Posts Tagged ‘House’

Expect the unexpected (From The Hill)

June 29th, 2010 by John Feehery

If there is any iron rule to the political game, it should be: Expect the unexpected. Things change, and sometimes they change rapidly.

At the beginning of President Obama’s term, the conventional wisdom declared that the Republican Party was going to splinter and collapse. Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) even openly mocked the plight of the GOP, saying that she hoped that the Republican Party would be strong again someday. Well, be careful what you wish for, Madam Speaker, because that day is just about here.

The conventional wisdom at the beginning of this year held that while Republicans had a shot at capturing the House, the party had no shot at regaining control of the Senate. But with the sudden passing of Senate President Pro Tem Robert Byrd (W.Va.), the declining health of some other Democratic senators and the fading political fortunes of such stalwart liberals as Barbara Boxer (Calif.) and Patty Murray (Wash.), that assumption has been turned on its head. The Senate has a clear shot, while the House looks like a sure thing.

The conventional wisdom coming from Washington after the Arizona immigration law passed was that the American people would believe it went too far. In fact, many Republican strategists made that exact point.  Read more...

Tags: , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Government, Politics, Theory | No Comments »

Revenge Best Served Cold

March 26th, 2010 by John Feehery

Republicans can learn much from Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

When a bipartisan majority in the House and the Senate passed the prescription drug benefit in 2003 (after a painful three and a half hour vote on the Conference report), Pelosi, who was then Minority Leader, promised immediately to repeal the legislation.

Democrats even briefly toyed with using that as one of their campaign themes, but it got lost in a Presidential campaign that focused mostly on national security and John Kerry’s flip-flopping ways.

But that didn’t mean that Mrs. Pelosi forgot about her pledge.

This health care reform package is notable for many reasons.  It took a long time to get done.  It spends a lot of money.  It will immediately raise premiums.  It promises to give better access to health insurance to those with pre-existing conditions.  It makes people who don’t want to buy or can’t afford to buy health insurance buy it anyway.

And it repeals two parts of the original and most offensive (from Pelosi’s perspective) portions of the bill.  It destroys the Medicare Advantage program, which Democrats irrationally feared would lead to the privatization of the Medicare program.  And it makes the prescription drug companies fill in the so-called donut hole, which was put in place to keep the original bill within its budget parameters.  Read more...

Tags: , , , , ,
Posted in Government, Politics, Theory, health care | No Comments »

The Corrupt Bargain

March 16th, 2010 by John Feehery

In 1824, the House of Representatives awarded the Presidency to John Quincy Adams after Henry Clay, who was then the House Speaker, concluded that he wouldn’t be President and cut a deal that landed him the job of Secretary of State.

It seemed like a good deal for Adams and a good deal for Clay.  But to supporters of Andrew Jackson, America’s first true populist leader, this was a “corrupt bargain”, a sign of a decadent and untrustworthy political process, and a rallying cry for a new class of American voters.

The “corrupt bargain” would haunt both Adams and Clay for the rest of their careers.  Adams became only the second one-term President (the first was his father), losing easily to Jackson in 1828.  Clay, although he would prove to be the most powerful Speaker in history, would never become President.

Congressional Democrats are now embarking on their own version of the “corrupt bargain”.   House Democrats have dreamed up a parliamentary device to vote on a health care bill that will become the law of the land (for how long, nobody really knows), without actually ever voting on it.  Read more...

Tags: , , , , ,
Posted in Government, Theory, corruption | 2 Comments »

Life is Complicated For Speaker Pelosi

March 6th, 2010 by John Feehery

The resignation of Congressman Eric Massa complicates the life of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.  And her life is already pretty complicated.

Of course, it means one less vote for a health care bill that Congressional Democrats are trying to get through a reluctant House.

And one vote is a big deal, because it looks like pro-life Democrats aren’t going to swallow what the Senate passed late last year.

The Democrats have constructed a complicated scheme to pass health care, overly complicated in my view.  The House has to somehow pass a Senate bill that includes a huge new tax increase on labor union health plans and abortion language that is still unacceptable to Bart Stupak.

Then they are going to pass another follow-on bill that will somehow reverse that labor union tax with so-called “reconciliation” instructions that the Senate then will theoretically take up and pass with 51 votes.

But first, the Senate has to hope that the Senate parliamentarian decides that whatever the House passes somehow fits in with the Senate rules, not a certain proposition.

And if the Parliamentarian decides that it is not kosher, well, then, Joe Biden has to step in and create a new precedent that will give the Republicans ample cause to shut the Upper Chamber down for a while.  Read more...

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Government, Politics, Scandals, election | No Comments »