A Rat By Any Other Name...

I have heard from a lot of people that they have never heard of the Senate using "Reconciliation" before, to pass a bill that won't get 60 votes, which is the Senate rule. Well, it has happened before, but I didn't hear much about it until today. I heard Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh talking about 2005, when President Bush wanted to use a simple Senate majority to confirm a Supreme Court Justice. It was called the "Nuclear Option". They (Glenn and Rush) played sound bites from several Senators who were completely against allowing the simple majority and overriding the Senate rules.

Senator Barack Obama was talking about President George W. Bush and the "nuclear option", saying "He hasn't gotten his way, and that is now prompting, you know, a change in the Senate rules that, really, I think, would change the character of the Senate, forever, and what I worry about would be you essentially have still two chambers, the House and the Senate, but you have simply, majoritarian, absolute power on either side, and that's just not what the founders intended."

I didn't know "majoritarian" was a word. Guess I'll have to "axe" an English teacher about that, and about using run-on sentences.

Senator Hillary Clinton said "So this President (GWB) has come to this majority in the Senate and basically said, change the rules! Do it the way I want it done!"

Senator Schumer said that we were facing a "Constitutional crisis". That "the checks and balances which have been at the core of this republic" were "about to be evaporated by the nuclear option." That it was "amazing, it's almost a temper tantrum".

Senator Feinstein said (this is one of my favorites): "The nuclear option, if successful, will turn the Senate into a body that could have its rules broken at any time by a majority of Senators unhappy with any position taken by the minority. It begins with judicial nominations. Next will be executive appointments, and then, legislation."

Holy cow I think she's on to something!

My favorite quote, though, comes from Senator Joe Biden. He said that the nuclear option "is ultimately an example of the arrogance of power".

Yesterday, Senator Harry Reid said that Republicans "should stop crying about reconciliation as if it's never been done before. It's been done in almost every Congress. And they're the ones who used it more than anyone else." But wait! Harry Reid is the one that said in 2002 that "The right to extended debate is never more important than when one party controls Congress and the White House."

So what is happening now, with Obamacare? The majority of Americans do NOT want it! But instead of going back to the drawing board and making a plan that a majority of Americans can agree upon (doesn't have to be a landslide or anything, we found that out on November 4, 2008), the Democrats in the Senate, along with the President, met and worked out the new bill. You know, the one that's going to be presented to the GOP in the "Health Care Summit" on February 25th. The Democrats are planning to tell the Republicans to take it as it is, or leave it. No more talking, no more stalling, and we're going to do this with "reconciliation" whether you like it or not. Hmmmm, Senator Reid, I thought that extended debate was really important when one party is in control.

Reconciliation = nuclear option = a no-go for all the Senators that I have quoted here, as well as all the others in the video below that I didn't quote.

I suppose reconciliation only means a no-go when you're not the majority.

I dunno, Secretary Clinton, I think you would have impressed the heck out of me if you had said to President Obama what you said to GWB:

"You have to RESTRAIN YOURSELF, MR. PRESIDENT."

Thanks to the 912 project for posting this video, so you can see and hear all that I've quoted, and more, for yourself.