6th
Congress after the mid-terms
Now that the dust has mostly settled from Tuesday’s mid-term elections, Congress is starting to roll up its sleeves and begin to deal with the myriad of issues that face the two-legged lame duck session of Congress. The Reid/Pelosi lead Congress has scheduled the first leg of the lame duck session to convene Nov. 15 and the second leg will convene Nov. 29. The lame duck session has so much legislation to consider, it’s hard to know where to begin.
It is important to discuss a few dates to watch in Congress. On the morning of Nov. 16 the Senate Democrats and Republicans will elect their leadership for the 112th Congress. No real changes are expected to occur. Senator Reid (D-NV) will retain his seat as the Senate Majority Leader and will lead the new Senate with 53 democratic members. Senator McConnell (R-KY) will retain his role as the Senate Minority Leader with 47 GOP members of the Senate. The week of Nov. 15 will also include orientation for the 13 +/- new United States Senators. The House Republicans will elect their leadership on Nov. 17 and the House Democrats will do the same on Nov. 18. This will allow us to know by week’s end who will be leading the Congress next year. Speaker Pelosi has announced she will seek the top post for the House Democrats again, only this time the top post will be the Minority Leader. She as a few announced opponents in Cong. Shuler (D-NC), Cong. Boren (D-OK), Cong. Larson (D-CN), Cong. Clyburn (D-SC) and Stony Hoyer (D-MD). In Speaker Pelosi’s letter announcing her intention to seek the top post, she touts the accomplishments of the Reid/Pelosi Congress. She lists Health care reform, Wall Street Reform and restoring fiscal discipline to Congress by making “Pay as you Go” rules the law of the land. However, what her letter neglects to mention is because the “pay go” rules allow for so many big ticket items to be excluded from the rule, the Reid/Pelosi Congress was able to rack up about $3 Trillion in deficit spending.
While the Leadership elections in both parties of the Senate and the House GOP will mostly be votes of acclamation, the Pelosi announcement might pose a serious divide within the Democratic Party. This divide could also spill over into the work that will need to be done during the lame duck session of Congress. The leadership elections will take place during the same week that negotiations on major tax provisions, unemployment benefits and funding the government must be solved. Also during the same day as the House democratic leadership elections, the President has called a White House meeting being dubbed the “slurpee summit.” This is a White House meeting calling for the top four leadership posts in the House and Senate to attend. The President has extended the invitation to Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), John Boehner (R-OH), Harry Reid (D-NV), Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Eric Cantor (R-VA), Jon Kyl (R-AZ), Steny Hoyer (D-MD) and Dick Durbin (D-IL). This meeting could be a bit uncomfortable; especially if the House Democratic leadership elections are as contentious has they look to be on paper.
Stay tuned for next week’s piece which will outline the laundry list of legislative items the Congress must tackle during the upcoming lame duck session. Also see how the House leadership elections are playing out and if they are effecting the behind the scenes negotiations as far as legislation that needs to be considered during the two-legged lame duck session.
(Source: gradegov.com)
