assurances" that any of the much-touted provisions that purport to protect labor and the environment will be written to be unenforceable.
(my emphasis, more at the link)
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