From the Washington Post:
After laying the groundwork for a decisive vote this week on the Senate’s health-care bill, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi suggested Monday that she might attempt to pass the measure without having members vote on it.Instead, Pelosi (D-Calif.) would rely on a procedural sleight of hand: The House would vote on a more popular package of fixes to the Senate bill; under the House rule for that vote, passage would signify that lawmakers “deem” the health-care bill to be passed.
Read the rest: House may try to pass Senate health-care bill without voting on it.
In the Wall Street Journal former federal district judge Michael McConnell points out that this is not Constitutional. Investor’s Business Daily says the “self-executing rule” procedure has been used before on minor issues, and could be struck down by the Supreme Court.
Comments by Cato‘s Michael Cannon make us realize this should not surprise us:
Democrats have already hidden 60 percent of the cost of the Senate bill, effected an obscenely partisan change in Massachusetts law to keep the bill moving, pledged more than a billion taxpayer dollars to buy votes for the bill, and packed the bill with an unconstitutional individual mandate and provisions that violate the First Amendment. It’s almost as if, to paraphrase comedian Lewis Black, Democrats spent a whole year, umm, desecrating the Constitution and at the last minute went, “Oh! Missed a spot!”
