The Eigler family decorated the gymnasium at St. Leo’s Elementary School for their mother’s seventy-fifth birthday party. Gary Knicht finished a ten-mile bike ride before joining his girlfriend for an afternoon swim in the heated pool at her apartment complex. Melissa and Brad Wilson took the kids to Chuckie Cheese for pizza and games.
Our War president Warded off angry protestors in South America. The house and senate met for an unusual Saturday session and passed a fourteen-pound, $388 billion omnibus spending bill without review or debate.
It was a sad day for America, regardless of what was in those pages, and even though the Eigers, Knichts, and Wilsons didn’t feel the earth move. What they didn’t know would hurt them.
Democrats complained. They needed time to review the bill. They wanted discussion and debate. They wanted a quorum, and silence in the room while they presented their positions and asked questions.
The gavel banged and multiple requests for order fell across the room and, apparently on deaf or defiant ears. The Republicans scoffed at the whiney Democrats. “The bill was available on the Internet, shortly after midnight,” they wailed without sympathy.
Suppose it were possible to read a fourteen-pound bill between shortly-after-midnight and eight the next morning. Is it reasonable to believe there would be no questions pertaining to the content? Or that those with the answers would welcome the three a.m. phone call for clarification? Do we, the American people, get what we deserve when our representatives either choose to vote on legislation they haven’t had time to review, or get railroaded into voting on legislation they aren’t comfortable with?
For all the rhetoric flying around about the Founding Fathers and what they had in mind, we seem to have forgotten how they valued checks and balances. I don’t see many of we the people marching on Washington to demand our checks and balances. We have gymnasiums to decorate, pools to dip in, and children to entertain, all worthy activities when we aren’t sacrificing our country to enjoy them.
Eight days have passed and I still don’t know what all is in those fourteen pounds of paper. I’m upset by the few things that have been discussed:
- Education took some hits. Special education was slashed by $482 million, No Child Left Behind (sic) by $398 million, and head start by $103 million. 100,000 college students will lose financial aid entirely, and 1.2 million others will face grant cuts. But the Cleveland Rock and Roll Hall of Fame got $350,000 and they approved $131 million for abstinence programs despite the fact that the national evaluation of abstinence programs has been delayed, and ignoring other evaluations that have been completed. (No Shrimp Left Behind received a Whopping $1 million in a “Wild American Shrimp Initiative”)
- Women’s Rights got trampled by an amendment that allows hospitals and insurers to refuse to cover or provide abortions, or to offer information on abortion even in the case of rape or incest. The amendment allows doctors to deny a woman the right to choose, and it went through without discussion or debate.
- Clean water spending took a $242 million cut yet an expansion on the Upper Mississippi River received $1.7 billion. Drilling in the protected Yukon Wildlife and Refuge in Alaska received authorized but an amendment eliminating subsidies for timber corporations didn't make it.
- A bipartisan proposal (passed two consecutive years) to restrict the War president’s plan to privatize thousands of government jobs was dropped. The Whipsaw president’s plan prevents government workers from submitting the most competitive bids and exempts private contractors from having to outline projected savings.
- Shrimp are not the only wild animals more deserving of those dollars than education: Missouri got $50,000 to control wild hogs, New York $199,000 to control geese, North Dakota $335,000 to shoo blackbirds off sunflowers, and Alaska $150,000 to keep the moose out of the Anchorage botanical garden.
The good news is that Congress denied funding for the Weary War President’s project to develop new nuclear weapons designed to target rogue states or terrorists who are developing weapons of mass destruction and the 30 million dollars requested to shorten the lead-time needed to resume nuclear weapons testing in Nevada.
I’m sure it would be in our best interest to find the entire document on the Internet and read it. Not that there is much we can do about it, but at least so we might know what to expect.
Sandy Knauer, author of six published novels, bringing politics and social issues to fiction, and heart to political and social issues.
Best regards,
Leland