Senator Reid sees "mopping up" lame-duck session

[Francesca9]

Source: Reuters

...He suggested that Congress focus on smaller issues, such as improved efficiency and a drive toward natural gas that would cut dependence on foreign oil, which he said had broad support.

Congress has dealt with a number of major issues since President Barack Obama took office in January 2009, including healthcare and financial reform. Efforts to tackle climate change have failed so far.

"I think we are at a point now where we are going to have to start looking at doing pieces of big things and not worry so much about the big things," Reid said...

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE68653020100908

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I don't expect much after reading this.

[depakid]

1. Whether Reid survives November or not

mopping him up needs to be the first order of Democratic business in 2011.

[gtar100]

2. So far the Senate has been nothing but lame-duck.

And Harry Reid can shoulder the brunt of that by being such a spineless majority leader. The world is on the brink of so many disasters, and we're stuck with him day after day, year after year. What is wrong with this world that incompetence rises to the top so easily? We need somebody who has the guts to take on the abomination called the republican party without pussy-footing around everything. Harry's not against Democrats, he's just a stick in the mud.

[No Elephants]

6. Democratic Senators elected him Minority Leader and then Majority Leader, I suspect

because he does what they want him to do and seems to be willing to take all the political heat for it, too. You don't re-elect someone whose performance during his first term was not to your liking.

[gtar100]

8. Plenty of blame to go around. But the head of the party bears the brunt.

And deservedly so. The Senate is not working and there is no leadership to make things any different. The filibusters by the republicans have been handled terribly. But maybe that's exactly what they want and is exactly to their liking.

[Phlem]

3. Really Harry!?

Cause you've been so friggin bold on the "big" issues, now it's time to get to the small stuff??!!
What has been the last 10 friggin years of your life, and the last 2 of Obama's???!!!

What a droopy sack 'O'.....

-p

[countmyvote4real]

4. Senator Reid as majority leader is lame, lame and more lame. n/t

[BumRushDaShow]

5. So many blame Pres. Obama for what is this man's fault.

The country is in BIG shambles and it NEEDED (and STILL NEEDS) the BIG things done before this Congress goes back into its mindless stupor.

Every time a major crisis occurs, they convene hearings and hearings and hearings. Then congresscritters on each committee having a hearing, proceed to grandstand their own individual "bills" to supposedly address the problem. Yet rather than follow through and combine these individual attempts into one bill to vote out of committee, every single boutique bill languishes and eventually dies in committee until the next crises. And then if some single bill manages to make it out of a committee because of a particularly egregious crisis, it again dies until the next crises because that one committee's bill that made it out hasn't been reconciled with any other committees' bills that may have made it out, thus eliminating the possibility of presenting ONE bill for a floor vote. And then with the next crises, should any consolidated bill be ready for a vote or is voted on, it sits in purgatory because the other chamber doesn't have a "companion" bill that made it out of their respective committees. And THEN if the next crises is politically expedient enough and both chambers have something that makes it to the floor for a vote, these disparate versions are inevitably piled on with so many non-relevant amendments and riders, that it is difficult to reconcile to form a single bill for both chambers to act on, resulting in both versions dying in their respective chambers without any further action until the next session and next crises, where they start all over again.

Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

[No Elephants]

7. Please consider Reply #6. Harry has only one vote in the Senate.

[Dappleganger]

9. Why don't they just all park their butts on the Mall and take up knitting.

If they won't fight for anything else, what's the point of being a public servant?