California Conservative

Yesterday, the Senate Finance Committee defeated a GOP-sponsored amendment that would’ve required the committee to post the Baucus bill online for 72 hours. Here’s how MSNBC reported it:

During the mark-up of the Senate Finance Committee’s health-care bill this morning, Senate Democrats were successful in defeating a GOP-sponsored amendment that would have delayed the bill’s passage.

While it’s true that the amendment would’ve caused a delay in passing the bill, it’s equally true that it would’ve provided greater transparency, too.

The amendment, sponsored by GOP Sen. Jim Bunning of Kentucky, would have required that the legislative language and the final cost analysis from the Congressional Budget Office be posted on the committee’s Web site for 72 hours before the committee votes on the final bill.

While the amendment, on its face, may seem reasonable by providing transparency for Congress and the public to read the bill, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus said it would take at least two weeks for the staff to write the bill that way.

The practice at the Senate Finance Committee during the past 30 years, under both the leadership of Democrats and Republicans, is that the committee votes on bill using “conceptual language,” or what some call “plain English.” No other committee works under this practice.

While conceptual language may have been the standard in the past, Republicans say this bill is too big, too important, and impacts too many people to handle it as business as usual.

I don’t care what the practice of the Senate Finance Committee has been. This is an important piece of legislation and alot of people want to read the bill. Just because alot of career politicians won’t read the bill doesn’t mean that the American people won’t read it. Somebody’s got to. If Congress won’t read the bills, then it’s We The People’s responsibility. (In essence, we’re becoming the check and balance system for lazy politicians.)

This is a perfect example of what’s fueling the TEA Party movement. Career politicians are refusing to do the most elemental part of their jobs, then essentially telling the American people what they will or won’t do.

THEY WORK FOR US!!! THEY DON’T TELL US WHAT THEY
WILL OR WON’T DO!!! PERIOD!!! WE TELL THEM!!!

If Democrats keep practicing the politics of ‘We’ve never done it that way before’, then alot of those Democrats will be collecting retirement checks in January, 2011, because the American people are demanding total accountability. If this group refuses to be transparent in their actions, then we’ll replace them with honest politicians.

The Sunlight Foundation’s Lisa Rosenberg summarizes the 72-Hour Rule well in this post:

Had there been a 72-hour rule in place before the passage of the USA PATRIOT Act of 2001, due consideration could have been given to whether the vast expansion of the federal government’s ability to engage in secret searches of U.S. citizens was warranted. Had there been a 72-hour rule in place when Congress passed the Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act of 2007, consumer advocates could have warned Members of Congress that the bill included weak safety standards for FDA reviews of drugs and medical devices. Had a 72-hour rule been in place before any omnibus appropriations bill was passed, billions of dollars of wasteful government spending could have been eliminated.

It’s obvious that the 72-hour rule would’ve improved alot of legislation. That begs this question: Shouldn’t we take our time more often and get the legislation right rather than operate from the premise that ‘We’ve got to move fast because we’ve got to do something’?

Congress faces a decision. They can try hiding what’s in the legislation and get defeated in their next election or they can make the system more transparent and improve the process. Whichever decision they make, they shouldn’t make the mistake that they won’t be held accountable. In this election cycle, there are three things that are guaranteed: death, taxes and being held accountable.

Technorati Tags: Sunlight, Max Baucus, Finance Committee, Accountability, Health Care, Reform, Democrats, We The People, Election 2010

Cross-posted at LetFreedomRingBlog

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 24th, 2009 at 10:22 am and is filed under Author: Gary Gross, Corruption, Election 2010, Health Care, Media, Special Interests. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.