‘Senator’ capitalized because the insecure often require that special little emphasis. In this case, SENATOR Boxer is demonstrating same by making a fairly pointless gesture that’s apparently fueled by pique:
Barbara Boxer may not only force her climate bill through the Environment and Public Works Committee without any Republican votes; aides say she could also do it without any Republicans in the room at all.
Boxer (D-Calif.) could exploit a loophole in committee rules that will allow her to approve the bill with a simple majority of the 12 Democrats on the committee, even if no Republicans are present. Republicans have vowed to boycott the proceeding.
This end run around Republicans — ignoring the usual rules that require at least two Republicans to be present for a quorum — could further hinder the chances for an already troubled cap-and-trade bill.
The problem here is that Senate Republicans are tired of Democrats forcing through legislation without analysis, deliberation, or in some cases, an opportunity to even read it; so they’re going to boycott the markup until they get a full EPA analysis. No attendance, no quorum, no markup. But SENATOR Boxer wants a bill to impress all those sophisticated Europeans at Copenhagen in December, so she’s going to alter the rules so as to force her version of the bill out via a rump committee. As the Politico article notes, this has other Democrats swearing, because: a, there was little likelihood of cap-and-trade being passed in a SENATOR Boxer-friendly form to begin with; b, there was not previously much chance of any version of cap-and-trade being passed by December anyway; and c, there is now effectively zero chance of either happening before the New Year. It’s trivially easy to slow legislation down to a crawl in the Senate, and there are now several motivated Republicans to demonstrate how to do that.
Marvelous work, SENATOR Boxer.
Moe Lane
Crossposted to RedState.
The political part of me is happy to see the SENATOR shooting herself in the foot like this. The geeky, formality- and technique-obsessed parts of me (the same parts that enjoy etiquette dinners, how-to articles, WH40K battle reports, and traditional Catholic ceremony) are excited to see just what all of these parliamentary tricks are that the Republicans have up their sleeve. It’s a win-win! Go for it, SENATOR! Oyster out.
One has to wonder at what point certain members of Congress will realize they are not there to push their own agenda, but to be the voice of the people. The people do not want this terrible legislation that will cost us dearly in the form of higher energy prices and lost jobs. Write your representatives and ensure they hear that a majority of Americans do not support this disastrous bill at http://tiny.cc/hYqYv.