Posted on 01/14/2003 2:44:20 PM PST by PhiKapMom
For those of you that may not know, the DemocRATs in control of the Senate Minority led by ms. clinton (don't be fooled by anyone -- she is calling the shots) have decided not to recognize the results of the last election and are maintaining Committee Chairmanship until the Republicans give them what they want.
The Memo below from Roll Call in October laid out their plans. What the DemocRATs did not expect was a Republican controlled Senate so now they are refusing to vote on a continuing resolution to keep the Government running and thus hand over control of the Senate Committees. It is to try and force Republicans to cave into their demands or Republicans will get no Committee Chairmanships. What they want is equal funding for Committees and 50/50 shared committees which is not an option.
There is a thread running about the Senate actions today at:
EVERYONE SHOULD BE WATCHING C-SPAN2
Right now we have 11 newly elected Senators that do not have Committee assignments because of this DemocRAT Obstructionist tactic.
Call your DemocRAT Senators (you have my sympathy) and let them know as a taxpayer you will not tolerate this stunt of theirs to withhold Committee Chairmanships from Republicans. Remind them that there are 11 new Senators without Committees and you are holding them responsible for this attempt on the part of the DemocRATs to hijack the Senate!
If you have Republican Senators, call them and tell them to keep up the fight and that we are behind them 100%!
Please call your Senators now. If you would like their phone numbers, you can find them at:
Thanks!
Frist to appoint GOP chairmen, flap settled or nothttp://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/822219/posts
By Amy Fagan
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said last night that if the parties did not resolve a dispute over how to split committee funding by early today, he would attempt to appoint Republican committee chairmen and members without resolving the funding issue.
"If an agreement isn't reached shortly I will be moving forward with the committee resolution," said Mr. Frist, Tennessee Republican.
Until an organizing resolution is passed, the committee setup remains as it was in the 107th Congress with Democrats holding the committee gavels and new senators without committee assignments.
Mr. Frist said negotiations over funding would continue through last night and he would assess the situation this morning.
If there has not been "sufficient progress" by then, he said last night that he will bring to the floor today an organizing resolution that would set committee membership and Republican committee chairmen, giving the Republicans their one-vote majority on committees.
Democrats would likely object strongly to this, since they want a nearly equal split in committee funding and want this stipulated in any organizing resolution.
They say a nearly equal split is fair, since that was the setup when they controlled the Senate last session. That setup carried over from the beginning of last session, when the Senate was split 50-50, with Republicans in control.
"What we had agreed to with a 51-49 breakdown in the 107th Congress is what we ought to agree to with a 51-49 breakdown in the 108th Congress," said Minority Leader Tom Daschle, South Dakota Democrat. "Let's do in this Congress what we did in the last one."
Republicans say the last session was a unique situation because the Senate changed to Democratic control halfway through the year, and it was impractical to negotiate a new funding arrangement. They note that historically, majority party chairmen could take as much as two-thirds of the funding for committees, and the minority party got one-third.
Sen. George Allen, Virginia Republican, complained that Republicans control the Senate again, but Mr. Daschle is "once again finding some procedural way of blocking Senate action," adding that it is part of a "continuing pattern of behavior."
An early confirmation hearing for Tom Ridge as head of the new Homeland Security Department has fallen victim to the organizing fight.
Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman the Connecticut Democrat who was chairman of the Governmental Affairs Committee in the 107th Congress called a hearing for this week and planned to preside over it.
But he said the White House balked at a hearing with a Democratic chairman. A Ridge hearing set for today was canceled and a new one has been set for Friday, though it is not clear who will be chairman.
Mr. Lieberman has offered to turn the gavel over to the panel's incoming Republican chairman, Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, if the Senate organizing dispute is not resolved.
Democrats said committee hearings can proceed without an organizing resolution.
"We don't need a new organizing resolution to do the work of the Senate," Mr. Daschle said.
Just heard Carl Cameron say that Frist is threatening to keep them in session next week - when they were supposed to be off - in order to get this done. They were supposed to be OFF next week? Sheesh...they just got back one week ago! Unbelieveable.
I swear, we freepers need a TV show so we can tell everybody what is really happening!
BUMP!!
Daschle lies - it was 50-49 with 1 independent last time. This time it is 51-49 with 1 independent. Not to mention last time the DemoncRATs needed to replace Paul Coverdale with Zig-Zag-Zell Miller and substituted the dead Carnahan's widow for Ashcroft, just to get the point where it "appeared" they had equality (which they didn't)
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