The more I see of President Obama, the more I think he's the four-year extension of the Bush Administration McCain was supposed to be. Likewise, the Democratic Congress. I love this passage, from a NY Post article:
The push to get the bill through before the holiday weekend was so frantic, members of Congress didn't have a chance to read all 1,071 pages of the document before they could vote.
"In a perfect world it would have been nice to have had more time to process it," said Ilan Kayatsky, a spokesman for Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY).
Perfect? Heck, in a good world, we read the bills we're voting on. Is there a Democrat out there who, with a straight face, can express joy over not reading the bill prior to voting? You want to open the door to corruption? This is a GREAT way to do it. Allow staffers to write god-knows-what, and then vote on it.
Well, this is as good a chance as any to remind you of Downsize DC's "Read The Bills Act".
There's a basic principle at stake here. America was founded on the slogan, “No taxation without representation.” A similar slogan applies to this situation:
“No LEGISLATION without representation.”
We hold this truth to be self-evident, that those in Congress who vote on legislation they have not read, have not represented their constituents. They have misrepresented them.
Obama's promise to post bills for five days before passage is nice, but it's empty transparency. Posting the stimulus five days before VOTING on it would have been the real deal. It kinda reminds me of my favorite Che Guevara quote:
"We can hold the trials any time, so long as the executions happen now".
Honest government is unafraid of debate, unafraid of scrutiny, and is in no rush to get the signatures on the dotted lest anyone read the fine print. Alas.
No comments:
Post a Comment