Beware the Lame Duck Bearing Gifts
The lame-duck session is now a reality, with both the House and Senate set to return November 15 for a one-week session, followed by a one-week break for Thanksgiving, and at least one more week at the beginning of December. It is possible Congress could stay in session throughout December in a replay of last year’s Christmas Eve health care vote.
Harry Reid’s surprise re-election and the Democratic retention of the Senate greatly increase the threat. Reid will now falsely claim a mandate to proceed with a far-left agenda, despite the huge national tidal wave he survived. His retained power along with the last opportunity for a long time to push legislation through the House will combine to create a dangerous environment.
A recent article in The Hill confirmed Democrats may try to pass as many as 20 bills in the lame-duck session, and there is still some risk of an all-out push on everything from energy, to card check, to enormous Social Security tax hikes based on the president’s deficit commission recommendations.
Cap and trade may be a bridge too far, especially with the decisive defeat of many coal-state Democrats, including Rick Boucher, who represented a district in the Virginia coalfields. And Joe Manchin from West Virginia, a special election winner to fill out the term of deceased Senator Robert Byrd, will be seated for the lame-duck session. Manchin had the most memorable TV ad of the cycle in which he shot the cap-and-trade bill with a rifle.
That does not however mean we can discount the threat of a very damaging energy bill, especially because lame-duck Senator and Kansas Governor-elect Sam Brownback is pushing for a renewable electricity mandate bill.
Similarly, card check is unlikely, but unions will demand and perhaps receive sweeping union pension bailout legislation.
Democrats will push these items because they don’t know when they will control the House again, and they expect more Senate losses in 2012 and 2014 because 2006 and 2008 were such big Democratic years. So the narrow window of the lame-duck session is the last best chance to pass big-ticket, far-left agenda items.
Along with the potential threats above, there are two enormously consequential fights that are certain to occur in the lame-duck session, and we need to win them:
Do not hold your breath waiting for the current Congress to nobly defer to the newly-elected Congress, that’s for sure.
A nice Amendment would be for Congresscritters to be immediately removed if they have lost their bid for re-election. After all, the people have spoken. They don’t get a 60-day lay-off notice. They have been fired!
“We’re going a different direction. We’re not picking up your options. Hit the damned road, Jack!”
I agree with you, Marc. When I was fired from a job, I was shown the door and just that quick. Why should politicians be any different?
We should send them home until the new Congress convenes. Stop the bleeding, no more spending, no more insane decisions. Maybe, just maybe, the Congress will get the idea that WE THE PEOPLE are in charge.
To Edward Durfee
Yes, indeed. I agree. Democrats, Republicans, right, left, whatever. The United States of America belongs to it’s citizens. We need Statesmen, not politicians. Go home. We want control of OUR country. It doesn’t belong to you. It belongs to us. Period.
I have a funny feeling the Democrats are not going to try anything major during the Lame Duck session. They know that if they do, Obama will be finished in 2012. Although, maybe that might have a lot of appeal to the Blue Dog Democrats who were all thrown under the bus during this election cycle. Most of the Democrats are leaving, so they may figure that they don’t have anything to lose and it would be sweet payback to Obama to see him defend another huge, bloated, out-of-control spending budget. Time for Scott Brown in the Senate to earn his paycheck and help block anything that comes out of Harry Reid. Then they will just have to wait for the new Congress to put something together in January. But if they do repeal all of the Bush Tax Cuts, the new Congress can also address that too, and fast. Don’t think they won’t even if Obama threatens to veto it.
I hope you’re right but I’m sure you are wrong. The defeated congress critters have no reason not to pass any odious bill they chose to pass and could very well be rewarded handsomely for doing so at the behest of SEIU and it’s ilk. One of the very first things the new congress will need to do is clean up the messes these bad puppies leave on the carpet. Then they need to start the defund, repeal, defeat process of all the stupid things like the healthcare debacle, the government motors debacle etc. I’m so glad I drive Ford products. I’d be so embarrassed to drive a Chevrolet/Buick/Cadilac etc.
I don’t remember where, but in the last day or two I’ve read somewhere that all the newly elected congressmen and woman should go to Washington D.C. and sit up in the gallery staring at those they are replacing and watch every move they make. I agree and think it’s a good idea, its time to turn up the heat, while at the same time looking ahead to 2012.
what is staring at them going to do, intimidate them…not
spoken like a tru 8 year old, it doesnt work on your neighbors wont work in the house or the senate
what is staring at them going to do, intimidate them? what are you 5 years old? It only makes you look like an idiot doing so, that wht you do to your neighbors??? bet they think you are an idiot too.
Your lack of care in editing your reply, and the gratuitous insult ensure I will give it the consideration it deserves.
Mr. Kerpen:
“To win these fights and stop all of the lame-duck policy threats, we have launched a new web site at http://www.NovemberSpeaks.com and are holding a rally in Washington on November 15.”
Just a quick note on tactics here. Why in the world would you hold a rally in DC in the middle of November…are you nuts?
Look man, I suspect that the kind of folks who attend these things are likely “rallied out”, and you’re asking them to go stand around on a wet, cold day in the District?
And let’s be frank, a small rally in DC won’t get squat in the way of free media exposure.
Now if you held the rally somewhere warm AND with a strong local conservative base, say Tampa or Las Vegas or Phoenix or San Diego, you’d get better coverage in the local media AND likely be rewarding conservative businesses and activists, not to mention that anyone attending could go get in a few rounds of golf or lay on a beach and sip fruity drinks with paper umbrellas in them before and after the hootenanny.
Worth thinking about.
“Harry Reid’s surprise re-election and the Democratic retention of the Senate greatly increase the threat. Reid will now falsely claim a mandate to proceed with a far-left agenda, despite the huge national tidal wave he survived. ”
Harry Reid will do no such thing. The fact that a sitting Senate Majority Leader had to undergo such a serious challenge from “Little Miss Nobody from Nowhere, Nevada”, backed by an organization that didn’t even exist two years ago should cure whatever penchant for radical moonbattery that a heterosexual Caucasian Mormon grandfather with an “A” rating from the NRA PAC might harbor.
The Alleged Hawaiian’s and the ghost formerly known as Speaker Pelosi’s moonbat agenda frankly died and was buried with the corpses of Ted Kennedy and Robert Byrd…and Harry Reid, having been around the joint LONG before the Alleged Hawaiian ever hove into view, should know it.
Have a rally that offers attendees some “fun in the sun” and rant and rave against DemocRatic Obstructionism with Speaker Boehner’s future program.
Except Reid has a massive penchant for self-delusion. What is relevant is that there are now 42 Republicans in the Senate during this Lame Duck session. That means we can maintain a filibuster even if one member breaks ranks.
There is no way I’d attend a rally in Nevada. I would attend one in Arizona though…
This Congress have had their chance to prove they represent the PEOPLE and they have FAILED MISERABLY. They should go home now and let the new Reps in to roll up their sleeves, get to work, and clean up this huge mess these so called “reps for the people” (a lie) out of sight. Go to Puerto Rico and stay there.We need new blood and better ideas like what Our Forefathers stood for!! Keep the law (no feebies for illegal immigrants), free enterprise, reduce the deficit, freedom to choose in healthcare and reversed that disgusting healthcare bill..New jobs and BIG TIME CUT BACK GOVERNMENT!!!
Our retiring lame-duck governor here in Wisconsin left us an $810 Million invoice on the way out the door, via secret deals signed last weekend to ensure that whoever won the election, we’d be forced to build a choo-choo train that nobody wants.
I recognize that at the federal level, things will only be worse.
One advantage the countries which have the Westminster model of Parliament have is, there is no lame duck session between election and when the new Parliament is sworn in.
So, what is there to prevent a motion that there is no business to be taken up by the House and the Senate between the time when the official results are released, and when the new Congress is sworn in? Exceptions can be made for results delayed because of litigiousness, but for the rest, a new Congress does
not have to be saddled with the venom of the old Congress in lame-duck session.
>>So, what is there to prevent a motion that there is no business to be taken up by the House and the Senate between the time when the official results are released, and when the new Congress is sworn in?
I’m not a procedural expert, but something tells me it’s not that simple.
Don’t the rules have to be adopted at the beginning of, in your case, the new Congress?
I say go for it, because if the Democrats want to leave as big a pile of El Toro poo-poo as they can muster, then they deserve to be crucified repeatedly for weeks, if not months, thereby removing the initiative from them to get in the way of dealing intelligently with toxic assets as far as the eye can see, debt which is on the books, and debt which is off the books.
They deserve crucifixion, being drawn & quartered, being tarred & feathered, and then burned at the stake.
Hey Baraaak….!
Can you hear us now????
Nothing is going to happen in the Lame Duck session.
In the house there may not be enough losers show up and the marginal winners know that 2 years from now they face another election from the crowds they spurned. Certainly the GOP will be enthusiastic and vote 100% NO to everything just to spite The Witch.
The senate has enough Kommiecrats up in ’12 to either not vote at all (most likely) or against anything that calls attention to voters. Even the Maine Sister (except for gramnesty of course) will shoot down anything the Hairy Reed tries to push
Defeated pols..go back to DC. Rent a Uhaul. Clean your apartments/condos/mansions out. Go bang that mesmerized, hawt staffer one last time. You’ve missed many a vote while out campaigning/fundraising and on those lovely “fact finding missions” to Hawaii, Paris, Spain etc.. No need to boost your voting record now. Now is the time to be a States(person?). Petty, tone deafness didn’t work. Don’t be a schlub now. Ya got your kickbacks, idiot kids jobs, lobbying, and your MSNBC gig all lined up. Just go away. NOW!