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One of the complaints of the voters in the last election was that Washington operates behind closed doors. There has been a lot a legislation passed by Congress in recent years that was not easily understood by the American people or that the American people were not given a chance to voice their opinion on. As Nancy Pelosi famously stated about the healthcare bill, “We have to pass the bill so you can find out what’s in it.” I wonder if even Congress had any idea what they were voting on.
Now we are faced with the same sort of situation with the super committee. Yesterday’s Washington Examiner posted an editorial suggesting that the negotiations be made public and the final product could be amended in the House and Senate rather than just voted on. Obviously these conditions are not in accordance with the original agreement, which I believe was the result of a lack of courage on the part of Congress. The editorial points out that Speaker of the House Boehner agreed to the secrecy despite having promised “the days of quickly ramming massive bills through Congress — such as the ‘stimulus’ that didn’t work and the job-killing national energy tax — are over. Under the new rules, the House will post all bills online at least three calendar days before a vote, giving lawmakers, the public and the media a chance to read each proposal and understand its impact.”
The editorial concludes:
As the Sunlight Foundation said in a recent memo on the issue, “it doesn’t have to be this way. Super Committee members still have the opportunity to redeem some measure of integrity by letting the public in on their legislation by posting their final recommendations online 72 hours before their vote. There is even a bill — the Deficit Committee Transparency Act (HR 2860) — that would require that. But, as of yet, members of Congress have shown little appetite for mandating Super Committee transparency.”
There is always the temptation to appoint a select group of “experts,” give them extraordinary powers, and shield them from public pressure in the hope they will objectively produce a reasonable solution to a vexing problem. That temptation should always be resisted, particularly in a democratic republic. There is still time for Congress to do the right thing on the supercommittee’s transparency.
I am not sure that the super committee will actually produce a bill. Generally speaking, the members of the committee are not acting independently–they are under the control of their respective political parties. It is Washington–politics is king–party politics is more important than the well being of America. There is also the issue of the philosophical divide between the two parties–the Democrats believe that the deficit is the result of taxes that are too low and the Republicans believe that the deficit is the result of spending that is too high. Until that issue is resolved, we will have gridlock.
