Democrats Plan to Pass Energy Bill in Lame-Duck Session

Via Jay Cost who writes in a piece titled, "The Pulpit of a Bully," comes this startling bit of information uncovered in a report at Politico:

EXCLUSIVE: Phil Schiliro, the White House congressional liaison, has told the Senate to aim to take up an energy bill the week of July 12, after the July 4 break (and after the scheduled final passage of Wall Street reform). Kagan confirmation will follow, ahead of the summer break, scheduled to begin Aug. 9. The plan is to conference the new Senate bill with the already-passed House bill IN A LAME-DUCK SESSION AFTER THE ELECTION, so House members don’t have to take another tough vote ahead of midterms.

A White House aide has the official word: “President Obama reiterated his call for comprehensive energy and climate legislation to break our dependence on oil and fossil fuels. In the coming weeks he will be reaching out to Senators on both sides of the aisle to chart a path forward. A number of proposals have been put forward from Members on both sides of the aisle. We're open to good ideas from all sources, and will be working with Senators on a comprehensive proposal. The tragedy in the Gulf underscores the need to move quickly, and the President is committed to finding the votes for comprehensive energy legislation this year.”

FACTS OF LIFE: How many crises of historic proportions are going to require unprecedented government action? Stimulus, Wall Street, health care, troops, energy: These are all big issues, but at what point will people think the president is just trying to spook people into massive government action?

Cost notes the 51st Congress was known as the Billion Dollar Congress, after the Republican-run legislature "raided the Treasury in an effort to pay off all its supporters." Cost suggests the 111th deserves the moniker the Trillion Dollar Congress.  After passing an enormously unpopular health care bill despite the protestations of the American people, the Trillion Dollar Congress intends on pulling the same shenanigans by passing a huge energy package in the lame-duck session before the 112th Congress is convened . Wither the will of the people who would have rendered their verdict on this Congress during the November midterm elections.  We all know how they value the will of the American people.

President "Never Waste a Crisis" Obama set the stage for this in his widely panned speech from the Oval Office Tuesday night.  Though the speech is replete with references to the urgent need to transition from fossil fuel, this section seems excerpted from his many health care speeches with only the subject changed to energy:

Now, there are costs associated with this transition.  And some believe we can’t afford those costs right now.  I say we can’t afford not to change how we produce and use energy – because the long-term costs to our economy, our national security, and our environment are far greater.  

Read the rest if you have trouble remembering the formulaic speeches Obama used to set the stage before Congress pulled every single trick imaginable to pass the health care law.   All the pieces are in place just as they were for health care, a House-passed legislation that won't be deemed dead until a new Congress convenes in January 2011, a Congress led by the likes of Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi and a band of merry thieves in Congress intent on imposing a New World Order whether the American people like it or not.  Damn the law let the peasants shout Viva il Duce.

Doug Ross suggests we commit this bit of advice  from Jim Geraghty to memory:

Every Republican challenger ought to be demanding that their Democrat incumbent opponent pledge in writing that they will not pass an energy bill in a lame-duck session if they are defeated. 

Jay Cost warns such bullying will haunt Obama in the 2012 presidential election  That is all well and good, but heaven knows the extent of the damage he will have inflicted until he finally usurps Jimmy Carter's place in the annals of failed One-Term Presidents.

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