The Keeper of the 100-Hour Clock

[DeepModem Mom]

NYT: Among His Official Duties, Keeping on Top of the 100-Hour Clock
By MARK LEIBOVICH
Published: January 10, 2007


A clock on the Web site of the majority leader at the end of legislative business Tuesday evening.

WASHINGTON, Jan. 9 — Rob Cogorno is busy watching the clock. And not just any clock.

It is The Clock, at least as far as Capitol Hill is concerned this week — and early next week, and maybe into late next week, depending on how long House Democrats decide it will run.

Mr. Cogorno’s formal title is floor director for Representative Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland, the House majority leader, but for all practical purposes, he is the Keeper of The Clock. That is the digital timepiece on Mr. Hoyer’s Web site marking the passage of legislative time as House Democrats push their “Hundred Hours for a New Direction” agenda through Congress.

Mr. Cogorno, 50, is a neatly dressed, precise and exacting man whose shiny desktop in the majority leader’s office holds a neat stack of newspapers and a canister of Purell hand sanitizer. He wakes promptly at 6:20 a.m. (by digital clock radio set to NPR) and has prided himself on being punctual since his parents gave him a Mickey Mouse watch when he was 6.

Mr. Cogorno tells time by his BlackBerry, but charts the official passage of “legislative time” by the stately face clock that looms above the House floor.

“We’re only counting legislative hours,” Mr. Cogorno says in response to the question he has volleyed repeatedly this week. “Legislative time” he explains, occurs when the House is in session and toiling at some official function — debating, voting or doing anything related to making laws. It does not count designated periods in which members can bloviate on all manner of things (say, the plumage of a state bird or the efforts of a national championship football team)....

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/10/washington/10clock.html?hp&ex=1168491600&en=7f87af6ba378e69c&ei=5094&partner=homepage

[liberal N proud]

1. Timekeeper

[LiberalFighter]

2. If they didn't stipulate what constitutes time for the 100 hour clock

the Republicans could very easily bloviate on all manner of things or even filibuster.