Reid's Rough First Week  

Posted by Rob Barton in , , , , , ,

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Harry Reid may not be able to find the time to smell the tourists this year, judging by his first week leading this Senate. Democrats wanted to hit the ground running, but Rod Blagojevich tripped them up and instead, they hit the ground with a wet thud.

When Blago was arrested, Reid drew up a letter demanding that Blago resign and not make the appointment, and had all of the senate democrats sign it. In the letter, he said, "Please understand that should you decide to ignore the request ...and make the appointment, we would be forced to exercise our Constitutional authority under Article I, Section 5, to determine whether such a person should be seated."

Reid backed down from that statement the day after the pictures appeared of the black Roland Burris and his black entourage being stopped from entering the 'All White Mens' Club'.


Technically, the law is on Reid's side, though, as the Senate has the final say in who its members are.

Each House shall be the judge of the elections, returns and qualifications of its own members, and a majority of each shall constitute a quorum to do business; but a smaller number may adjourn from day to day, and may be authorized to compel the attendance of absent members, in such manner, and under such penalties as each House may provide.
Each House may determine the rules of its proceedings, punish its members for disorderly behavior, and, with the concurrence of two thirds, expel a member.

Each House shall keep a journal of its proceedings, and from time to time publish the same, excepting such parts as may in their judgment require secrecy; and the yeas and nays of the members of either House on any question shall, at the desire of one fifth of those present, be entered on the journal.

Neither House, during the session of Congress, shall, without the consent of the other, adjourn for more than three days, nor to any other place than that in which the two Houses shall be sitting.

This is only one of the stumbling blocks that the democrats faced this week, as Bill "Horatio Sanz" Richardson withdrew his name from the nomination for Secretary of Commerce. This was a known issue to Obama's vetters since before his nomination, so there must be something there we don't know about.

Then there was the appointment of Leon Panetta as director of the CIA. Appointing an intelligence chief without any experience is about as smart as electing a president with absolutely no executive experience. Oh, wait, we did that one, didn't we?

Let's not forget about Obama's 'present' vote on the situation between Hamas and Israel. He conveniently use his new mantra "One President at a Time" in deferring all decisions about US reaction to the conflict to Bush. Come on, Bam-Bam, you only have ten days before this all falls in your lap. You must have some kind of opinion.

Finally, there was Obama's backtrack on his economic stimulus plan. This week, Obama told the country that we would be looking at huge deficits for years to come. Let me guess... four years? Eight years? In doing this, he has admitted that his plan won't work. He also revised the word 'created' to 'saved' when talking about jobs in his plan. This may have been smart on Obama's part. How do you measure a 'saved' job? Will he take credit for every job not done away with during his tenure? Using that standard, three million should be a fairly easy goal to reach.

So this is what it's like when the most ethical congress teams up with the chosen one to solve all of our country's woes. Flip-flopping, continued deficits despite a trillion dollar stimulus package, vacillating in the face of terrorism, questions of integrity... and that's just in the first week. This is going to be a looooooonnggg four years. I can only hope that the segment of the population who gets their news from Entertainment Tonight and The Daily Show really see what they have gotten us. It would be too much of a stretch for them to realize that this has been going on for the past two years and was being passed off as Bush's fault.

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