I hope enough of people feel as violated I do. We should feel violated because we have been. Not only do I hope we can get this repealed on solid grounds, but there should be measures taken to prevent shenanigans from ever reocurring.

The first vote will be on what’s called the Manager’s Amendment, which is essentially the rules under which the House will take up the Senate Bill and Reconciliation Bill. This set time limits for debate and limits the ability of the opposition to attach amendments.

The second vote will be on the Senate Bill, by itself. If it passes, it goes to the President.

The third vote will be on the Reconciliation Bill, which will go to the Senate.

Of course, this could all change by 1 tomorrow

So the new plan is to set the rules, present a package of amendments and then vote on the original bill. I have no issue with that.

What troubles me is this:

“makes clear that the House intends to modify the Senate bill and not approve the Senate bill itself.”

So they are saying that they intend to shoot down the Senate bill and present an alternative? Am I reading this right? Or are they going to pass the Senate bill as is with no guarantee the Senate will accept their follow on amendment? Why not go to the joint process, avoid all the intrigue, and come out with one bill everyone can support?

Probably because the whole package of sausage is loaded with e coli and they don’t want anyone to know.

The House leadership is dropping plans to use “deem and pass”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/20/AR2010032001651.html?hpid=topnews

Which means they have the votes to pass the bill

Playing political games will not make the Senate bill enrolled. Pelosi’s public statement attests that. Voting on a rule is not the same as passing the original bill even if there is a counter resolution to be sent to the Senate. If Congress does not vote up or down on the bill as presented, the only self-execution that will occur starts in November if not before.

“A final copy of legislation passed by the United States House of Representatives and the Senate, which is then sent to the president for signature.”

The Senate bill is not enrolled because the House never voted approval.

“There is no authority in the presiding officers of the house of representatives and the senate to attest by their signatures, not in the president to approve, nor in the secretary of state to receive and cause to be published, as a legislative act, any bill not passed by congress.”

Therefore if you follow Marshall Field, there can be no authority to declare ‘deemed’ to have passed authorizing the reconciliation bill because the underlying Senate bill is not enrolled. Otherwise any bill could be deemed into law simply by having the Congress leadership attest that it had passed legislative process.

“It is said that, under any other view, it becomes possible for the speaker of the house of representatives and the president of the senate to impose upon the people as a law a bill that was never passed by congress. But this possibility is too remote to be seriously considered in the present inquiry. It suggests a deliberate conspiracy to which the presiding officers, the committees on enrolled bills, and the clerks of the two houses must necessarily be parties, all acting with a common purpose to defeat an expression of the popular will in the mode prescribed by the constitution.”

Which is why I think it’s about the dumbest move I’ve ever seen a majority in the House ever make.

It’s okay to do something like this on a low priority bill when nobody really cares about procedure, but if they thought the public wasn’t going to notice this they’re either naive or stupid.

And your wife’s reaction is, I think, the reaction that most Americans have to it

“Well, that’s dumb.”

And:

“Can they do that?”

Sadly, as you point out, my responses are pretty much “yes it is and yes they can.”

I did not say that Sections 5 and 7 contradict each other. Rather, that they compliment each other.

Section 7 says that for a bill to become a law it must be voted on by each chamber of Congress. But, it does not prescribe the method in which that must happen.

Instead, in Section 5 the Founders left to to each Chamber to decide on their internal procedures, including how they would vote on legislation.

And I wouldn’t put any money on your prediction that SCOTUS will over turn this

If section 5 allowed Congress to nullify the requirements of section 7, then section 7 would not be the supreme law of the land but the house rules would be. ERROR.

There would be no constitutional crises if the Supreme Court overturns and obviously dumb precedent that violates the obvious logical meaning of the law.

Yeah the liberals will cry their eyes out, but remember these are the people that made the Roe decision. They deserve not one molecule of sympathy.