Want to know what the House ACTUALLY did today?

[Fearless]

Here are some fun tidbits...

10:00 A.M. -
The House convened, starting a new legislative day.

12:33 P.M. -
DEBATE - The House proceeded with one hour of debate on H. Res. 375. (to establish the Commission on Freedom of Information Act Processing Delays, and for other purposes)

3:01 P.M. -
DEBATE - The House proceeded with two hours of debate on S. 627. (to establish the Commission on Freedom of Information Act Processing Delays)

5:40 P.M. -
POSTPONED PROCEEDINGS- the Chair postponed further proceedings on S. 627 until a time to be announced. {OP's comment: Isn't it great that they postpone a debate on establishing a commission to process delays after two hours??}

6:00 P.M. -
DEBATE - The House proceeded with forty minutes of debate on H.R. 2213. (to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 801 West Eastport Street in Iuka, Mississippi, as the "Sergeant Jason W. Vaughn Post Office" )

6:14 P.M. -
DEBATE - The House proceeded with forty minutes of debate on H.R. 1975. (to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 281 East Colorado Boulevard in Pasadena, California, as the "First Lieutenant Oliver Goodall Post Office Building")

6:32 P.M. -
DEBATE - The House proceeded with forty minutes of debate on H.R. 2062. (to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 489 Army Drive in Barrigada, Guam, as the "John Pangelinan Gerber Post Office Building" )

OP's insert: There are two more post office namings after this

6:50 P.M. -
The Speaker announced that the House do now recess.

11:54 P.M. - The House convened

11:56 P.M. - The House adjourned.


http://gov.mtopgroup.com/ref/art1/house-live.htm?allday

The House is clearly a functional body. They renamed post offices today.

[animato]

1. Where's the part where they pizza? nt

[Ruby the Liberal]

2. I wonder if they are on the 'to be closed' list for September.

[HappyMe]

3. Wow!

Working their fingers to the bone. I don't know if I should laugh or cry.

[Newest Reality]

4. Whew!

I don't know if I could handle that much hard work on important and relevant issues in times like these.

Are we paying them enough for that?

Will they be getting to H.R. 666, the Condom Color Choice Act,(to establish fair choice in condom color choices through availability regulations with consideration of size prejudices) in the near future?

Jobs are no big deal these days since unemployment is the new normal.

[saras]

5. The times listed have no relationship to the activities...WTF

It took two and a half hours to convene.

One hour of debate took two and a half hours.

Two hours of debate took two and a half hours.

Forty minutes of debate took fifteen minutes.

Another forty minutes of debate took fifteen minutes.

ANOTHER forty minutes of debate took twenty minutes, with two more "post office namings" squeezed into the same time.

That's an awesomely flexible clock. I want one.

[Fearless]

6. I have only excerpted some things...

Leaving gaps in timing. Some things did finish early however... the time is just the maximum time allotted for debate.

[Recursion]

12. Having worked in the House back in the day...

It's not as nonsensical as it seems.

Two and a half hours to convene sounds bad, but they have a lot of administrative stuff to do, not to mention formalities like the invocation, saying the pledge of allegiance, and the journal vote (basically voting on whether or not the previous day happened). Then they have to deal with whatever administrative stuff the Clerk and Sergeant at Arms have (eg, "get your travel claims in by the 15th" or "whoever parked an unmarked black SUV in the Rayburn parking lot please move it" -- imagine any company with a couple of thousand employees; they have to deal with the same bullshit). Then there's a quorum call to get the people who are still in their offices onto the Floor. This time also usually includes "Speaker's minutes" which is a chance for any Member to go up and talk about whatever they want to for the record (stuff like "Mr. Speaker, I rise to recognize Tim Price who just achieved the rank of Eagle scout...").

In terms of the times of debate, the time allocated is actual recorded time speaking, not time on the clock, so all of the stuff about "the chair recognizes the gentleman from Oklahoma" doesn't count towards the one hour. Neither do points of order ("hey, it's my turn to talk, not his"), points of privilege ("it's too cold in here", or "one second, I have to go move my unmarked black SUV"), or parliamentary procedure requests ("OK, whose turn is it to talk, really?").

The "forty minutes" is just kind of a generic time they allocate to things that won't take very long. The sponsoring member gets up and makes a speech about who this guy was and why he deserves a Post Office; this is entered into the Congressional Record so the family of the guy can get a copy along with a flag that was flown over the Capitol. It's one of the few pieces of comity still observed that Members are basically given discretion over naming Post Offices in their district; I don't recall a PO renaming bill that ever failed. The sponsoring member then yields the balance of his or her time.

Basically, a lot of what Congressmen do is talk about stuff nobody else cares about so it can get on CSPAN and in the Record, and that takes up most of the day -- there was actually a lot less of that today (there's usually a second session of Minutes after the business is complete and the body turns over to the Committee of the Whole; they seemed to skip that), probably because they're doing a big bill. While other Members are talking about stuff nobody else cares about, Members usually go back to their offices to do constituent services.

[Volaris]

16. heh reading this made me think about something I haven't thought about in a long while...

My paternal grandfather was an old-school Eisenhower Republican and Grandma was a lifelong New-Dealer (they had been through WWII together, he was an airman and she was a nurse, if that matters) but they got along well enough...

Anyway, I remember being a little kid and sitting on their living room floor watching Primary and General election coverage with them every cycle, as they LOVED politics... I would listen to them debate and have meaningful conversations about how everything was working out on the other side of the television glass...

The thing I remember MOST about my grandfather's view of politics specifically and life in general was his unabashed HATRED for bureaucratic inefficiencies; he used to say things like "if something needed doing and that thing could be done in half an hour, it would take The Government three and a half days to get it done"...(This was NOT because he hated government or thought that government was bad all the time at everything it did, just that everything governmental required consensus, rather than just one guy having the power to go out and get something done all by himself...I always suspected this was because he had been in the Army, and things just worked faster in that sphere, and it left a mark on his way of thinking...)

One time I asked grandma about this peculiar facet of his personality and she said "Well, yeah, THAT'S why he's a Republican."

Reading this thread makes me think they really DON'T make 'em like they used to lol, and conjures up quite a happy childhood memory, so thank you for that.=)

Peace,

[Riftaxe]

7. Naming post offices is important or no one could mail anything...

I mean imagine the confusion that would ensue if every post office was not named!

New in town, how would you ask for the location where you could mail a letter...ask for the post office? No one would know what you were talking about!!!

[krispos42]

8. *facepalm*

[Kennah]

9. So the House folded, again.

[Skidmore]

10. I'm so borrowing this and disseminating it on Facebook.

[newfie11]

11. no wonder they think everyone can work into their 90's

Anyone can do the shit they do.

[Vinca]

13. All Boehner has accomplished so far is the naming of buildings.

He must be the worst Speaker in the history of the country.

[moose65]

14. It seems like such a waste of time...

to spend time on the floor "debating" the naming of Post Offices. If these bills ALWAYS pass (which I assume they do), then couldn't that be taken out of the business of the House? If members are responsible for naming the Post Offices, couldn't they do that when they're back in their districts? They could have little "Naming Ceremonies" where they invite the families of the "namee" and have a photo op and the whole dog-and-pony show, then somehow get it certified or whatever later. It just seems that they are adding unnecessary things to the schedule when there are MUCH more important things they should be talking about.

As an aside... I assume also that Republicans probably hate the Postal Service. That would seem to follow their usual M.O.: the post office competes with private business, surely private business could do it better, etc, etc.

[Creideiki]

15. Jobs, jobs, jobs.

Or something.