100 Hours — Dems legislate, GOP whines

January 18, 2007

The “100 Hours” agenda is wrapping up today, and as Tom Edsall explained, “Something odd happened on Capitol Hill this week. Something that seemed to start out as a publicity stunt — the House Democratic leadership’s 100-hour agenda — actually turned into a…qualified success.” (Try not to sound too surprised, Tom.)

Pelosi & Co. came started the 100-hour clock with six items on the to-do list. They’ve checked off the first five and, right on schedule, will pass the sixth today — the last being a $15 billion package of fees, taxes, and royalties on oil and gas companies. The money, the AP noted, will be used to promote renewable fuels.

It’s worth taking a moment to give the House Dem leadership a pat on the back. Before the 110th started, there were some concerns that the party, out of power for 12 years, would fall into bad habits. Internal squabbling and a lack of discipline would doom their policy agenda. The opposite has happened — Pelosi, Hoyer, and the leadership team have done everything they said they would do, and in the process, they’ve delivered on an agenda with broad public support.

And then, of course, there’s the minority party.

As Congress considers the final piece of the House Democrat’s six-bill ‘100 hour’ agenda, House GOP Conference Chairman Adam Putnam on Thursday said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-California, “has squandered a historic opportunity to work with Republicans.”

“After a series of broken promises, twisted arms, and fishy loopholes, the biggest dog-and-pony show in modern legislative history ends today,” the Florida Republican said in a statement. “It is unfortunate that at the expense of bipartisan due process, Democrats have rammed through the House a watered-down slate of so-called reforms that will never become law in their current form.”

It’s quite a sad spectacle to see just how poorly the GOP is adjusting to life in the minority. The crux of Putnam’s whining concerns are that a) this was a great chance to get Republicans’ input on legislation; b) Dem leaders pressured Dem lawmakers to vote for the Dem agenda; and c) Dems weren’t “bipartisan” enough.

I’m not one to give congressional Republicans advice, but c’mon, can’t these guys show some pride? Is this really the best they’ve got?

The Dems should shove those pigs in the basement. And if McConnell wants to filibuster- hit him in the face with the “Nuclear Option.” Pigs.

  • House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-California, “has squandered a historic opportunity to work with Republicans.”

    Incredible. Democrats might observe that Republicans have squandered a decade-long opportunity to work with them, much of that time (post-9/11) being historic by any measure.

  • Pelosi has established a good template for running the rest of the Congressional session. She should say what she hopes to accomplish and what the goals are of the legislation she hopes to pass so that Repubs are forced to come out in the open about their highly touted “ideas.” Make it about the issues and not the petty politics practiced in the 109th.

    Putnam needs to be called on the carpet to flesh out his straw men of alleged Republican contributions to the debate and other allegedly bipartisan overtures by their party.

  • The good thing about this kind of productivity is that it can become a habit and might carry over throughout the term (and, dare I say it, beyond?).

    I said it on a previous post, and to echo Haik @1, let them filibuster. Give them every opportunity to show that they do not want to take action to help the American people. It would be a great opportunity to really expose them.

  • What a bunch of losers. They want more profits for Exxon and less renewable energy? They want higher drug prices, higher student loan fees, fewer cures for illnesses, and less security?

    Looooo-Zerrrrs.

    And to the Dems: Please don’t be stupid. Don’t give these creeps a break, they will not return the favor if/when they ever get the gavels back. But if you really want to change the rules back to let the minority party have back the power they should, make them ask for it, and make them promise that they will not change it right back if they get the gavels back (not that they won’t lie about that too).

    If all the Republicans can’t be civil, then don’t do it.

  • Nancy Pelosi, D-California, “has squandered a historic opportunity to work with Republicans.

  • Nancy Pelosi, D-California, “has squandered a historic opportunity to work with Republicans.

    She certainly did. Like leave the bills open to deal-breaking amendments like the line-item veto. Good for her.

  • An-an-an she’s makin’ us work five day weeks! [Boo-hoo-hoo!]

    This is like the last half hour of a horror/thriller movie. Soon the villian will be screaming “Nooooooooooo!” as his lab/lair/space ship falls to pieces around him.

    Popcorn?

  • “… at the expense of bipartisan due process…”

    Are you kidding me? Get a load of the 100 hours legislation vote totals in this chart: http://www.nytimes.com/ref/washington/100HOURS_GRAPHIC.html. Republican support ranges from a low of 24 votes for negotiating Medicare drug prices to a high of 124 votes for cutting interest rates on student loans. How many major pieces of Republican legislation (I know, an oxymoron) in the last Congress picked up even 24 Democratic votes?

    Yet another demonstration of how small and petty the Republican leadership really is.

    GO SAINTS!!!

  • Drew P makes an important point (though as an Eagles fan I wish he were a bit less happy this week–but I am rooting for the Saints among the four teams left).

    The preferred model under DeLay was to win as late as possible, by as narrow a margin as possible, all in order to compromise as little as possible. And whenever possible, the tactic of choice was to obscure whatever was really being done (giveaways to Big Pharma, Big Oil, Big Church, etc) with windy rhetoric about Markets and Values and Defending Das Homeland.

    What Pelosi has done in this first stretch of the session, Republican croc tears notwithstanding, is pretty straightforward by comparison–not to mention salutary. Hopefully the public will understand and agree that gov’t functions better when the majority party clearly states its intentions, then carries them out.

    Putnam unfortunately is pretty young, but maybe he’s just had a politically ugly upbringing under creeps like DeLay and The Blob (Hastert). Either way, Pelosi is engaging in behavior modification here too–if/when the Republicans stop behaving like obstructionist, purely partisan asshats, they’ll earn the right to come out of the Time Out corner and govern with the grown-ups.

  • I wish I could give you chapter and verse, but somewhere in the past 24 hours of omniverous radio listening (southern plains! iced in!) I heard a Republican actually expressing pride in what the House had accomplished — and he identified with it.

  • And we all remember that “historic moment” when the vote on Medicare Part D was held open while the Hammer was on on the floor blackmailing and bribing house members to vote yes or die.

    Since there are no new Republican members in this congress – we’re dealing with the same old whiners – somebody zap them with the
    Ray Gun of Irony.

  • ***- somebody zap them with the Ray Gun of Irony. ***
    —————–bcinaz

    I’m fresh out of Ray Guns of Irony. Would a Civil War vintage muzzle-loader with a really long bayonet work for you?

  • Haik,@1

    What do you have against pigs? They may look unattractive but they’re intelligent and, generally, clean (if you let them). The Repubs, OTOH…

  • “Welcome back Lance” – Dale

    Sorry to have missed so many days. Fortunately for my future employment prospects, it turns out that jailbird Darlene A. Druyun, the former Air Force principal deputy assistant secretary who tried to get the Government to spend MORE money on Boeing to lease new tankers than it would have cost to buy them, also thought she knew more about contracting for major systems then bureaucrats with years of experience. So I’ve got a full time position cleaning up after one of her messes 😉 Typical Bushite stupidity.

    I’ll try to drop by more often.

  • Re #10, I love that image. Sort of like Flash Gordon finally getting the best of Ming the Merciless as the evil fiend watches his empire go up in flames around him.

    Air-popped, no butter, please. 😉

  • Pelosi cleaning up the House, Lance cleaning up after Druyun … the world keeps getting more hopeful with each arriving sunrise.

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