Only in the Congress could corruption be so overtly masqueraded as a parliamentary process. 

The Healthcare Bill has a major hurdle to cross.  The neutral Parliamentarian has ruled that Reconciliation can only take place after the Senate bill has been passed.  Then and only then is the Senate able to Reconcile the legislation to match what is required to pass the House.   But this is backwards.  Any thinking member of the House must know that the promise Pelosi and Reid are providing to fix the problems they have with the Senate Bill are not their promises to make.  They are not able to guarantee any vote in the Senate.  This would require the cooperation of 99 men and women that Harry Reid does not control.  First there are 41 seats occupied by Republicans and then there are numerous seats occupied by democrats that originally struck the language from their version of the Healthcare Bill that 10 or 12 Democrat members of the House insist upon for passage.  Who can guarantee the men and women of the Senate will not vote to strike that language again and leave themselves a bill to be signed by the President that suits them and not the 10 or 12 House Democrats who are Pro Life? 

The problem Pelosi has is that her gang does realize this and as such she must find a way to get past the hurdle of how to get 216 votes that are required to pass it when she probably now has only 206 or something close to that.  She can’t allow the bill to go to conference because it would then have to pass another cloture vote in the Senate and Scott Brown’s election has made it unlikely if not impossible for a successful cloture vote to take place. 

Word has it that the House Speaker has strategized a method for allowing the Senate bill to be passed not by a vote but by a change in the rules to simply ‘deem’ it to be passed by completing Reconciliation in the House.  And back up again, that Parliamentarian said the bill must actually first pass the House.  Might the Vice President overrule the Parliamentarian in this process the Democrats are trying to define?  The Constitution says both Houses may create their own rules but does it say anything about passing a bill by simply deeming it done or is there instead language that indicates a majority vote might be required?

Article I, Section 4 references “Each House shall keep a Journal of its Proceedings, and from time to time publish the same, excepting such Parts as may in their Judgment require Secrecy; and the Yeas and Nays of the Members of either House on any question shall, at the Desire of one fifth of those Present, be entered on the Journal.”  It doesn’t speak to anything the Speaker or the Majority Leader might deem.  How would deems be recorded in the Journal if one fifth of those present request a roll call?  Or will deems be considered “Secret?” 

Article I, Section 7 indicates that “Every Order, Resolution, or Vote, to which the Concurrence of the Senate and House of Representatives may be necessary (except on a question of Adjournment) shall be presented to the President…..”  It doesn’t speak to legislation that might be deemed but it does reference that concurrence must take place.  Can concurrence truly be deemed to have taken place without a vote? 

In my youth I recall the Soviet Politburo.  I recall its willingness to do whatever was required to achieve the desired results of the Communist Party.  But I don’t ever recall worrying in my country that my representative might be disenfranchised by a Speaker of the House who would allow the passage of a bill to simply be deemed passed rather that actually passed.  Further I don’t know how such matters as the inclusion of policy concerning Right to Life can be placed in the bill through a Reconciliation process.  I can imagine this within a “corrupt” system and like many, I have come to regard this Congress, this Speaker and this Majority Leader as both Corrupt and Hypocritical. 

http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=OWE1Zjk4MjlkNDAyOGI4ZGNmMzNiYzYyMzI5ZDc0YmQ=

Hypocrisy is nothing new in any Congress.  We all certainly were able to witness when Congresswoman Pelosi lambasted Speaker Hastert in 2006 for not immediately publicizing the advances made by Mark Foley to a Congressional page.  But we saw no similar concern from Nancy Pelosi when she became Speaker herself and then sat on the same charges against Eric Massa from October 2009 to March 2010.  We certainly were able to see Harry Reid stride to the microphone and tell the world that there was no room in America for the negative, defeatist attitude on display from the Republican side of the aisle.  Yet wasn’t this the same man who in 2008 strode to the microphone to tell the same world that the War in Iraq was lost?  We have all come to live with the hypocrisy of Pelosi and Reid.  We have come to expect a Congress that was even corrupt but we rationalized that the corruption was the act of men like Congressman Jenrette, Congressman Rostenkowski, Congressman Jefferson and others who acting alone accepted bribes or Congressman Rangel, Congressman Hayes, Congressman Cunningham who quietly accepted favors or failed to report income or pay taxes.  We have not yet come to live with a Congress that would overtly thwart the will of the American people by deeming passage of anything from a seat of arrogance and through sheer gall. 

This 111^th Congress is beyond contempt.  They rode to such a commanding victory in 2008 that their power has gone to their heads and they believe it is up to them now to command.  They demonstrate to all who are watching what our founders meant by a Tyranny of the Majority.  There are no real rules for these people.  There is only the semblance of a process to make things appear as though they are doing things properly while the Speaker and Majority Leader proceed to dismantle the very foundation of our government and erode the liberties that we hold dear.  These are dangerous and despicable people in our House and Senate.  They represent a cancer to our republic.  Jack Cafferty is right, Nancy Pelosi is a horrible woman and Harry Reid is no better.