Posted on 01/23/2015 7:01:55 AM PST by cotton1706
Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) late Thursday left Democrats angry and sputtering on the Senate floor, as he used his new power as majority leader to brush off several Democratic amendments in an effort to speed up work on a bill to approve the Keystone pipeline.
McConnell has so far made a point of allowing amendment votes, something Democrats barely allowed for the last few years. Earlier Thursday, McConnell boasted that the Senate had already held more amendment votes on the Keystone bill than Democrats allowed during all of 2014.
“We’ve actually reached a milestone here that I think’s noteworthy for the Senate,” McConnell said after the 15th amendment vote. “This is the way the Senate ought to work.”
But McConnell has also said the Senate can’t work on the Keystone bill forever, a warning that he wants to finish it up at some point in the near future.
Late Thursday night, McConnell said the new open process in the Senate led members of both parties to propose a new wave of amendments that he wanted to deal with immediately. He asked senators for an agreement to vote on a series of 12 amendments right then and there.
Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) objected, and said Democrats would be ready to keep working on these amendments on Friday. But McConnell dismissed that and said the Senate should be ready to work on them now. With no agreement, he said his only choice was to start a series of votes to table, or kill, all Democratic amendments.
“Given the fact that they’re reluctant to vote on their own amendments… the only way to go forward is to table their amendments,” he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at theblaze.com ...
Kabuki theater here. Nothing substantial here, just the usual know your place power play in Washington. When it comes to actually making a call that causes a change in liberal policy that liberals of both parties don’t like Mitch will not be so nasty to his dear friends across the aisle.
!!!
We should be thankful for the crumbs from the master's table. Got it.
“Given the fact that they’re reluctant to vote on their own amendments… the only way to go forward is to table their amendments,” he said.
Are you implying that conservatives didn't want Keystone to go forward. He's making the Dems look like idiots. They'll continue to pay for this in 2016.
We have a lot of competitive races in the Senate then. We have to be prepared and right now jobs and the economy are item one for American voters. Let's give them what they want - a booming economy - and then they'll give us what we want - political power for a generation.
That's how change gets made. It's done over time. We didn't get here in one big liberal step, did we?
Certainly not. I am saying it is a mistake to think McConnell is getting religion. Or thinking he's turning into something he has never been, or will be. A real leader who plays hard ball. He is not & he doesn't. Like a broken clock, he gets it right twice a day. But he's still broken.
That was fun - “Mr. President! Mr. President! Mr. President! Mr. President!”
I do wonder what his “parliamentary inquiry” was going to be after objection was made to his unanimous consent request.
Agreed. He needs watching.
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