Going back on his initial commitment to become a Senator on February 11th, Scott Brown has now insisted that he be seated in the Senate immediately, essentially to prevent a vote on Obama’s nominee for NLRB chair, Craig Becker.
Becker is a very distinguished labor lawyer who has received support from among others, Chicago law professor Richard Epstein (hardly the thin end of the Marxist wedge). So of course the Republicans wanted to filibuster him. But the Democratic leadership was gong to bring him up for a vote this week in order to get him through before Brown was seated. So of course Brown wants to be seated now.
And Harry Reid has caved completely, insisting that his hands are tied in the matter.
Again — does anyone think that if the shoe was on the other foot, and George W. Bush had a nominee he wanted to get through, that Mitch McConnell wouldn’t find some way to get him through?
Does anyone doubt that if the shoe was on the other foot, and the Republicans needed to find some way to stop certification, then they would find it? Oh yes — they already did that with Al Franken, pursuing a frivolous lawsuit for six months and blocking Democratic initiatives in the meantime.
As one livid labor leader put it:
I love how we cave to the Republicans and won’t seat our Senator, [Al] Franken. Then we reverse cave and seat their senator. I mean forget the analogy of one is playing checkers and the other playing chess. It’s like one is playing chess while the other is sitting there picking their nose
And no — this isn’t just about Reid and the Senate. Becker is Obama’s nominee. Where is the President? Why won’t he fight for his people?
Now, there is no Democratic majority on the NLRB — a crucially important federal regulatory board of strong concern to organized labor. And Obama is just twiddling his thumbs. Why should loyal Democrats bust their tails to support this guy?
If I didn’t know better, I would assume that the White House wants a Republican Congressional takeover in November.
We’ve finally found something the WH wants that it’s going to get!
Whatever happened to acting appointments?
“Does anyone doubt that if the shoe was on the other foot, and the Republicans needed to find some way to stop certification, then they would find it?”
I guess we know which is the stupid party and which isn’t? Eh?
)
If I didn’t know better, I would assume that the White House wants a Republican Congressional takeover in November.
Tom Tomorrow has an explanation:
http://www.salon.com/ent/comics/this_modern_world/2010/02/01/this_modern_world/index.html
Of course, the situations are not comparable, in that Franken LOST on election night, and only finally prevailed after a series of recounts. While Brown WON on election night, and his opponent conceded.
So there actually was a reason for not immediately seating Franken: He wasn’t immediately the winner.
I have to say this has raised my opinion of Reid; Refusing to seat an elected office holder in a timely manner, for absolutely no reason except that you don’t like his party, is a remarkably poisonous thing to do in a democracy. While Franken wasn’t seated as soon as he should have been, the Republicans at least had a legal leg to stand on, the election was still contested. There’s no basis AT ALL for refusing to seat Brown.
Gah, Brett, Franekn WON on election night. Because that’s the day folks voted, you know.
The count wasn’t certified until months later . . . which is why they didn’t seat him until then.
It’s not some Schrodinger’s Election, where it sits in some super-position of win / loss until we open the box.
The Senate seats them when the paperwork gets in there, certified.
Yes, retroactively, after the recounts were complete, we could say that Franken won the election election night. If you were making the case for seating Coleman immediately, and then replacing with Franken after the recounts were done, that would be relevant.
The point remains: There was some legal basis for arguing about who’d been elected in Franken’s case. None exists in Brown’s case. Kudos to Reid for not pretending otherwise.