Senator No
Via No Silence Here:
If I understand all this correctly, a senator (apparently Ted Stevens) can stop legislation all by his own self by placing a mysterious voodoo known as a secret hold on said piece of legislation.
I’m not up to date on all the hooey that governs senate rules but here’s an idea: Get off our collective butts and elect one Libertarian senator to the senate. Have him place secret holds on all legislation. We’ll call him Mr. No. He’ll put holds on everything. Stop passing stupid laws. Stop growing the government at a rate that is faster than the economy. Stop the growth of the bureaucracy.
A big yes to Senator No. Legislation runs through Congress like diarhhea through a sick dog.
Even better: a fixed limit on the length (total number of characters) of the text representing the complete body of federal legislation. Find out what we have now, reduce it 5% annually for a decade or two. Can’t decide what to drop? Most recent. Want some new laws? Fine, you have to get rid of some old ones.
Throw in automatic sunset after four years on every law passed with less than unanimous approval of both houses, and we’re talking government as if freedom mattered.
A boy can dream.
Posted on August 31st, 2006 by pwyll
Filed under: General
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I just finished watching a CNN segment on the secret hold matter. They fell over themselves giving credit to bloggers who doggedly kept this story alive.
And it was Senator “Wildman” Ted Steven (R-Alaska) who used this anachronistic “courtesy” exended other senators and blew the lid off it.
Secrets holds are now dead meat because they have become political dynamite. No senator would now dare to place a secret hold on a bill.
At least not any time soon.