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Up or Down
Author: BobR    Date: 2013-10-03 11:07:42

Between 2005 and 2008, President Bush was trying to get some judicial nominees appointed. These need to be approved by the Senate. The Democrats in the Senate were not rubber-stamping them like the Republicans thought they should be. They were mired in hearings and committees, and the process was slow and deliberative. This riled the Republicans no end. The message from them was clear: Up or Down!... Up or Down!

Of course - that's what they demand when it's something they want. What happens when it's something they don't want? Well - we know the answer to THAT one - it's happening right now.

The Republican Speaker of the House has declared that he will not pass a clean spending bill. Every spending bill they've sent to the Senate has had one or more poison pill amendments, and the Senate strips them out, approves the "clean" version and sends it back to the House. The House could vote on the clean bill - there's nothing stopping them - except for the Speaker and a minority of extremist Republican House members.

We've been down this road before. At the beginning of the year, we were set to go over the fiscal cliff. The messy bills went back and forth between the two houses of Congress. We got to zero hour, got past zero hour, and then finally - a clean bill was put up for a vote in the House:
The House’s final up-or-down vote on the Senate bill was due sometime after 11 p.m. Eastern time, according to CNN.

Prospects for passage remained uncertain, but the vote marked a step back from a plan Republicans voiced earlier to amend the Senate bill, a move which might have sunk the deal.

The Senate had approved the compromise bill in the wee hours of Tuesday morning, but after reviewing the details of the deal, many House Republicans said they could not support it because it does not include spending cuts.

Most notably, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said he could not support the agreement.
[...]
Republican leaders decided to poll their caucus members on two courses of action: One would amend the Senate bill and add spending cuts, but the second would be a vote on the clean version of the Senate plan.

Ultimately, the clean version passed with bipartisan support. Of course - it was only a stop-gap measure, and later on we DID go over the "fiscal cliff".

Perhaps that's why Speaker Boehner won't put up a clean bill this time for an Up or Down Vote - he knows it would pass. Many Republican lawmakers are already feeling the heat from constituents:
Lawmakers locked in a political stare-down Wednesday were buffeted by rising anger from across the nation about a partial government shutdown that ruined vacations, sapped businesses and closed military cemeteries as far away as France. Some on Capitol Hill ominously suggested the impasse might last for weeks, but a few Republicans seemed ready to blink.

Republican Rep. Peter King of New York accused tea party-backed lawmakers of trying to "hijack the party" and said he senses that a growing number of rank-and-file House Republicans — perhaps as many as a hundred — are tired of the shutdown that began Tuesday morning and will be meeting to look for a way out.

Some - including Rob Wittman of VA - have openly said they'd like to vote for a clean bill, but they are being denied the opportunity. Just like in January, there are enough reasonable Republicans to vote for a clean bill along with Democrats that it would pass, and everyone could get back to work.

C'mon Speaker Boehner - Up or Down... Up or Down...
 

119 comments (Latest Comment: 10/04/2013 00:07:55 by Raine)
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