Comments on: Now that is a fillibuster

By: Jeff83

Jeff83 — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 00:40:28 +0000

“How many lines is our tax legislation? Or other significant laws?”

We just passed a 634 page taxation Act, which was just ammendments to international tax rules, and a few other issues. The main part of the act is in two volumes (the version I have in about 7 font is 1500 pages in the first volume and similar in the second volume including the schedules) then on top of that there is the Taxation Administration Act (811 pages) GST act etc etc.

So really as legislation effecting 300 million odd people, its size is to be expected. But this debate long ago left the key issue and went in fairy land, thanks in a large part to the news (cough) networks.

Personally dont care, not my mess, its the Americans, however I would sooner have Rupert Murdoch Shot than allow him to take over one of our main news networks.

By: Jeff83

Jeff83 — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 00:34:32 +0000

Whenever the Republicans get back in to power, I hope the democrats get the spine to do what the hypocritical Republican party does and is doing, and when they start to complain (as they did under Bush citing ‘standard practice) shove it back in their hypocritical faces.

Under Clinton the Republican party wasted most of the senates time trying to impeach Clinton for a fucking affair for crying out loud and they have not got any better.

If a party did the equivalent here they would be ‘gone by lunch time’ (couldn’t resist), but then again we don’t have that beauty which is Fox ‘invent the news and then report it as news’ “News” (cough).

By: Repton

Repton — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 21:42:36 +0000

How many lines is our tax legislation? Or other significant laws?

By: Repton

Repton — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 21:41:35 +0000

Hey, they’ve always got an alternative. Here’s an excerpt from Rolling Stone’s article on the 2006 US Congress:

For similarly petulant moves by a committee chair, one need look no further than the Ways and Means Committee, where Rep. Bill Thomas — a pugnacious Californian with an enviable ego who was caught having an affair with a pharmaceutical lobbyist — enjoys a reputation rivaling that of the rotund Sensenbrenner. The lowlight of his reign took place just before midnight on July 17th, 2003, when Thomas dumped a “substitute” pension bill on Democrats — one that they had never read — and informed them they would be voting on it the next morning. Infuriated, Democrats stalled by demanding that the bill be read out line by line while they recessed to a side room to confer. But Thomas wanted to move forward — so he called the Capitol police to evict the Democrats.

By: Murray

Murray — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:46:49 +0000

Good forbid they should have the slightest damn idea what it is they are debating or voting on.

By: bchapman

bchapman — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 07:13:35 +0000

Won’t be happening for the Health Care Bill though, the Senate has voted to move to debate 60-39.

By: V

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 02:38:59 +0000

This link sheds some light on how the bill becomes so long:
http://cafehayek.com/2009/11/disgusting.html

By: gazzmaniac

gazzmaniac — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 02:37:37 +0000

Not so sure about the presence or absence of a politician during the reading of a bill being a prerequisite for being able to vote on it. If a bill were 2000 pages long, (and I were an MP) I would almost certainly vote against it simply because of its length. You don’t have to be present in the house while it’s being read to make that decision. It’s also a real punishment for MPs to be forced to listen to a BS green party (for example) bill that they’re never going to vote for anyway.
I do think that if the sponsoring MP had to read the bill themselves on each reading, it would make sure that they were drafted to be to the point, and wouldn’t need to be seriously amended. It may even speed up the passage of law through parliament.

By: brucehoult

brucehoult — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 00:52:06 +0000

Absolutely, I can not see any need for passing a volume of new law that can not be literally read out in parliament, with any MP who wants to vote on it being present throughout.

How on earth are we supposed to follow the law if there is so much of it that we can not know what it is?

Even better: every law has to be passed again, from scratch, every five to ten years, or else it expires.

By: redqueen

redqueen — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 00:03:58 +0000

This seems like a really good idea. We should bring it back here. It would bring socialism to its knees. Someone like Sir Roger could propose an act saying, ‘We repeal…’ and then it would take ten minutes to get the law done. When a Government decided it wanted to pass twenty acts a year at 2,000 pages each, it simply would not have parliamentary time. This seems like a very honest way of capping the amount of time wasting through simple reality. Can we have a referendum on this?

By: gazzmaniac

gazzmaniac — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 23:24:08 +0000

backster – even if you don’t believe those stories (I don’t) if laws and regulations are simpler, more people can understand them and it is easier for people to comply. Not to mention that people don’t have to waste as much time and money on compliance and can get on and do what actually makes money.

By: Grant Michael McKenna

Grant Michael McKenna — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 23:11:27 +0000

Our parliamentary system still has a “First Reading”- back before printing was developed, all bills were read out so that MPs [or their clerks] could copy them. Nowdays it is just a notice that the bill has been printed and is available from the Clerk of the House- although every MP will already have a copy. IIRC, the ability to ask for the bill to be read in full lasted until the 1880s, when a lot of Parliamentary procedure was revised because of the obstructions caused by Irish Nationalists.

By: backster

backster — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 22:55:37 +0000

gazzmaniac……You are exactly right…There is no need for laws to be complex. The supreme lawmaker restricted his to ten simple ones and covered just about everything.

By: gazzmaniac

gazzmaniac — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 22:49:12 +0000

Oh yeah – maybe the politician who is sponsoring the bill should be the one to read it

By: gazzmaniac

gazzmaniac — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 22:43:38 +0000

I actually thought that each bill was read in parliament before debate – isn’t that where the term “first reading” etc came from?
Maybe forcing each politician to not only read, but be forced to listen to, each page of every bill before each debate and vote would make a pretty good incentive to draft good, simple law to start with. Maybe then we wouldn’t get the crap legislation we keep getting now. All for a change to that!

By: Andrew W

Andrew W — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 21:46:47 +0000

With every page initialed by each politician!

By: Graeme Edgeler

Graeme Edgeler — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 21:45:42 +0000

s.russell – the requirement to have the bill read aloud does not arise from the US Constitution.

By: Viking2

Viking2 — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 21:44:30 +0000

PaulL; and to sign to say they have read every page and understood all the ramifications.

By: PaulL

PaulL — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 21:38:53 +0000

s.russell – my problem is that any law is 2074 pages long. Do these guys get paid by the page or something?

For a bill to be that long it either has an enormous amount of waffle in it, an enormous amount of pork that has nothing to do with the bill, or so many exceptions and carve outs that the bill is meaningless.

Shorter laws are usually better laws. Reading every one would sure as hell make them shorter. It should be mandatory to read every bill before passing it.

By: Andrew W

Andrew W — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 21:28:17 +0000

How the fuck does a bill get to be 2000 pages long?