The Senate just voted 91 to 3 to pass the Defense Appropriations bill. It's almost exactly the same as the bill president Obama vetoed about a month ago. Since then, however, agreement was reached on there being an increase in domestic spending to levels above those set by the sequestration measure. Now Obama says he will sign the bill. Indeed, Obama is signing the bill even though it prohibits the transfer of any prisoners from Guantanamo to the USA. Supposedly, that provision (which has been in every such bill since 2010) was another reason why Obama had vetoed the earlier bill. This makes clear that Obama was just using the military and funding for our national defense as a bargaining chip to force higher domestic spending.
All this gives rise to an important question: is there any reason for Congress to now follow the budget that was part of the compromise a few weeks back? Why can't the Republican majorities pass spending measures that just don't spend all the money authorized in the budget? With the defense spending bill in place, the GOP could next pass some of the less controversial spending bills. For example, they could fund the Departments of Interior, Commerce and Treasury. Those bills could follow the compromise figures. When they got to departments where more spending is truly not needed, however, the majority could pass measures that funded only those programs that deserve it. Since these are spending bills, they can get through the senate using reconciliation; that means no Democrat filibusters. Once passed, the bills would go to Obama. If he wanted to veto them, the GOP could keep passing the bills and sending them to Obama. If one or two departments were to shut down, it would hardly be a government shut down. A united congress could force Obama to back down. (And with all the other departments funded we would not have to see that video of the national parks closed or the soldiers not getting paid.)
It is certainly worth thinking about.
By the way, were Obama and the Obamacrats to scream that the Republicans had gone back on the agreement, the GOP could point out that it just agreed on a budget, not on the actual appropriations. That would be true. They could also point to things like Obama telling the nation 25 times that he did not have the power to change the immigration law only to later claim the opposite and issue an order doing just that.
All this gives rise to an important question: is there any reason for Congress to now follow the budget that was part of the compromise a few weeks back? Why can't the Republican majorities pass spending measures that just don't spend all the money authorized in the budget? With the defense spending bill in place, the GOP could next pass some of the less controversial spending bills. For example, they could fund the Departments of Interior, Commerce and Treasury. Those bills could follow the compromise figures. When they got to departments where more spending is truly not needed, however, the majority could pass measures that funded only those programs that deserve it. Since these are spending bills, they can get through the senate using reconciliation; that means no Democrat filibusters. Once passed, the bills would go to Obama. If he wanted to veto them, the GOP could keep passing the bills and sending them to Obama. If one or two departments were to shut down, it would hardly be a government shut down. A united congress could force Obama to back down. (And with all the other departments funded we would not have to see that video of the national parks closed or the soldiers not getting paid.)
It is certainly worth thinking about.
By the way, were Obama and the Obamacrats to scream that the Republicans had gone back on the agreement, the GOP could point out that it just agreed on a budget, not on the actual appropriations. That would be true. They could also point to things like Obama telling the nation 25 times that he did not have the power to change the immigration law only to later claim the opposite and issue an order doing just that.
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