Posted on 07/23/2008 3:23:39 PM PDT by jazusamo
Senate Republicans have threatened to block nearly all other bills pending before the August recess if Democrats refuse to vote with them on expanding offshore drilling.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said bills that do not pertain to energy can wait until after the August recess, with gas prices now surpassing $4 per gallon.
McConnell and top Republicans indicated Wednesday they would oppose any procedural votes to take up other legislation, which require 60 votes to succeed.
"We think there is nothing more important that we can do right now than to deal with the Number One issue of the country," McConnell said. "This is the biggest issue since terrorism right after 9/11. People are pounding on their desks, saying, 'Why don't these people get together and do something about this problem'?"
The hardball tactics reflect Republican confidence that they can pull off a major election-year victory with gas prices at record highs, after they have been battered at the polls and have lost on several recent high-profile legislative battles.
Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) planned for the Senate this week to pass a bill targeting market speculation on oil futures, which both sides blame for playing a role in driving up gasoline prices.
Following swift Senate action on the narrow energy bill, Reid wanted the Senate to approve a massive defense authorization bill, an overhaul of the Consumer Product Safety Commission, legislation to protect reporters' sources, an extension of expiring energy tax incentives, and a major package of 33 bills held up by Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.).
But Republicans are planning to keep the Senate on the energy issue until their demands are resolved. The massive housing-rescue package might be the only other measure that gets valuable floor time before the August recess.
Democrats say the GOP is intentionally prolonging the debate in order to score political points by insisting on more than two dozen amendments to the oil-speculation bill. Democrats, who say opening up new lands won't affect prices for a decade and are concerned about its environmental impacts, have offered the GOP one amendment to the oil-speculation bill.
But the GOP is positioning itself as the party willing to do whatever it takes to lower gas prices. The Republicans say Democrats are scared to cast votes on new drilling in the face of voter anger over high gasoline prices, and they point to the majority's decision to scrap appropriations bills to avoid a debate over lifting the congressional ban on drilling along the Outer Continental Shelf.
McConnell said the Senate will be in session in September and will have time then to finish outstanding issues.
"Our goal is to stay on the subject that the American people are demanding that we do something about and finish the job," McConnell said.
His deputy, Minority Whip Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) said the GOP would object to any motions to proceed to other measures in order "to keep the energy bill on the floor to pass a good energy bill."
Rodell Mollineau, a Reid spokesman, shot back at the Republican threat.
"Why would Sen. McConnell's statement be any different than his posture on most every other bill to come through the Senate?" Mollineau said. "Bush-McCain Republicans have conducted 83 filibusters so far this year and have blocked six attempts this summer to address the energy crisis. Their feigned outrage would be laughable if it wasn't at the expense of millions of Americans suffering at the pump."
KEEP UP THE PRESSURE
KEEP UP THE PRESSURE
KEEP UP THE PRESSURE
Yeeehah!
If the GOP were smart, they would be getting ads on TV, radio and online, linking the high gas prices to the Democrats. Make it like a “Thank the Democrats” kind of ads. “Like the high gas prices? Thank the Democrats!” Show how beholdened to the enviro-kooks they are and show how because of the price of oil, the price of others things have gone up. Time to stop being nice and call these socialists out for who they are!
YES!
Kudos to McConnell and other GOP who have the stones to force this issue to a head.
Amazing how well they can play hardball when they are the minority party, and how fast they bend over looking for the lubricant to take it up the kazoo when they have a majority.
As long as the GOP holds tight they have the winning issue and all polls show it.
The Repubs have a winner in this if they'll just keep pressing.
bump
Off topic somewhat, but I couldn't pass this one up.
I hope those who presently intend to sit out the election realize that protection for taxpayer employed traitors will pass with little comment during the first 100 days of an Obamanation.
Sucks doesn't Harry when in order to keep you majority the "conservative" Dems have to vote with Republicans or get voted out.
99.9% of all the GOP’s problems could be solved with backbone. 99.9%
This is a start.
start some re-call elections,,hit em where it hurts.
If they walk the talk, I’ll send them some money.
I wonder what the Democrat excuse is for being against drilling of oil to bring down the price of gas? Is it because then they won’t be able to destroy the American way of life as fast? They have no good excuse that they can verbalize. But it’s obvious what their agenda is. The rats!!!
How many times did a Democrat senator hold up legislation on their own with a filibuster threat? What goes around comes around.
The republicans are being too smart by half.
They favor drilling...great. However, threatening to hold up a defense spending bill while getting ready to pass something as gutless, idiotic, and blatently acquiescent as the mortgage bailout is absurd.
So if it doesn't affect prices for a decade who cares....so drill anyway.
Exactly...The RATS have selective amnesia when it comes to all their threats to filibuster.
Tag adjustment.....
RBOB gasoline 2.95 down 61 cents from the recent peak high. This will show up at the pump eventually, within a month probably.
Wow, can it be the GOP in WashDC has found some stones?
If Mitch and the boys can’t make hay with this oil drilling issue, they had all better resign and go back to grade school.
Republicans don’t even have to exaggerate campaign ads this election. Just reveal the no-drilling votes the Democrats have passed the past 15 years, and the Dem quotes can cook their own liberal goose.
Everybody freakin’ knows the wacky lib Democrats have been preventing US energy companies from producing what we need. Whether or not they are honest with themselves is another matter.
This is all pointless, nothing but finger pointing and political posturing on both sides of the issue. If the Dems would actually have their heads removed from their collective a*ses and start using some common sense. Instead of trying to replace logic with a flawed naive ideology. And if the Repubs would actually fight and talk back the same way the dems do about the Repubs, we might actually get some where with some decent legislation.
I keep looking for the d*mn reset button for Capitol Hill. i haven’t been able to find it, anyone know where it is???
Everyone has known it for years and didn’t much care until now with us paying $4.00 plus for gas. It’s caught up to them at the worst possible time, for them.
OMG... Cajones sighted!
Does this bill have provision in it for ANWR? Or is it a separate issue? Seems to me, were I a democrat, and as keen on the environment as they say they are, ANWR would be the lesser of two evils for them.
I would think they’d opt to drill in the remote desolate ANWR area than the waters off of Florida, etc.
I love that! :)
I don’t know, this piece only mentions offshore drilling.
Why should they have to make a choice? Everyone in the driveby media keeps telling them this is a shoo-in year for the dems. Obama has a lock on the White House. Soon they’ll have ALL thier power back where they see it rightfully belongs. There’s no reason for them to go wobbly over a simple little thing like the demands of the vast majority of the American People, now is there? All those cars were polluting and harming Mother Gaia. Hell, $10 gas would be a blessing upon her, said the former elected then unselected President of the United States, Algore. /s
It's called the Second Amendment.
Contact your Congress critters to let them know that you are tired of high gas prices.
AMEN
AMEN
AMEN
Me too, I don’t have much but I sure would participate . Screw the dumbs. Amen
Thanks for your post and links, it’s a good reminder. I have contacted mine and will do so again.
That isn't true, and even if it was, a decade will get here eventually and if we haven't acted today, the problem will be even worse then. We know this is true because this is the same argument they used against drilling a DECADE ago.
You’re so right and no one can convince me that President Bush and the Repubs taking the stance they have recently hasn’t already helped in the lowering of the price of oil.
We the security situation in the ME, it is unwise to play this game in this manner. We are already 10 years too late in securing our energy future.
I am glad to see the republicans showing some balls, but this should have been a no brainer immediately following 9/11.
Bump to that!
That is it - there's the slogan!
As Jay Leno put it, the dems were "whining that drilling now would not produce oil for ten years.
Exactly what they said ten years ago!"
You hit ‘em right between their evil little ratty eyes.
But...there was a post I read that said something about mccain going to visit an offshore drilling rig. Then the poster theorized that the MSM would immediately be inundated with reports of a massive oil spill...timed perfectly for mccain’s visit to the drilling platform...a conspiracy theory if you will...that the democrats or someone with power would actually set up a spill to happen just for the purpose of making mccain look bad.
Well, guess what?
We just had a horrible oil spill in the mississippi river.
Things that make you go “hmmmm”.
They estimate about 10,000 barrels, Yikes. Haven’t heard anything about it on the news yet and it looks like it happened in the wee hours this morning.
“So if it doesn’t affect prices for a decade who cares....so drill anyway”
Yeah, and to think that these selfish uppity ones are on the tax dole, of course gas prices don’t concern them when they are way over-paid. How out of touch these losers and traitors are with real people. If gas prices are bad now, what do they think they will be like 10 years from now? What an idiot attitude.
A main point that the GOP needs to repeat over and over is the fact that the Dems argued the "no impact for a decade" charade a decade ago (and before that). Not to mention that expanded drilling itself affects the market price way before said drilling goes online.
Reid: Oil makes us sick.
They have clearly called for an oil embargo against the American people!
They have called us ‘addicts’ and they are content to watch us go through an unnecessary withdrawal. They see us, the American people, as nothing more than crack-cocaine users! They are trying to break the American people.
They are content to make us ‘hit rock bottom’ and leave us there to wallow in our sin. Once we are wallowing in our sin of oil then they will exact punishment upon the American people. We will pay (literally) to reconstruct the infrastructure in their image.
This is not a problem of economy according to them. This is a problem with America's morality. This is the result of the sin of prosperity against the world. Read their words closely this plays perfectly into their twisted fascist world. Oil/Gas is something to be weaned off of...for our own good, good of the planet, good of the world, good of the troops. That is the card that is being played against the GOP and against the American people.
As Jonah Goldberg demonstrates in his book, Liberal Fascism, they remove God and replace it with secular morality for the good of the nation. This means that they create secular sins. The big sin right now is oil. And the democrats can save us from our sin if they can break our oil addiction.
Oil is not an addiction...it runs the world economy. Shame on Bush for ever using those words in a State of the Union speech. He unwittingly opened that door and we all walked right through it. Our work is cut out for us if we wish to break this embargo.
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