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Civics class: Where is the House-Senate health care conference committee?
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com ^ | March 7 2010 | Byron york

Posted on 03/07/2010 3:44:03 PM PST by Para-Ord.45

Today's Washington Post Outlook section gives featured lefty blogger Ezra Klein another shot at the supposedly dysfunctional workings of the Senate. "As the minority becomes less responsible with the filibuster (and oh boy, have minority Republicans become less responsible with the filibuster), the majority needs to use reconciliation more often," Klein writes.

The article begins:

"Ask a kid who just took civics how a bill becomes a law and she'll explain that Congress takes a vote and, if a majority supports the bill, the bill goes to the president. That's what we teach in textbooks, but it's not what we practice in Washington."

Now, if you did in fact ask a kid who just took a civics class, she -- could be he! -- might explain that the House and Senate pass bills, and if there are differences between them, the bills usually go to a House/Senate conference committee, where lawmakers appointed by the leaders of both parties resolve the differences between the bills and come up with one final bill, which the House and Senate pass and which then goes to the president's desk for signature into law. (Wasn't that the method used for the 2001 and 2003 Bush tax cuts, the 1996 welfare reform bill and other legislation often cited by Klein and his allies today?) Isn't that what a kid who just took a civics class would say? Isn't that what we teach in textbooks? And is that what's being practiced in the case of the national health care bills?

The answer, of course, is no, because Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Harry Reid, who in the past have been strong advocates of conference committees, decided to skip conference for the health care bill. Why? Because it might be troublesome -- and public. Better to bypass it altogether, assured that Klein and others will devote their energies to attacking Republican irresponsibility.


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: byronyork
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1 posted on 03/07/2010 3:44:03 PM PST by Para-Ord.45
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To: Para-Ord.45
You either have the filibuster or you do not. Using it when you disagree with a law is not being less responsible, it is being more responsible.

The problem is that it wasn't use often enough for the right reasons before.

We have the same problem with impeachment: it should have been used often and early to show its importance. Unfortunately for us now, we had men cut from better cloth at that time, and it wasn't necessary. By the time it was necessary, there was sufficient precedent of it being an "extreme" measure.

2 posted on 03/07/2010 3:49:48 PM PST by kosciusko51
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To: Para-Ord.45

Senator DeMint (R-SC) insisted that Senator McConnell object to the appointment of the House-Senate Conferees, thus preventing a Conference on the bill.


3 posted on 03/07/2010 3:50:32 PM PST by thethirddegree
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To: Para-Ord.45

Not being racial but it does seem the Jews are always the liberals. Why in the world is that? No profiling means turning a blind eye to demographics.


4 posted on 03/07/2010 3:56:04 PM PST by Beowulf9
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To: Beowulf9

Maybe because the last time they didn’t agree with a radical leftist, 6 million ended up dead? Just sayin’ ...


5 posted on 03/07/2010 3:57:47 PM PST by kosciusko51
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To: kosciusko51
Maybe because the last time they didn’t agree with a radical leftist, 6 million ended up dead? Just sayin’ ...

Except that Hitler was more on the radical right.

6 posted on 03/07/2010 3:59:03 PM PST by jimmyray
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To: jimmyray
Myth. Read the book "Liberal Fascism". Hitler was a National Socialist, and was loved by the Communists until he attacked the USSR.
7 posted on 03/07/2010 4:00:53 PM PST by kosciusko51
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To: kosciusko51

Well, congresscritters now do not usually duel one another on the floor, nor do they beat one another with their canes. They’ve found it much kinder and more civil to trade favors with the taxpayer’s dollars.


8 posted on 03/07/2010 4:03:23 PM PST by HiTech RedNeck (I am in America but not of America (per bible: am in the world but not of it))
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To: kosciusko51

Guess Adolph got a mite too crazy for the Rooskies to tolerate. This is like Jonah purposing to swallow the whale.


9 posted on 03/07/2010 4:04:54 PM PST by HiTech RedNeck (I am in America but not of America (per bible: am in the world but not of it))
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To: HiTech RedNeck

I wouldn’t mind seeing a good beat-down on C-SPAN. It would do wonders to their ratings, too. ;-)


10 posted on 03/07/2010 4:07:46 PM PST by kosciusko51
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To: kosciusko51
He was also a National Fascist, appealing to the traditional “Right” values of God, Guns and Country, not necessarily in that order. He made strong appeals to straight morality, marriage, and was totally against homosexuality. I do somewhat agree about the socialist part, though. However, he did not make wholesale seizure & control of industry, especially war material, a priority.
11 posted on 03/07/2010 4:09:34 PM PST by jimmyray
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To: Beowulf9

Jews have seen liberals as more open than conservatives, which prefers the liberals when they (the Jews) are looking for a port in a storm, which they seem to do a whole lot because they really get hated on all over the world. There were a few ugly incidents during WWII where the government (well, FDR was a big fat liberal, but he seemed conservative enough to the Jews at that time) wouldn’t let in Jewish refugee ships, preferring to send them back to lands where they would be fed to the Nazis.


12 posted on 03/07/2010 4:10:47 PM PST by HiTech RedNeck (I am in America but not of America (per bible: am in the world but not of it))
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To: kosciusko51
Myth. Read the book "Liberal Fascism". Hitler was a National Socialist, and was loved by the Communists until he attacked the USSR.

Having only read reviews of the book and not the book itself, it appears to concentrate on Mussolini (even in the subtitle) and not Nazi's per se. I would be interested to see why you state that the Russians "loved" Hitler and the Nazi movement. They were not allies, they just had a treaty.

13 posted on 03/07/2010 4:16:42 PM PST by jimmyray
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To: jimmyray
National == Deutchland Uber Alles

He hated God and the Christian Church.

He restricted gun ownership to the average citizen. In fact, it has been documented that many of our current gun laws are similar to the one in Nazi Germany

He was no more right-wing than Obama is a centrist. He was just right of Lenin/Stalin.

14 posted on 03/07/2010 4:20:41 PM PST by kosciusko51
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To: jimmyray

No, I said communists, especially American communist. I suggest you read the book. It is very enlightening.


15 posted on 03/07/2010 4:22:00 PM PST by kosciusko51
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To: jimmyray
He was also a National Fascist, appealing to the traditional “Right” values of God, Guns and Country

Guns? When did Hitler make a pitch to gun rights? I never heard that before. Please specify. As to God, I suppose that Nazis made some general appeal to religion but I don't this was too important. Hitler was not particularly religious, nor were his advisors. Also, I don't recall reading that he emphasized this in his speeches. His big issues were the "stab in the big," high unemployment. and pride in the German "race," not particularly German Lutheranism or Catholicism.

16 posted on 03/07/2010 4:22:57 PM PST by Captain Kirk
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To: Beowulf9

It would be helpful for you to read

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203440104574402591116901498.html

he can answer this better than any of us.


17 posted on 03/07/2010 4:23:29 PM PST by Ouderkirk (Democrats: the party of Slavery, Segregation, Sodomy and Sedition)
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To: jimmyray

that’s “stab in the back”


18 posted on 03/07/2010 4:23:44 PM PST by Captain Kirk
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To: jimmyray

Need to get your facts straight

NAZI = National SOCIALISTS


19 posted on 03/07/2010 4:24:26 PM PST by Ouderkirk (Democrats: the party of Slavery, Segregation, Sodomy and Sedition)
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To: jimmyray
Hitler was a National Socialist, and was loved by the Communists until he attacked the USSR.

NAZIs and Communists both have the same goal...TOTAL GOVERNMENT CONTROL of the citizens lives.

20 posted on 03/07/2010 4:24:58 PM PST by Don Corleone ("Oil the gun..eat the cannolis. Take it to the Mattress.")
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