HR 554 – taking transparency and political responsibility to where they belong – to the people.
‘(1) It shall not be in order to consider a motion to dispose of a Senate amendment reported in disagreement by a conference committee until at least 72 hours (excluding Saturdays, Sundays and holidays except when the House is in session on such a day) after the report in disagreement and any accompanying statement have been available to Members, Delegates, the Resident Commissioner, and the general public pursuant to subparagraph (2).
In English:
H.Res.554 – Amending the Rules of the House of Representatives to require that legislation and conference reports be available on the Internet for 72 hours before consideration by the House, and for other purposes.
This should not be a partisan issue – it’s one of transparency and accountability – for both the citizens and those whom we have elected to serve. What are the honest, non-self-serving arguments against this bill? What could the politicians be trying to hide?
Benn Rosales
October 4, 2009 at 6:49 pm
I’m totally down with transparency from the Congress, and have always laughed at the notion that all bills should be read. I do however believe that the people who actually write in amendments should be held up to the light. I’m not sure how, but “I didn’t know that was in there” doesn’t seem to be a good thing to say when it costs $nine trillion bucks.
Jim Duncan
October 5, 2009 at 12:02 pm
Benn –
I absolutely agree. And you have senators publicly acknowledging that they have not nor can not read the initial bills, how can they justifiably propose amendments.
Missy Caulk
October 5, 2009 at 7:24 pm
Wasn’t this talked about in the campaign.
What happened?
Lately it has been just to cram it down everyones throats, without reading it.
If it is good and there is nothing to hide why not make it public? If it wasn’t for the proliferation of blogs we would not know half of what is going on.