oh, and congress snuck the alaskan refuge oil drilling bill through...

[acroyear]

The House attached it to a completely unrelated bill (on defense spending) that was guarenteed to pass.  The head of the committee that got it through just happens to be from Alaska.

Why not NOW, when the abuse is so obvious, aren't the republicans clammoring for that absolutely essential line item veto that they were pushing so hard back in the 80's?

(not that it would matter in this instance, as the "president" has been trying to get alaska destroyed for the money since he arrived...)

update: protests by democrats got the measure taken off before a final vote.

Comments

[dawntreader]

"snuck" ... HEH. seems pretty blatant to me. they've been trying to get that thing through since our barely presidential fathead came to office.

it's disgusting. they don't even bother trying to hide the fact that they're all money-grubbing, earth-destroying, fatcat, self-rigteous and people-hating prigs anymore. in fact, they are all proud of it. just once... JUST ONCE. i'd like to get the sense that any of them actually care about ANYTHING besides themselves.

[rsteachout.livejournal.com]

Isn't there already was a line-item veto. I thought Clinton used it. It turned out to be pretty ineffective.

[acroyear70.livejournal.com]

congress did once try to pull a completely unconsititional "restricted line item veto" (one that would only apply to the main budget), which got thrown out in court in a matter of weeks.

[thatliardiego.livejournal.com]

Actually -- what happened with the line item veto is the GOP pushed it through in late '95/early '96, but sat on it in conference hoping that Bob Dole would win the '96 elections. When they didn't, they sent it to Clinton and he signed it. The first time he used it (he cut some money for some GOP districts in North Carolina), some members of Congress appealed via cert to the Supreme Court, which tossed it out. End of story.

[rsteachout.livejournal.com]

Well, one at least has to give them credit for sending it on to be signed even after their candidate lost.

(Damn LJ keeps not posting this reply. Hopefully, this won't suddenly show up 7 times)

[acroyear70.livejournal.com]

on the other hand, should one be praised for pushing through something so obviously unconstitional?

i hear Wolf is still trying to push through his rediculous double-unconstitutional proposal (Utah getting an "at large" seat while not-a-state DC gets a voting seat).

[rsteachout.livejournal.com]

Oh, and it still has to get through the Senate, which is the house that has usually defeated and bottled up this provision.

[acroyear70.livejournal.com]

yeah, they're talking about having to call the house back into session next week after Christmas because they'll have to vote on the compromises required by the Sentate's voting, both on this and on the Patriot act extensions (especially as the extensions have to be passed or will get dropped at the end of the year).

[javasaurus.livejournal.com]

We really don't want a line-item veto, and we really don't want one-bill/one-law. Why? Because a line-item veto gives too much power to the president, the ability to override almost any opposition-proposed law. A lot of laws and budget items get passed as deals made between congressmen: I'll agree to your funding for highways in Mississippi if you agree to my funding of schools in Montana, etc. If line-item could occur, these deals would cease and a lot of localized laws and funding efforts would fall apart. Having all-or-nothing groups of laws means such deals can be made and enforced. And without such deals, I suspect a lot of have-not states would be completely ignored.

It is unfortunate that such deal-making gets abused (a lot of hiding of controversial blurbs in must-pass laws), but the alternative is to stop congress altogether, or just hand the congress to the president and make the country a dictatorship. OK, maybe I'm exagerating. Maybe.

[acroyear70.livejournal.com]

well, maybe there CAN at least be a restriction on riders to prevent totally unrelated things from slipping in, some requirement that a rider has to at least have SOMETHING to do with the appropriations bill that its tacked on to?

[dawntreader]

i completely agree with that. i think they should at least be related. it's so unfair. what's even more unfair is that the rider bills are often hot button issues attached to something that someone in congress would be a FOOL to say no on. all the press comes out, "so and so voted NO on this bill. HOW COULD THEY?" when they were really voting "no" on the idiotic rider bill.

again... i think it's so low and unfair and unfortunately, being underhanded and sneaky is bipartisan. :P

[blueeowyn.livejournal.com]

Ah but with the spin doctoring that politicians can do, they can probably 'justify' just about anything as related.

Drilling for oil in Alaska so that we are not dependent upon the area where people are shooting at our valient men and women of the armed forces?

Marriage is between one man and one woman tacked onto a bill that finances medicare/medicaid because if marriage is opened up the health care costs formulas will be rendered null and void

Selling National Parks tacked onto a Higher Ed funding bill because these parks are not properly furthering education in this country and we NEED to be sure that NO CHILD is left behind and since not all children can see Mt. Rushmore (or the Grand Canyon or ...) we shouldn't discriminate against these children but instead open up education.

and so forth.

Blech ... must go wash mind out with lye soap now.

[fiona64.livejournal.com]

This gripes me mightily, and always has ... the matter of attaching riders, that is.

Even if we do drill in ANWR, all it will do is destroy the delicate eco-system there. It will not appreciably change our dependence on foreign oil, not that Dubya gives two shits about that. He just wants *more* oil ... which means more money in his pocket.

I really hate this administration and it's "do as I say, not as I do" behavior. We had to have a special prosecutor to find out that Clinton got a blowjob ... but now that we have *serious* malfeasance going on in the White House, the special prosecutor is "unconstitutional"? I don't think these morons know the first thing about the Constitution, other than that it's a sight nicer to use in the outhouse than a corncob or the Sears catalog. :-/