by Matthew Hay Brown
Call Sen. Arlen Specter a puppet, and you’re going to hear about it.
The Pennsylvania Republican took to the Senate floor today to charge Majority Leader Harry Reid with violating Senate rules on decorum Tuesday during debate over the Alternative Minimum Tax.
Reid, frustrated by his inability to overcome Republican opposition to a Democratic plan to address the AMT, complained that “President Bush is the man that’s pulling the strings on the 49 puppets he has here.”
According to Specter, those comments violate the Standing Rules of the Senate – specifically, Rule XIX, which states that “No Senator in debate shall, directly or indirectly, by any form of words impute to another Senator or to other Senators any conduct or motive unworthy or unbecoming a Senator.”
“It is my view that being called a puppet is in direct violation of that rule,” Specter said. “I don’t think there’s much doubt about it. That is a term of derision. That is a term of ridicule.”
The back and forth illustrates the tension now growing on Capitol Hill, where lawmakers who were hoping to leave Washington well in advance of Christmas remained deadlocked on the AMT, Iraq war funding and appropriations.
The appropriations bills still outstanding could be rolled into a single omnibus bill, or Congress could keep funding government with another continuing resolution. The Pentagon says it has enough money to keep the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan going until March.
But the AMT will ensnare some 25 million taxpayers next April if Congress doesn’t act. And the Internal Revenue Service has warned that failure to address it now could delay the processing of tax returns, and the mailing of refund checks.
Both sides want to fix the AMT, which was never intended for the middle class families who now fall within its limits. But congressional Democrats want to replace the lost revenue with tax increases in other areas, while President Bush and his Republican allies in the Senate oppose any tax increase.
Specter says the inability of the sides to come to an agreement doesn’t make GOP senators puppets. He listed issues on which they have defied the White House: embryonic stem cell research, the Water Resources Development Act, the State Children’s Health Insurance Program and the Labor, Health and Human Services and Education spending bill.
“When the majority leader makes a proposal and asks for Republican assistance, many of us have been willing to listen to what he has to say,” Specter said. “But he doesn’t improve his case when he starts calling us puppets.
“I really wonder if he’s up to the job.”
Specter said his staff had advised Reid’s staff that he would be raising the issue on the Senate floor, and he awaited a response from Reid. The majority leader, who was not in the chamber as Specter spoke, did not return to comment.
Specter’s complaint didn’t stop Sen. Byron Dorgan from referring to the same Republicans who are blocking Democratic legislation as “human brake pads.”
(AP Photo/Dennis Cook)
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Comments
Since I am not a senator, I'll say this about Sen. Reid. You are a crook. You are a criminal based on your illegal land deals the lobbying your sons do. You are a traitor based on your comments about our military and your insistence that we have lost the war.
You are a sad sack of garbage, Sen. Reid, that disgraces the halls of the Senate.
(Just a little payback for all the hate and nonsense the Loons wrote about the late Henry Hyde.)
Posted by: John D | December 5, 2007 4:24 PM
Of course, when Jean Schmidt called Senator Murtha a coward, THAT was ok by Specter and all the republicrites.
Oh yes, juanniee d, ouch. ROTFLMAO!
Posted by: rncbs | December 5, 2007 5:23 PM
Wouldn't it be nice to see this much contempt from Republicans towards their own leader who ignored warnings before 9/11, started a war, and can't seem to ever tell the truth.
Posted by: Paul | December 5, 2007 5:29 PM
"OKAY TAKE IT BACK"
SENATOR SPECTOR HAS REALLY HELPED US BE STONEWALLED BY THIS ADMINISTRATION. IT WAS HIS INTERN WHO ALLOWED FOR SIGNING STATEMENTS AND THE APPOINTMENT OF REGENTS UNIVERSITY LAW SCHOOL GRADUATES. HE IS THE SENATOR WHO ALWAYS HAS A BACKDOOR PLAN TO LET THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION CONTINUE TO EAVESDROP WITHOUT A WARRANT.
SO IT'S ABOUT TIME, AND THE ARCHIVE DON'T LIE!
SO I UNDERSTAND, BUT IT WOULD ALSO BE OKAY TO TAKE IT BACK IN THE NAME OF STATEMENSHIP. OTHER THAN THAT. HE CALLED HIM AS HE SAW HIM. BECAUSE IT'S TRUE! MAYBE NOT PROFESSIONAL OR ETHICAL, BUT MORALLY SPEAKING. BOTTOM LINE TRUTH.
Posted by: Roger Morris | December 5, 2007 5:30 PM
What would we do without Harry Reid for comic relief? Who needs the Three Stooges when Reid plays the roles of all three?
Posted by: Cary Oka | December 5, 2007 6:04 PM
Since I am not a senator, I'll say this about Sen. Reid. You are a crook. You are a criminal based on your illegal land deals the lobbying your sons do. You are a traitor based on your comments about our military and your insistence that we have lost the war.
You are a sad sack of garbage, Sen. Reid, that disgraces the halls of the Senate.
Dito
Posted by: CJ | December 5, 2007 6:13 PM
What would we do without Harry Reid for comic relief? Who needs the Three Stooges when Reid plays the roles of all three?
_____________________________
Well we could always rely on bu$h playing Jerry Lewis in the nutty professor.
Posted by: rncbs | December 5, 2007 6:34 PM
Harry Ried is a Mormon.
For some reason, the media doesn't talk about that.
Posted by: JD | December 5, 2007 7:00 PM
The truth hurts.
Posted by: Rick/Sneads Ferry, NC | December 5, 2007 7:13 PM
Harry Ried is a Mormon.
For some reason, the media doesn't talk about that.
Posted by: JD | December 5, 2007 7:00 PM
So is Orin Hatch, why aren't they talking about that? Where's the outrage??
Posted by: Jones | December 5, 2007 8:33 PM
Since I am not a senator, I'll say this about Sen. Reid.
Posted by: John D | December 5, 2007 4:24 PM
Since I am not a senator, I'll say this about John D.
You're a dope.
Posted by: Gerry Reid | December 5, 2007 9:57 PM
A government watchdog group now says more than 10 million White House emails are missing. Citizens for the Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) described this massive hole in White House email records last April. At that time they thought the number was 5 million - Now they say it is more than 10 million emails. In one of the great understatements of this here Christmas season, the group says that this revised estimate - quote - highlights that this is a very serious and systematic problem at the White House - unquote. Both CREW and another private group called the National Security archive are suing the Bush administration to try to get information about all these missing emails. The White House email problems first came to light during special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald’s investigation into the leak of CIA officer Valerie Plame’s identity.
It’s worth noting what a critical time period these missing emails represent. Why it’s from March of 2003 to October 2005. That would include the start of the Iraq War right up through the aftermath of Katrina. As the director of one of these groups put it: It doesn’t get more historically valuable than that. Given the way the White House handled both the war and Katrina, it’s also quite convenient that suddenly this mountain of stuff is missing. By the way it’s against the law that these emails be destroyed or lost. They are supposed to be saved. The Presidential Records Act of 1978 mandates White House communications be preserved. Another law broken — Another example of nobody doing a damn thing about it.
Posted by: rncbs | December 6, 2007 12:05 AM
What is this, an elementary school playground? Getting up in your shorts for being called a "puppet"? Oh, please Mr. Spector, get over yourself. You guys ALL sling mud at each other all day long. Why not just build a giant mud pit in the Senate chamber and throw it at each other till you all start laughing hysterically (like we do here at the Swamp). Then maybe you guys can get some work done.
Posted by: DD | December 6, 2007 4:36 AM
The right keeps up the defeatocrats, un-patriotic, dog poo name-calling......I'ld say puppet works for me.
Posted by: bill r. | December 6, 2007 7:33 AM
Arlen Specter has always been a force for backwardness.
"Puppet" is a pretty harmless epithet to call this political Neanderthal.
People who are too young won't know that it was Specter 44 years ago on the Warren Commission who came up with the ridiculous "magic bullet" theory to explain some facts that could not be explained in Kennedy's assassination.
Talk about desperate attempts to serve establishment interests, that one stands as the grandaddy of them all.
Posted by: John Chuckman, Toronto, Canada | December 6, 2007 8:31 AM
2nd generation puppets/ grandpuppets
Posted by: John A | December 6, 2007 8:45 AM
John D., agreed. I would only add that Reid is not just a sad sack of garbage, but a hypocritical one. If you look at his voting record, he is a staunch supporter of the Iraq War. If you listen to his (meaningless) rhetoric, you would think he was staunchly anti-war. His hypocrisy only gaurantees that no one likes him. The GOP hates him for his rhetoric, and will never forgive him for declaring defeat while we still have active troops on the ground. The loony far left hates him because he voted for the war, voted for continued funding at every juncture, and voted to confirm Petreaus, knowing full well of his "surge" plans. The people in the middle hate him simply because they can't stand a hypocrite.
Posted by: Herbie H. | December 6, 2007 10:39 AM
Boy have the parties reversed each other on this issue:
Republicans - Borrow more money to pay for changes to the AMT
Democrats - Pay for tax changes to the AMT
Who would have thought that the Democrats are more fiscally conservative than the Republicans.
Posted by: pd | December 6, 2007 12:10 PM
The wing nuts stupid President gets caught lying again so they attack a fine Senator.
The few remaining idiots that still support this treasonous administration should move to Russia,you are a disgrace to the real America!!!
Posted by: Raving Loon | December 6, 2007 12:16 PM
It is noted that posts are screened for relevance, obscenity... "and over the top personal attacks" yet John D is allowed to enter a post that calls another human being " a sad sack of garabage," " a traitor." Are there different standards applied to those posters who denigrate Democratic or liberal individuals? Or is it anything goes?
Posted by: George of Palos | December 6, 2007 2:12 PM
George of Palos, stifle yourself. Me calling someone a traitor or a sad sack of garbage is extremely mild compared to some of the names and other idiocies coming from your friends on the Left.
Also, Georgie, you should note my comment in the parantheses. Very key. The Trib Swampers eventually pulled them, but the comments from your buds on the Left to Henry Hyde were some of the most vile and disgusting words ever written and printed (and the fact that they were eventually pulled -- and were talking dozens here -- should give you some indication of just how bad they were). So, in other words, get a clue.
Posted by: John D | December 6, 2007 4:28 PM
pd raises a great point. I registered as a Republican 20 years ago when the party stood for fiscal responsibility, states’ rights and small government. Now the party is run by the religious right (so much for states’ rights) and any group that has enough money to buy preferential tax treatment.
It is now the Democrats championing fiscal responsibility by asking investment bankers to pay the same income tax rates as everyone else in order to reallocate the burden of the AMT. In blocking it, my fellow Republicans shamelessly label this fair reallocation a “tax increase”. It is, as I said, a reallocation, and one that is absolutely necessary because every revenue forecast that was used to justify the Bush tax cuts in the first place (and still used today to show how they will increase revenues) was based on AMT-derived funds. By closing a loophole on a privileged few, the Democrats are now trying to offset the loss of the very revenue that Bush and congressional Republicans used to justify the tax cuts while they initiated huge spending increases.
My Republican friends should stop feeding us revenue projections based on taxes they know will never be collected and which they refuse to replace with fair ones. Just as importantly, they should stop their reckless spending—all done with the knowledge that a “tax and spend” Democratic will someday need to raise taxes to pay for it.
Anymore, if you want to support the ideals that I believed in when I became a Republican, you must vote for a Democrat. How things have changed.
Posted by: SAN | December 6, 2007 6:35 PM
Harry Reid is an evil evil man. He says he's a Democrat but his views & voting record are right in line with a Republican. Now he is hand picking & funding who should run for Congress in Nevada. He needs more puppets & his son baby Reid is going to local unions & begging for them to support his puppet. When will we get fed up with the crypt keeper's hold on Nevada?
Posted by: annie | April 1, 2008 11:40 AM