Rules memo defends Dem plan to pass Senate bill without vote

[ProSense]

Rules memo defends Dem plan to pass Senate bill without vote

By Ian Swanson

House Democrats are marching forward with plans to move the Senate healthcare bill through their chamber without actually voting on it.

The House Rules Committee on Tuesday morning released a memo defending the so-called “deem and pass” procedure, which the memo said has a long precedent in the House and is commonly used.

“For starters, despite what the minority may claim, the precedent for adopting a resolution and at the same time concurring in a Senate amendment to a bill was set back in 1933,” the Rules memo stated.

Under the process, the Rules Committee would adopt a self-executing rule that would “deem” the Senate bill passed when the House votes on a package of changes to the Senate bill.

The package of changes then will be voted on by the Senate under budget reconciliation rules, which prevent Republicans from mounting a filibuster.

The Rules memo noted that the House just used the procedure in February to pass an increase to the federal debt limit, and that the model has been used “far more often by Republicans than Democrats” over the years.

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[Lerkfish]

1. IMHO, doing so will hand over all seats to republicans at the next election

:shrug:

[ProSense]

2. Doubt it.

Pass. The. Damn. Bill.

[SPedigrees]

7. Yes. Pass the damn bill. By whatever means it takes. nt

[Lerkfish]

18. and whatever is in it.

[ProSense]

20. Well,

yes and yes:

Statement by Cecile Richards, President of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, on Final Stages of Health Care Reform

“As a trusted provider of health care to millions of women and families, Planned Parenthood is committed to fixing our broken health care system and guaranteeing quality, affordable health care for all Americans.

“Nobody knows better than the doctors, nurses, and other health professionals in local Planned Parenthood health centers how urgently families need affordable, quality health care. If enacted, President Obama’s proposal would extend health care coverage to tens of millions of women and families, guarantee access to affordable preventive screenings for cancer and other life-saving tests, protect women against gender discrimination by private insurers, end the practice of dropping coverage because of pre-existing conditions, and significantly increase access to reproductive health care. The proposal also includes a commonsense provision to expand family planning under Medicaid, which would significantly increase access to essential preventive health care for millions of women.

<...>

[kjackson227]

25. +1

[jody]

3. Hardly "all seats" but highly probable control of the House. n/t

[ProSense]

5. Republicans are not going to pick up 40 seats, and that's what they'd need

to have two vote majority.

[NYC Democrat]

4. Most people don't known or care about process.

[Bitwit1234]

9. Bulll------why in the hell would people vote for republicans

just because the democrats are giving them a taste of their own medicine. For eight years they put up with more than this in republican crap and they didn't overwhelmingly vote democratic until bush reign was over and they saw the mess republicans had made.

More people in this country WANT HEALTH CARE then those that don't. And if it will take them to come out and vote for the democrats the republicans won't stand a snowballs chance in hell.

The republicans know this, why do you think they are on cable and network whining and moaning and got their pants in a twist. Because they are trying to persuade Democrats that they WON'T get re-elected when they know damn well if they pass this bill they will.

[jefferson_dem]

11. Really?

Henny Penny.

Don't you support killing the bill anyway?

[Lerkfish]

21. are you going to follow me around in every thread and harrass me?

this bill is not health care reform. Therefore passing it is only a bailout for the insurance companies with no restrictions.

so, yeah, I'd prefer a different bill. I think Grayson's Medicare bill is a good hail mary save of everything wrong in this one.

so what?

you get to have your opinion. So do I.

[onenote]

12. all of them? Really?

Hyperbole much?

[Name removed]

19. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[unblock]

15. sigh. good sarcasm is lost on too many people....

[phleshdef]

16. You are way overestimating how much the average voter pays attention to legislative processes.

[leftynyc]

32. Not hard to state

that health care went through without a vote because the Dems are cowards. See, I just did it in one sentence.

[phleshdef]

36. Also not hard to state how many votes were actually taken, which were tons for all the bills

[leftynyc]

44. After screaming for months

about an up or down vote - now we're not even going to vote on it? You really think that will work with independents?

[HughMoran]

22. They are simply passing the Senate Bill and ammending it in one vote

It's not that complicated to understand - I summarized it in 13 words.

So :shrug: - I think you're overreacting.

[leftynyc]

33. You're speaking reconciliation

which this is not. Nobody on this board rejects reconciliation - a majority is how votes should be won. This is different. Not voting - deeming it passed - is what this is about and all it does is provide cover for the fucking cowards who are too chickenshit to vote up or down on this. And it's probably the only thing that will get the congress to change hands in November. Wretched idea.

[HughMoran]

37. No, I was talking about the process of passing the Senate bill and ammending it in one vote

You really should read a few of the other posts detailing the actual procedure, versus people's uninformed comments on this topic.

[leftynyc]

46. Passing the senate bill

with a reconciliation vote is fine. This deeming passage is just handing the pukes and their minions in the press a talking point - an excellent talking point I might add. I can imagine the ads in Oct/Nov "See, the dems think this bill sucks so bad, they wouldn't even put it up for a vote". It's a terrible idea.

[tridim]

27. Well yes, that's what Rush says.

Fortunately he is wrong about 99.9% of the time.

When people see this bill in action they're going to be extremely happy with the party who delivered, and extremely upset with the party that said NO every time. That's how the real world works, the media doesn't understand this simple concept.

[derby378]

39. Without a VOTE?!?

The Senate voted on the damn thing, and the House can't be trusted with it? What people are going to notice is that the bill was rammed through the House without a vote, effectively silencing the House. That means more Democrats losing seats in the House, which we cannot afford, especially for a bill that's going to have everyone up in arms within a year of passage.

[karynnj]

38. "All" ????

That seems totally unlikely especially on a procedural move that was an interim step to passing the bill.

The Republicans ignore that other procedures are often used to pass bills - even important ones. In 2000, the HUGE consolidated budget, which among other things included the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000, had its conference report passed by voice vote, which the Democratic leadership had to agree to. This is the bill that meant that derivatives and credit swaps were not to be regulated.

The Senate vote in June, 2000 was mostly Democrats against and Republicans, the majority, for it - passing it 52 to 43. The House voted for the conference bill on this in December, but when it returned to the Senate, it was passed via a voice vote. This meant that other than the few Democrats who voted for the bill to begin with - Breaux, Byrd, Cleland, Harkin, Hollings, Kerrey, Kohl, and Lincoln, no Democrat actually voted for this huge Budget bill.

[Jennicut]

6. Rethugs used these types of rules when W. was President and really, if it goes

back to 1933 then they have nothing legitimate to say. Politicians attack the process when they get desperate, rather then attacking the policy.

[JoePhilly]

8. Nope ... not even close ...

I've talked to lots of people about the HCR debate.

Most of them don't know that one bill passed in the House, another passed in the Senate, and there is a proposal by the President which is now being used to turn it all into a final bill.

They have no idea what reconciliation is. Even more unaware of what the Nuclear Option is, or was (probably why the GOP has pretty much dropped that dopey argument.

Once this passes ... it will a concrete thing. And the Dems will have no problem saying "hey, we passed a bill in the House and we passed one in the Senate, an then we passed a bill that merged them ... happens that way all the time."

And people will shrug, and say "Ah, ok."

And the debate becomes concrete about what the bill does. Lots of the provisions are easy to explain, and it will be harder for the GOP to lie about death panels when the concrete thing exists.

[Jennicut]

23. You are correct. The ones concerned by all this are the Congress, Political

Junkies, and perhaps the media. The public just wants to know, did it pass or not, and then they decide from there. My own husband has no idea what reconciliation is. Heck, I don't think he even knows that there is a Senate and a House. I am not kidding.

[Peacetrain]

10. Prosense. I am confused by all the jumping up and down on whether it is legal or not

Did not the HCR pass the house?

Did not the HCR pass the senate?

So the bill has passed already.. and it is just bringing the two bills together enough so the President can sign it into law?

[ProSense]

13. Here:

Skinner has a very good explanation here.

[Peacetrain]

14. Thank you! I missed that

[slackmaster]

17. Fools. The mad fools.

:nuke:

[Perky]

24. Ugggh I know this is perhaps necessary...but this has legal battle written all over it,

[HughMoran]

26. They are simply passing the Senate Bill and ammending it in one vote

Nah - it's a common procedure - if the rules allow it, then there is no argument to be made.

[ProSense]

28. No it doesn't. n/t

[Perky]

29. You don't think this is precisely the type of thing that Grover Norquist would sue over

as a means of padding his own wallet with money form tea partyers?

[ProSense]

30. Based on what, and who gives a shit about Grover Norquist? n/t

[onenote]

34. and you don't think norquist is going to sue if its passed through some other procedure?

Seriously?

[Jennicut]

35. It already went to the Supreme Court when Repubs used it. Public Citizen sued and lost.

http://openjurist.org/486/f3d/1342/public-citizen-v-united-states-district-court-for-the-district-of-columbia

It was in regards to the Repub Congress approving a national debt limit increase in 2005 using a self-executing rule similar to the Slaughter Solution. Pelosi joined Public Citizen against the Repub majority, arguing that using a self-executing rule was unconstitutional. The Supreme Court said it was not. What goes around comes around. They want to use arcane rules, so can we. And we won't have legal battles over it.

Ezra Klein argues that arcane rules suck and we need to fix the filibuster so both parties don't have to rely on them to get things done but that is another argument for another day. http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2010/03/the_arms_race_of_rules.html

[leftynyc]

31. Terrible idea

Vote up or down. This kind of nonsense will get the congress to change hands in November (a result I have always considered extremely unlikely....until I heard about this).

If the pukes were doing this, we'd be screaming from the rooftops. Either the Speaker has the votes or she doesn't.

[ProSense]

40. "This kind of nonsense will get the congress to change hands in November " Nonsense n/t

[leftynyc]

42. If this passes without a vote

I'd be tempted to stay home - it's dishonest and I have no desire to have my party lower itself to the puke standard. Reconciliation is fine - deem and pass is garbage.

[ProSense]

43. OK. n/t

[vaberella]

41. Good God. We're shaking the dust off old laws to get this done!! n/t

[ProSense]

45. "the House just used the procedure in February to pass an increase to the federal debt limit"

Still, everyone is shocked! Shocked!

Republicans feign outrage well. Actually, they're in hissy fit mode.

[vaberella]

47. Okay then...not so old!! ^_^

:rofl:

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

49. Ah, back in the day....

February, I remember it well....

[vaberella]

50. ...

:P

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

48. I love this...

We get healthcare and Mitch McConnel has a stroke bitching about it.

Two-for-One!

[leftygolfer]

51. Just Pass The Bill

Sometimes, you have to do what is right...not what is popular