As reported in last Sunday's Philadelphia Inquirer, here is how Philadelphia-area members of Congress were recorded on major roll-call votes last week.(I SERIOUSLY hope to be through dealing with all of the nonsense that has held me back and no doubt caused my "hit" count to plummet by early next week - I guess I should consider myself lucky that something like this had not happened up to now; I may decide to tell you, dear reader, the whole sordid story one day.)
And now, without futher ado, let's find out what Joe Pitts voted "No" to last week.
HouseBrady and Fattah were, of course, busy running for mayor before they lost to Michael Nutter (congrats, by the way – may not be “business as usual” anymore).
War funding. The House passed, 302-120, a bill to release $96 billion in Iraq and Afghanistan war funding in two steps. About $43 billion would be provided immediately and $53 billion in July if President Bush certifies Iraq has met certain benchmarks.
A yes vote was to pass the bill (HR 2207).
Voting yes: Robert E. Andrews (D., N.J.), Jim Gerlach (R., Pa.), Tim Holden (D., Pa.), Frank A. LoBiondo (R., N.J.), H. James Saxton (R., N.J.), Allyson Y. Schwartz (D., Pa.) and Joe Sestak (D., Pa.).
Voting no: Michael N. Castle (R., Del.), Charles W. Dent (R., Pa.), Patrick Murphy (D., Pa.), Joseph R. Pitts (R., Pa.) and Christopher H. Smith (R., N.J.).
Not voting: Robert A. Brady (D., Pa.) and Chaka Fattah (D., Pa.).
I hate to say this, though (speaking of business as usual), but I think all of this is a fruitless exercise (as noted here). President Nutball wants His Glorious At First But Now Sadly Totally Fracked Up Iraq MisadventureTM to go on and on and on and on…
And by the way, Smerky (speaking of Iraq), it looks like the war “came home again” (related to this – my condolences to Sgt. Dunckley’s family and friends)…
Iraq withdrawal. The House rejected, 255-171, a bill that would have required President Bush to start withdrawing U.S. troops and contractors from Iraq within 90 days of enactment and complete the pullout of all but a residual force within the following 180 days.The fact that Allyson Schwartz voted “no” is shocking to me, further proof to me that too many Jews in this country want this war to go on as long as Dubya wants it to also.
A yes vote was to pass the bill (HR 2237).
Voting yes: Andrews, Murphy and Sestak.
Voting no: Castle, Dent, Gerlach, Holden, LoBiondo, Pitts, Saxton, Schwartz and Smith.
Not voting: Brady and Fattah.
Now, before you decide to “flame” me for just saying that, please allow me to point out here and now that I know there are men and women of conscience of all kinds of faiths, ethnicities, and sexual preferences who want this tragic misery to end, and the roaring silence from the hierarchy of the Catholic Church on this is quite depressing as well. But to deny all of this is criminal in itself at this point.
And by the way, Tim Holden needs to take a long, hard look in the mirror also.
Student loans. The House passed, 414-3, and sent to the Senate a bill to remedy illegal or unethical practices in the federal student loan program. The bill (HR 890) would bars lenders' gifts to college and university loan officials and better protect the privacy of students' personal data.Oh mah gawd – Joe Pitts actually did something good. Congratulations!
A yes vote was to pass the bill.
Voting yes: Andrews, Castle, Dent, Gerlach, Holden, LoBiondo, Murphy, Pitts, Saxton, Schwartz, Sestak and Smith.
Not voting: Brady and Fattah.
And with all due respect to Casey Lee Cobb, I should point out that Ron Paul was one of the three “No” votes here (the other two were fellow Repugs Jeff Flake and Lynn Westmorland - Update: As Prof. Marcus and others have noted, though, Paul was "spot-on" here).
Homeland security. The House passed, 296-126, and sent to the Senate a $39.8 billion budget for the Department of Homeland Security in fiscal 2008, up $6 billion over 2007. The bill also grants civil-service job safeguards to the 170,000 DHS employees.Comforting in a strange way to see Pitts return to form here (we just can’t have those “big government” civil service protections for those trained to assist first responders in the event of a terrorist attack, can we now?).
A yes vote was to pass the bill (HR 1684).
Voting yes: Andrews, Castle, Dent, Gerlach, Holden, LoBiondo, Murphy, Saxton, Schwartz, Sestak and Smith.
Voting no: Pitts.
Not voting: Brady and Fattah.
Border-control system. Members approved, 264-160, an amendment to HR 1684 (above) permitting full use of the Automated Targeting System at border crossings. The ATS is a database of individuals' personal travel data for assessing whether travelers, including Americans, pose a terrorist threat.Not much to think about here as far as I’m concerned.
A yes vote backed the ATS.
Voting yes: Andrews, Castle, Dent, Gerlach, Holden, LoBiondo, Murphy, Pitts, Saxton, Schwartz, Sestak and Smith.
Not voting: Brady and Fattah.
SenateI noted this last week – the one “no” vote was Bernie Sanders of VT since the bill failed to legalize the importing of drugs from Canada and elsewhere.
Drug safety. The Senate passed, 93-1, and sent to the House a bill giving the Food and Drug Administration new authority to conduct long-term monitoring of drugs after they go on the market and to require prompt corrective action when harmful complications come to light.
All Philadelphia-area senators voted for the bill (S 1082).
Prescription-drug imports. Senators voted, 49-40, to negate a measure permitting individuals to import federally approved prescription drugs from countries such as Canada. The vote, during debate on S 1082 (above), set unattainable certification standards for buying lower-cost pharmaceuticals from abroad.I guess this was part of the price for passing S 1082 – yes, it stinks, but it was the only way to get a veto-proof majority. Casey did the right thing last week; it’s a shame he didn’t carry it over to this week.
A yes vote was to negate a pending drug-import measure.
Voting yes: Carper, Lautenberg, Menendez and Specter.
Voting no: Casey.
Not voting: Biden.
Conflicts of interest. On a 47-47 tie vote, the Senate rejected a bid to reduce conflicts of interest on the Food and Drug Administration advisory panels that judge the safety of new drugs. The proposed amendment to S 1082 (above) would have limited participation by experts with financial ties to firms whose drugs are under review.If you want to read the gory details concerning this atrocity, click here.
A yes vote backed the amendment.
Voting yes: Biden, Carper, Casey, Lautenberg and Menendez.
Voting no: Specter.
Here are the Dems who helped sink this amendment:
Robert ByrdVioxx? Fosamax? Lipitor? Any of these names ringing a bell with you guys?
Chris Dodd
Ted Kennedy (God, was THIS part of the deal for 1082 also? What’s the damn point?!)
John Kerry
Ben Nelson
Jay Rockefeller
The next time someone files a class action lawsuit for a wrongful death due to medication rushed to market from an FDA advisory panel, I’ll think of you guys and shake my head in disgust.
This week, the House debated the fiscal 2008 defense budget, while the Senate took up a bill to curb illegal immigration (sounds like it passed, but now goes to the Senate).
(By the way, on a wholly unrelated note, I see that Blogger's commenting feature is acting up - it looks like this post and the one with last night's videos do not permit comments, which is truly odd since the others do. I'll check on this some more - I assure you I didn't change any settings.)
