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START treaty must be ratified in lame duck session (Secretary of State Hillary Clinton)
By Secretary of State Hillary Clinton - 09/30/10 03:22 PM ET
Thank you very much, Senator Kerry, and thank you for your strong leadership that produced the 14-4 vote in the
Senate Foreign Relations Committee. I’m very grateful that Chairman Kerry and Ranking Member Lugar were at the forefront of making the case why the treaty is so much in America’s
national security interests.
I also applaud the continuous resolution that included money that will be spent in order to modernize our nuclear facilities and begin the process of updating not only our technology, but training of personnel that are necessary in order to ensure that we are providing good stewardship of America’s nuclear programs.
This vote that was in the committee demonstrates unequivocally that national security is a bipartisan commitment. As we have seen with every arms control agreement, going back to the original START 1 treaty that was passed, ratified by the Senate 18 years ago tomorrow, this is an obligation and responsibility that senators addressed without regard for the day-to-day politics. In fact, that last treaty, as John will know by doing the arithmetic, occurred in another election year, but that does not in any way undermine the bipartisan acknowledgment of the importance of continuing this critical work.
We have had excellent conversations with senators on both sides of the aisle and we will continue to answer questions and work with the Senate broadly beyond the committee in preparation for the vote that we are hoping will occur in the lame duck session, because we ran out of time here during the Senate before it went out prior to the election.
But the support for new START by our entire military leadership, our intelligence community, six former
secretaries of state, five former
secretaries of defense, three former
national security advisors, and seven former commanders of U.S. Strategic Command is an extraordinary endorsement of why this treaty needs to be passed, and passed in the lame duck session.
So again, I thank the chairman for his leadership, for the great vote that we got from the committee, and I look forward to the vote in the lame duck session that will once again demonstrate the Senate joining all of its predecessors in years past to continue to support arms control treaty.
http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/foreign-policy/121943-start-treaty-must-be-ratified-in-lame-duck-session-secretary-of-state-hillary-clinton
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Article of Interest: The Obama-Pelosi Lame Duck Strategy
Union 'card-check,' cap and trade, and so much more.
Washington, Jul 9 -
By JOHN FUND
Democratic House members are so worried about the fall elections they're leaving Washington on July 30, a full week earlier than normal—and they won't return until mid-September. Members gulped when National Journal's Charlie Cook, the Beltway's leading political handicapper, predicted last month "the House is gone," meaning a GOP takeover. He thinks Democrats will hold the Senate, but with a significantly reduced majority.
The rush to recess gives Democrats little time to pass any major laws. That's why there have been signs in recent weeks that party leaders are planning an ambitious, lame-duck session to muscle through bills in December they don't want to defend before November. Retiring or defeated members of Congress would then be able to vote for sweeping legislation without any fear of voter retaliation.
"I've got lots of things I want to do" in a lame duck, Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D., W. Va.) told reporters in mid June. North Dakota's Kent Conrad, chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, wants a lame-duck session to act on the recommendations of President Obama's deficit commission, which is due to report on Dec. 1. "It could be a huge deal," he told Roll Call last month. "We could get the country on a sound long-term fiscal path." By which he undoubtedly means new taxes in exchange for extending some, but not all, of the Bush-era tax reductions that will expire at the end of the year.
In the House, Arizona Rep. Raul Grijalva, co-chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, told reporters last month that for bills like "card check"—the measure to curb secret-ballot union elections—"the lame duck would be the last chance, quite honestly, for the foreseeable future."
Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin, chair of the Senate committee overseeing labor issues, told the Bill Press radio show in June that "to those who think [card check] is dead, I say think again." He told Mr. Press "we're still trying to maneuver" a way to pass some parts of the bill before the next Congress is sworn in. Other lame-duck possibilities? Senate ratification of the New Start nuclear treaty, a federally mandated universal voter registration system to override state laws, and a budget resolution to lock in increased agency spending.
Then there is pork. A Senate aide told me that "some of the biggest porkers on both sides of the aisle are leaving office this year, and a lame-duck session would be their last hurrah for spending." Likely suspects include key members of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Congress's "favor factory," such as Pennsylvania Democrat Arlen Specter and Utah Republican Bob Bennett.
Conservative groups such as FreedomWorks are alarmed at the potential damage, and they are demanding that everyone in Congress pledge not to take up substantive legislation in a post-election session. "Members of Congress are supposed to represent their constituents, not override them like sore losers in a lame-duck session," Rep. Tom Price, head of the Republican Study Committee, told me.
It's been almost 30 years since anything remotely contentious was handled in a lame-duck session, but that doesn't faze Democrats who have jammed through ObamaCare and are determined to bring the financial system under greater federal control.
Mike Allen of Politico.com reports one reason President Obama failed to mention climate change legislation during his recent, Oval Office speech on the Gulf oil spill was that he wants to pass a modest energy bill this summer, then add carbon taxes or regulations in a conference committee with the House, most likely during a lame-duck session. The result would be a climate bill vastly more ambitious, and costly for American consumers and taxpayers, than moderate "Blue Dogs" in the House would support on the campaign trail. "We have a lot of wiggle room in conference," a House Democratic aide told the trade publication Environment & Energy Daily last month.
Many Democrats insist there will be no dramatic lame-duck agenda. But a few months ago they also insisted the extraordinary maneuvers used to pass health care wouldn't be used. Desperate times may be seen as calling for desperate measures, and this November the election results may well make Democrats desperate http://hoekstra.house.gov/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=197320 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Liberals in Congress have a plan to raise your taxes after the elections this fall, something they must do to continue feeding the Obama Administration’s spending addiction. Watch for them to act after the midterm elections under the cover of the report from the bipartisan National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform. Obama was smart in the way he set up his commission. It reports to Congress
on December 1. Congressmen who were voted out of office in November for
excessive government spending will be allowed to stick it to the taxpayers one more time by voting for massive tax increases, and, since they’re already unemployed, they’ll face no electoral consequences.
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=38344
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Obama Energy Czar Carol Browner appeared on NBC’s "Meet the Press" Sunday with host David Gregory touting a lame duck session of Congress after the November elections as a means to pass elements of the unpopular Obama agenda.
The new Congress would not be sworn in until January.
Gregory asked Browner about the failure of Democrats to pass Obama’s cap and trade national energy tax.
ENERGY SECRETARY CAROL BROWNER: We're deeply disappointed that we were not able to get clean energy legislation. There's a tremendous opportunity for our country to lead the global clean energy revolution. But that requires us to put in place the, the right laws, the right signals so that we build the wind turbines here, we build the solar panels, then we can ship them to China. We're in danger of losing out.
GREGORY: I understand the arguments. The president drew a line in the sand there. Is he conceding defeat on this?
BROWNER: Not yet. The Congress is coming back. We will continue to see if we can get legislation. We passed it in the House. We'll continue to work in the Senate.
GREGORY: Lame duck session, they could do it potentially there.
BROWNER: Potentially.
House Republican Conference Chairman Mike Pence (R-Ind.) appeared on the same program and said Democrats from “the
White House to Capitol Hill” just don’t get it.
“You just heard
Carol Browner here on the show say that they're intending, I think she said, possibly to use the lame duck session to pass a
national energy tax,” Pence said. “That is outrageous. What the American people know is necessary to get this economy moving again is to get federal spending under control, and preserve and promote the kind of policies and tax cuts that will create jobs.”
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=38467
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Pelosi, like Brown, has argued that any such fee must be imposed on transactions around the globe in order to protect the competitiveness of major exchanges such as those in New York and London.
The speaker's insistence on a global approach has frustrated some in her caucus and contributed to some misreporting of her stance. As if wanting to set the record straight, Thursday's comments were much more declarative and forceful in support of action than any in the past.
“I believe the transaction tax still has a great deal of merit,” Pelosi said, and if agreement can be reached among the G-20 nations, “It is really a source of revenue that has really minimal impact on the transaction but a tremendous impact on helping us meet our needs.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1209/30200.html
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