the Right Angler
Now this has not made Dr. No many friends over the years. Republicans and Democrats alike rely on earmarks to get re-elected, and Coburn has been a constant thorn in their side. In fact, right now, he is personally holding up the passage of these 35 pork laden bills and is in a stand-off with the Senate Majority Leader who refused to allow any debate or amendments on these bills. Coburn demanded debate and held them up with a Senate parliamentary maneuver known as a “hold”. Reid fought back by putting all 35 bills into one called the “Coburn Omnibus Bill” and brought it to the floor.
Coburn explained his position going in: “…we shouldn’t be doing all these bills in the dark, there should be a full and open debate, there ought to be opportunities to amend them to pay for them; there ought to be an opportunity to amend them if there’s a policy question that the common sense Americans might say: that’s stupid, why would you do that? And if we had the debate, and I lose. I’m fine. But not having a debate and not amending and not exposing to the American people what our priorities are and what we think are important by debating an amendment, says that we don’t think we have an obligation to do that to the American people. So, all I’ve said all along, I can’t block any bill from coming to the floor. That’s the majority leader’s priority. But I can say you’re not going to pass with me looking the other way. That’s what I’ve said – that if you want to pass them, put them on the floor but have an honest and vigorous debate. I plan on using all the sixty hours that are available for the debate to have the debate and if Americans will pay attention what they will learn is how stupid congress is.”
The showdown took place on the floor of the Senate this past weekend. Dr. No partnered up with a few other good men like: Senator Minority Leader Mitch McConnell [R:KY], Senator Jim Demint [R:SC], Senator Jeff Sessions [R:AL], and Senator Richard Burr [R-NC]. They made it clear that Coburn intended to take all 60 hours allotted to him to block the floor action. Harry Reid then tried to invoke cloture. With Democrats controlling the Senate, they would most certainly pass the bill with a straight vote. Cloture is a procedure that puts a time limit on a bill. This would have ended Coburn’s 60 hour filibuster and given them the straight vote they needed. In order to invoke cloture, Reid needed 3/5ths of the Senate to agree. He didn’t get it. Our guys then took to the floor and made it clear that a vote on this Wasteful Spending Bill would only delay the Energy Bill that Americans are waiting for. They accused the Democrats of supporting pet pork projects over the real needs of the American people. This put the Democrats in a tough position. Coburn intends to delay the vote on the Spending Bill as long as he can. Reid wants to sneak it in before the Energy Bill. As of now, it’s been delayed and Coburn has, for the time being, blocked big Government growth again. We’ll see if Reid can withstand the pressure that Coburn’s filibuster puts on him. The longer Reid waits, the more he’ll look like he doesn’t care about America’s energy concerns.
Can we help Senator Coburn in his effort? He thinks so: “e-mail every senator, Republican or otherwise and say start thinking long term, not short term. Quit wasting money. And if you’re going to spend new money get rid of the waste somewhere else. There’s just 300 billion dollars a year in waste appear – and those aren’t my numbers. That’s the Government Accountability Office, Congressional Budget Office that do reports and do congressional research service. So, if we’re upset here we’re going to have an 800 billion dollar deficit here and no body but a few of us in the Senate are saying maybe we ought of cut some spending somewhere?”
It’s no wonder Congressional approval ratings have dipped down to 9%. They spend and spend with little regard for how we are going to pay for it and even less results. Big Government is a threat to all of the freedoms guaranteed in the Constitution. Dr. Tom Coburn has spent his career fighting for limited Government and common sense spending. We all need to get behind him and elect more representatives that share his passion for saying: “NO!”
